| Last modified: June 19, 2004 |
| MPEG Rights Expression Language |
Overview
This reference document pertains to the principal MPEG-21 work products related to rights language and rights management as expressed in MPEG-21 Part 5 'Rights Expression Language (REL)' and MPEG-21 Part 6 'Rights Data Dictionary (RDD)'. It presents some of the key resources and the historical development of MPEG-21 parts 5 and 6. The MPEG-21 Overview Document summarizes the role of Parts 5 and 6 in the larger MPEG-21 framework, and particularly, in relation to the concepts of the Digital Item, User Model, and Part 4 Intellectual Property Management and Protection (IPMP). More complete description is provided in the MPEG-21 Vision, Technologies and Strategy document. In September 2003, Part 5 and Part 6 advanced to FDIS [Final Draft IS] status as ISO/IEC FDIS 21000-5 (SC 29 N 5543, Project JTC 1.29.17.05, 21000-5) and ISO/IEC FDIS 21000-6 (SC 29 N 5551, Project JTC 1.29.17.06, 21000-6).
On 2004-04-01, MPEG-21 Part 5 was published as an ISO Standard: ISO/IEC 21000-5:2004, Information technology — Multimedia framework (MPEG 21) — Part 5: Rights Expression Language [REL]. ISO MPEG REL defines "an XML-based language for expressing rights related to the use and distribution of digital content as well as access to services." On 2004-05-15, MPEG-21 Part 6 was published as an ISO Standard: ISO/IEC 21000-6:2004, Information technology — Multimedia framework (MPEG-21) — Part 6: Rights Data Dictionary [RDD]. ISO/IEC 21000-6:2004 "describes a Rights Data Dictionary which comprises a set of clear, consistent, structured, integrated and uniquely identified terms to support the MPEG-21 Rights Expression Language (REL), ISO/IEC 21000-5." The IS documents are not publicly accessibly, but may be purchased from ISO.
Notice: ISO MPEG REL is based upon the proprietary XrML specification owned by ContentGuard — itself a private company principally owned by Time Warner Inc. and Microsoft Corporation. According to a June 01, 2004 message posted to the Atom-Syntax mailing list, ContentGuard believes "products or systems that implement either of the [XrML or ISO MPEG REL] specifications may infringe one or more of ContentGuard's patents and will need a patent license from us." Concrete discussions about license fees payable to ContentGuard "usually entail signing an NDA [non-disclosure agreement] before discussing actual fee structures." See details in the memo posted by Asbjørn Ulsberg, quoting Rajan Samtani (Director, Sales & Marketing, ContentGuard, Inc.) in response to an inquiry about ContentGuard's XrML patents, and in the related declarations relating to XrML tendered to OASIS: ContentGuard has copyrights to the XrML 2.0 specification and schema (including previous releases) along with a trademark on the name "XrML". ContentGuard also owns US Patents 5,638,443, 5,634,012, 5,715,403, and 5,629,980 which have claims that may necessarily be infringed by the use of the [XrML 2.0] contribution. Other details are discussed in the patents document.
MPEG-21 Part 5 and Part 6, FDIS:
Information technology -- Multimedia framework (MPEG-21) -- Part 5: Rights Expression Language. Final Draft International Standard (FDIS). Reference: ISO/IEC FDIS 21000-5:2003(E). From ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11. Date: 2003-07-25. 135 pages. The Part 5 document "specifies the syntax and semantics of a Rights Expression Language" and defines "an authorization model to specify whether the semantics of a set of Rights Expressions permit a given Principal to perform a given Right upon a given optional Resource during a given time interval based on a given authorization context and a given trust root." Background: "Before making high-quality and valuable multimedia resources available online, content owners want to be assured that their rights to those resources are respected. In addition, the business models and contracts of content distributors often involve conditions regarding distribution, such as fees, territory restrictions, time limits, and so on... the players involved in the online distribution and consumption of multimedia resources need to exchange information about the rights, terms, and conditions associated with each resource at each step in the multimedia resource lifecycle... To address many of these issues, a common Rights Expression Language that can be shared among all participants in this digital workflow is required. A common Rights Expression Language addresses important aspects of the interoperability issues inherent in digital multimedia resource distribution; the issues relating to exchanging Rights Expressions during their life cycle; and the system issues such as trust, authorization, and authentication. This part [5] of ISO/IEC 21000 addresses a part of the overall vision for ISO/IEC 21000, which is to define a multimedia framework to enable transparent and augmented use of multimedia resources across a wide range of networks and devices used by different communities..." [from the FDIS 'Introduction']
Information technology -- Multimedia framework (MPEG-21) -- Part 6: Rights Data Dictionary. [Technologie de l'Information -- Cadre de Multimedia -- Partie 6: Dictionnaire de Gestion des Droits des Données.] Final Draft International Standard (FDIS). Reference: ISO/IEC FDIS 21000-6:2003(E). From ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11. Date: 2003-07-15. 234 pages. MPEG-21 Part 6 "specifies a Rights Data Dictionary for use within the MPEG-21 Framework. This Rights Data Dictionary forms the basis of all expressions of rights and permissions as defined by the MPEG-21 Rights Expression Language (specified in ISO/IEC 21000-5)." A table presents fourteen Standardized ActTypes "which provide the semantic content for the Multimedia Extension Rights in Clause 9.6 of ISO/IEC 21000-5. These ActTypes provide basic functionality for the REL. Employed within a rights expression, the Multimedia Extension Rights are capable of being used to create licences required by Rights Holders." These ActTypes include: Adapt, Delete, Diminish, Embed, Enhance, Enlarge, Execute, Install, Modify, Move, Play, Print, Reduce, and Uninstall.
MPEG-21 Part 5 REL and the OASIS Rights Language TC Specification
There is a significant overlap between MPEG-21 Part 5 'Rights Expression Language (REL) and work planned for completion in the OASIS Rights Language Technical Committee owing to the prominent role of ContentGuard, and to the common intellectual property heritage in the ContentGuard/Microsoft XrML (Extensible Rights Markup Language) specification. ContentGuard announced on April 03, 2002 that it was "delivering on its promise to turn XrML over to a global standards body" by contributing the XrML specification to OASIS, thus handing over "control of XrML to an international standards organization... [said Michael Miron] 'OASIS, an international standards consortium focused on developing interoperable specifications built on public standards such as XML, is in the best position to oversee XrML's development and work with other standards organizations who share a common vision of a single extensible rights language standard'..." Between April 2002 and July 2003, the ISO/IEC JTC 1 / SC 29/WG 11 "Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) Working Group" was the most active (visible) arena for standardization of ContentGuard's XrML REL technology, leading to the July 29, 2003 announcement that Parts 5 and 6 of MPEG-21 had been completed. MPEG 21 Part 5 [ISO/IEC FCD 21000-5] Rights Expression Language is edited by Thomas DeMartini (ContentGuard, US), Xin Wang (ContentGuard, US), and Barney Wragg (UMG, UK). As of July 2003, no committee specification had been produced within the OASIS Rights Language TC.
A principal difference between MPEG-21 Part 5 REL and the OASIS 'Rights Language' design is scope: both are based upon XrML, but MPEG-21 Part 5 REL is derived from XrML 2.0 and the OASIS 'Rights Language' work is based upon an XrML version 2.1 contribution from ContentGuard to the OASIS RLTC. A key component in XrML 2.0 was removed from the specification when XrML 2.1 was created and submitted to the OASIS RLTC. XrML 2.0, MPEG-21 Part 5 REL, and XrML 2.1 have the 'REL Core' and the 'REL Standard Extension'. XrML Version 2.0 also contains the 'Content Extension' which "defines types and elements to describe rights, conditions, and metadata for digital works, allowing trusted systems to exchange digital works and interoperate," including "AccessFolderInfo, Backup, Copy, Delete, Edit, Embed, Execute, Export, Extract, Install, Loan, ManageFolder, Play, Print, Read, Restore, Transfer, Uninstall, Verify, Write." This XrML version 2.0 Content Extension (CX) is now represented by the MPEG-21 Part 5 'Multimedia Extension' (MX) which defines rights such as Modify, Enlarge, Reduce, Move, Adapt, Extract, Embed, Play, Print, Execute, Install, Uninstall, and Delete. The XrML Version 2.0 Content Extension was removed in the XrML 2.1 version presented by ContentGuard to the OASIS TC as a basis for technical committee work.
Parts 4-6 of ISO/IEC 21000 (especially) deal with rights. Part 4: MPEG-21 Intellectual Property Management and Protection (IPMP); Part 5: MPEG-21 Rights Expression Language; Part 6: MPEG-21 Rights Data Dictionary. See the Working Documents listing on the MPEG website for up-to-date references and official documents.
MPEG Rights Expression Language (REL)
[September 2003] Information technology -- Multimedia framework (MPEG-21) -- Part 5: Rights Expression Language. Final Draft International Standard (FDIS). Reference: ISO/IEC FDIS 21000-5:2003(E). From ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11. Date: 2003-07-25. 135 pages.
[March 2003] Study of Text of ISO/IEC FCD 21000-5 Rights Expression Language. ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11/N5599. March 2003, Pattaya, TH. 138 pages. From the Multimedia Description Schemes Subgroup, International Organization for Standardization [Organisation Internationale Normalisation], ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11, Coding Of Moving Pictures and Audio. Edited by Thomas DeMartini (ContentGuard, US), Xin Wang (ContentGuard, US), Barney Wragg (UMG, UK). Unofficial PDF generated from the .DOC version, contained in the ZIP archive (source). This is a redline version with diffs relative to N5349; for N5349 see following reference. Source ZIP archive 2003-05. Note changes in certain namespace declarations in this "Study of Text of ISO/IEC FCD 21000-5 Rights Expression Language": The (ContentGuard) XrML namespaces declared with http://www.xrml.org/schema/2002/05/xrml2core and http://www.xrml.org/schema/2002/05/xrml2sx are now deleted; new declarations include xmlns:r - urn:mpeg:mpeg21:2003:01-REL-R-NS; xmlns:mx - urn:mpeg:mpeg21:2003:01-REL-MX-NS; xmlns:sx - urn:mpeg:mpeg21:2003:01-REL-SX-NS. See the file listing for documents in the ZIP archive. Included are three sample documents and the three XML schemas:
- REL Core XML Schema, xsd
- Standard Extension XML Schema (SX), xsd
- Multimedia Extension (MX), xsd
- Acme example
- Alice example
- Xin example
[February 18, 2003] Text of ISO/IEC FCD 21000-5 Rights Expression Language. Edited by Thomas DeMartini (ContentGuard, US), Xin Wang (ContentGuard, US), Barney Wragg (UMG, UK). From the Multimedia Description Schemes Group, International Organization for Standardization [Organisation Internationale Normalisation], ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11, Coding Of Moving Pictures and Audio. Reference: ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11/N5349. December 2002, Awaji, JP. Status: Approved. == Information technology -- Multimedia framework (MPEG-21) -- Part 5: Rights Expression Language. ISO/IEC FCD 21000-5. Date: 2002-12-13. 125 pages. International Standard ISO/IEC 21000 5 was prepared by Joint Technical Committee ISO/IEC JTC 1, JTC, Subcommittee SC 29. Attention is drawn to the possibility that some of the elements of this part of ISO/IEC 21000 may be the subject of patent rights. ISO and IEC shall not be held responsible for identifying any or all such patent rights. [This part] Clause 5 specifies the REL Core, composed of the REL Architecture, supporting types and elements, and REL Authorization Algorithm." Section 7 documents the REL Multimedia Extension. Annexes include: Normative Annex A: XML Schemas; Informative Annex B: Example Rights Expressions; Informative Annex C: Extension Mechanisms for Introducing New Rights; Informative Annex D: Relationship Between ISO/IEC 21000-5 (REL) and ISO/IEC 21000-6 (RDD). Produced through ISO Project Number JTC 1.29.17.05 (21000-5). Reference: ISO/IEC FCD 21000-5 (SC 29 N 5236), 2003-02-18. Rights Expression Language (Part 5 REL) released as 'FCD' had an FCD Ballot due date of 2003-06-17. According to the Timetable for MPEG-21 Standardisation as published in ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29/WG11/N5231 (October 2002), Part 5 REL was expected to reach FDIS [Final Draft International Standard] level as of July 2003, and final IS [International Standard] in September 2003. JTC 1.29.17.05 Project editors [2003-05-14] include: Mr. Keith Hill (Rightscom Ltd) [WWW]; Mr. Thomas DeMartini (ContentGuard, Inc.) [WWW], and Mr. Barney Wragg (Universal Music Group) [WWW]. See similarly from the working documents register Text of ISO/IEC FCD 21000-5 Rights Expression Language. NB: this display version is an unofficial PDF; see the canonical source for "Text of ISO/IEC FCD" in the ZIP archive with .DOC file. Canonical source for FCD text for ballot: 29n5236t.doc [cache].
[August 26, 2002] Information Technology -- Multimedia Framework -- Part 5: Rights Expression Language. Committee Draft. Edited by Thomas DeMartini (ContentGuard, US), Xin Wang (ContentGuard, US), and Barney Wragg (UMG, UK). International Organization For Standardization. ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11: Coding of Moving Pictures and Audio. Document Reference: ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11/N4942. Text of ISO/IEC CD 21000-5. Date: 2002-07-26. From the Multimedia Description Schemes Group. Approved at the Klagenfurt, AT Meeting. 115 pages. Normative Annex A documents the REL Architecture; Normative Annex B provides the XML Schemas [Versioned '01' namespace: urn:mpeg:mpeg21:2002:01-REL-NS]; Informative Annex C documents the 'Relationship Between ISO/IEC 21000-5 (REL) and ISO/IEC 21000-6 (RDD)'. The MPEG-21 Part 5 Rights Expression Language (REL) has a substantial dependence upon ContentGuard's XrML (Extensible Rights Markup Language) specification, as evidenced in the text and declared XML Schema namespaces (e.g., xmlns:sx="http://www.xrml.org/schema/2002/05/xrml2sx", xmlns:r="http://www.xrml.org/schema/2002/05/xrml2core"). We are led to understand that MPEG-21 Part 5 (REL) is [to be] the official XrML 'Content Extension' (superseding the XrML 'SX Content Extension' which was published in XrML 2.0 but omitted from XrML 2.1). See background in "ContentGuard Releases XrML Version 2.0 and Submits Specification to Standards Bodies." XrML is also being used as the basis for the OASIS Rights Language TC; see the MPEG WG11 [Class C] Liaison Statement to OASIS Right Language Technical Committee and posting which indicates that this Part 5 CD 'is out for National Body comments which are due 10-27-02'. See the news item for document source. [.DOC]
[April 06, 2002] N4639. Information Technology - Multimedia Framework - Part 5: Rights Expression Language - Working Draft. MDS Title: MPEG-REL WD 2.0. International Organization For Standardization. ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11 - Coding Of Moving Pictures and Audio. Document: ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11/N4639. [ISO/IEC WD 21000-5.] March 15, 2002, Jeju, KR. Status: Draft. 36 pages. Check the MPEG website for the official text and for more up-to-date versions of this draft document. [Draft 'distributed for review and comment; subject to change without notice and may not be referred to as an International Standard. Recipients of this document are invited to submit, with their comments, notification of any relevant patent rights of which they are aware and to provide supporting documentation.'] Excerpts: Namespace: "The namespace for the REL will be urn:mpeg:mpeg21:2002:REL-NS-01. The '01' [portion] represents a serial number that is expected to change as the REL schema evolves along with this part of ISO/IEC 21000." Draft Section 4 defines a number of "rights" elements and corresponding semantics (e.g., for "play, print, export, edit, extract, embed, copy, transfer, loan, read, write, execute, delete, backup, restore, verify, manageFolder, accessFolderInfo, install, and uninstall." For example, play "represents the right to render the work into a transient form, as appropriate to the resource type. Depending on the content type, exercising this right might result in displaying a book, playing a video or audio clip, or playing a computer"; print "represents the right to make a permanent rendered copy of the work outside the control of a repository. Renders and helpers may be used during the exercise. Exercising this right might result in a printing a hard copy of a book, creating a bitmap image on a removable disk, or creating an audio recording on a magnetic tape." Draft Section 4.3.1.1 defines a 'DigitalWork' as a "sequence of bits that can be a resource. It represents the content to which rights and conditions are being applied. The DigitalWork type is composed of four different kinds of elements: description, metadata, locator, and parts. The description describes the DigitalWork, but does not define it. That is to say that two DigitalWork instances that are identical -- except for their description elements -- declare the same DigitalWork. On the other hand, the metadata, locator, and parts elements define the DigitalWork..." Draft Section 4.4.1.5 defines a 'Watermark' as a "list of information to be embedded in a copy of the work by a device while producing this copy': The Watermark type is composed of three different kinds of elements: string, watermark token, and object. The string element declares the textual information. Each watermark token declares the corresponding information shown in the table below. The object element declares the information declared by its content's type (DigitalWork, by default)..." [See the official source, .ZIP/.DOC]
[December 7, 2001] N4533. MPEG-21 Rights Expression Language Working Draft. Information Technology -- Multimedia Framework -- Part 5: Rights Expression Language -- Working Draft. From: MPEG Multimedia Description Schemes (MDS) Group. December 07, 2001 [Pattaya, Thailand]. 15 pages. Reference: ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11/N4533, ISO/IEC WD 21000-5. International Organization For Standardization, ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11, Coding Of Moving Pictures and Audio. Summary:
Rights Expression Language (REL): "This working draft has been produced following the 58th Meeting in Pattaya, December 2001. During this meeting submissions to the CfP (N4335) and Requirements (N4336) where evaluated. This evaluation process included review and comment by three independent MPEG experts. As a result of the comments from these experts one submission for the REL was selected as the working model for further work. The submission selected was M7640 from ContentGuard. The process of review during the Pattaya meeting determined that while M7640 was best suited as the model to go forward the experts express concerns that elements of M7640 needed to be further evaluated to identify modification and additions to this REL to fully meet MPEG's requirements. A series of Core Experiments will be undertaken between the 58th and 59th meeting to facilitate this process of modification and addition.
Semantics of the REL: "The working assumption for the semantics of the REL is that these semantics will be based on the specification of M7640. The semantics will be modified and added to as a result of the ongoing development process of this standard."
Syntax of the REL: "The working assumption for the architecture of the REL is that this architecture will be based on the specification of M7640. The architecture will be modified and extended as a result of the ongoing development process of this standard. Editor's Note: Concerns to be addressed. These include but are not limited to: (1) Default interpretation of the element implicitly specified by the context; (2) 1-to-1 relationship between Semantic entities and syntactic elements; (3) Expression of UID; (4) Expression of roles; (5) Sequencing; (6) Inheritance of rights and permissions." [source ZIP/.DOC, see working documents listing]
MPEG Rights Data Dictionary (RDD)
[September 2003] Information technology -- Multimedia framework (MPEG-21) -- Part 6: Rights Data Dictionary. [Technologie de l'Information -- Cadre de Multimedia -- Partie 6: Dictionnaire de Gestion des Droits des Données.] Final Draft International Standard (FDIS). Reference: ISO/IEC FDIS 21000-6:2003(E). From ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11. Date: 2003-07-15. 234 pages.
[February 18, 2003] Text of ISO/IEC FCD 21000-6 -- Rights Data Dictionary (RDD). From the Multimedia Description Schemes Group, International Organisation for Standardisation [Organisation Internationale Normalisation]. ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11. Coding Of Moving Pictures and Audio. Reference: ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11/N5352. Awaji, December 2002. Edited by Chris Barlas and Godfrey Rust. Status: Approved. == ISO/IEC FCD 21000-6. Information technology -- Multimedia framework (MPEG-21) -- Part 6: Rights Data Dictionary. [Technologie de l'Information -- Cadre de Multimedia -- Partie 6: Dictionnaire de Gestion des Droits des Données.] 287 pages. Produced through Project Number JTC 1.29.17.06 (21000-6). Ballot reference: ISO/IEC FCD 21000-6 (SC 29 N 5238), 2003-02-18. In accordance with Resolution 5.5.1 taken at the 63rd SC 29/WG 11 meeting, 2002-12-09/13, Awaji, Japan, the SC 29 Secretariat issued FCD ballot. JTC 1.29.17.06 Project editors [2003-05-14] included: Mr. Keith Hill (Rightscom Ltd) [WWW]; Mr. Chris Barlas (Rightscom Ltd) [WWW], Mr. Godfrey Rust (Data Definitions) [WWW]. Canonical source .DOC at 29n5238t.doc [cache].
[July 26, 2002] Information Technology -- Multimedia Framework -- Part 6: Rights Data Dictionary. Committee Draft. Edited by Chris Barlas and Godfrey Rust. International Organization For Standardization. ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11: Coding of Moving Pictures and Audio. Document Reference: ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11/N4943. Text of ISO/IEC CD 21000-Part 6. Date: 2002-07-26. From the Multimedia Description Schemes Group. Approved at the Klagenfurt, AT Meeting. 409 pages. Normative Annex A defines RDD StandardizedTerms; Normative Annex B provides Rules and Styles Guidelines for Textual Elements and Headwords; Normative Annex C specifies Requirements for the Registration Authority for the Rights Data Dictionary. Source: MPEG website. [.DOC source]
[March 22, 2002] MPEG-21 Rights Data Dictionary Working Draft 2.0 [RDD]. Information Technology -- Multimedia Framework -- Part 6: Rights Data Dictionary. From International Organisation For Standardisation, ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11: Coding of Moving Pictures and Audio. Edited by Chris Barlas (Rightscom) and Godfrey Rust. Document reference: ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11 N4645. Jeju, Korea. March 22, 2002. 32 pages. "The vision for MPEG-21 is to define a multimedia framework to enable transparent and augmented use of multimedia resources across a wide range of networks and devices used by different communities. This sixth part of MPEG-21 (ISO/IEC 21000-6) specifies a Rights Data Dictionary for use within the MPEG-21 Framework. This Rights Data Dictionary forms the basis of all expressions of rights and permissions as defined by the MPEG-21 Rights Expression Language (specified in ISO/IEC 21000-5)... The Rights Data Dictionary comprises a set of clear, consistent, structured, integrated and uniquely identified Terms to support the MPEG-21 Rights Expression Language. This Standard establishes the core of this Dictionary, and specifies how further Terms may be defined. The RDD is intended to support the transformation of metadata from the terminology of one namespace into that of another namespace in an automated or partially-automated way with the minimum ambiguity or loss of semantic integrity. The RDD is a prescriptive dictionary, in that it determines a single meaning for the name ('Headword') of a Term; but it is inclusive in that it recognizes alternative Headwords and definitions from other namespaces and incorporates them through mappings. RDD recognises legal definitions as and only as Terms mapped from other Authorities. Therefore Terms which are directly authorized by RDD neither define nor prescribe intellectual property rights or other legal entities..." [source ZIP/.doc]
[December 10, 2001] MPEG-21 Rights Data Dictionary (RDD) Working Draft 1.0. Information Technology -- Multimedia Framework -- Part 6: Rights Data Dictionary. From: MPEG Multimedia Description Schemes (MDS) Group. December 10, 2001 [Pattaya, Thailand]. Edited by Chris Barlas (Rightscom). 20 pages. Reference: ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11/N4534, , ISO/IEC WD 21000-6. "The vision for MPEG-21 is to define a multimedia framework to enable transparent and augmented use of multimedia resources across a wide range of networks and devices used by different communities. This sixth part of MPEG-21 (ISO/IEC 21000-6) specifies a Rights Data Dictionary for use within the MPEG-21 Framework. This Rights Data Dictionary forms the basis of all expressions of rights and permissions as defined by the MPEG-21 Rights Expression Language (specified in ISO/IEC 21000-5)." [source ZIP/.DOC, see working documents listing]
[April 04, 2001] Activity current in 2001-04 by ISO MPEG (Moving Picture Experts Group) addresses a markup-based machine-readable 'Rights Expression Language' to govern intellectual property and digital rights.
From the July 2001 document ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29/WG11 N4335: "Call for Proposals for a Rights Data Dictionary and Rights Description Language":
MPEG has identified the need for a Rights Expression Language and a Rights Data Dictionary in the context of three of its standards: (1) MPEG-4, in the efforts to create more interoperable IPMP; (2) MPEG-7, to describe, as a part of content descriptions, the conditions to access content, and; (3) MPEG-21, to achieve the goal of expressing rights for all Users of MPEG-21's so-called 'Digital Items'. [A User is any entity that interacts in the MPEG-21 environment or makes use of a Digital Item. Such Users include individuals, consumers, communities, organisations, corporations, consortia, governments and other standards bodies and initiatives around the world].
MPEG has defined the requirements for a Rights Data Dictionary and a Rights Expression Language based on input from a wide variety of interested parties. This Call for Proposals invites submissions that fulfil some or all of these requirements... All parties that believe they possess relevant technologies for a Rights Data Dictionary or a Rights Expression Language are invited to submit proposals for consideration by MPEG. These parties do not necessarily have to be MPEG members... Submissions shall be received by Wednesday 21 November, 23:59 hours GMT.
[RDD/REL Evaluation meeting will be held November 30 - December 2, 2001. See other references below.]
From the March 2001 ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29/WG11 N4044 'Call for Requirements':
MPEG, a working group in ISO/IEC, has produced three important standards (MPEG-1, MPEG-2 and MPEG-4) and is working on MPEG-7 and MPEG-21. Extension work is ongoing on the Intellectual Property Management and Protection' (IPMP) specification in MPEG-4, with the goal to enhance interoperability in the consumption of protected content. The Content Description Standard MPEG-7 is in Final Committee Draft status, to be completed by the end of 2001. The Multimedia Framework' MPEG-21 standard is in an initial development phase, with the Requirements phase in an advanced stage and the first Call for Proposals issued in October 2000. MPEG has a long history in working with members of the creative industries and rights holders' communities on the identification, management and protection of intellectual property carried on systems designed to MPEG specifications. MPEG has identified the need for a Rights Expression Language and a Rights Data Dictionary in the context of three of its standards: (1) MPEG-4, for the IPMP extension, (2) MPEG-7, to describe, as a part of content descriptions, the conditions to access content, and (3) MPEG-21, to achieve the goal of expressing rights for all Users of MPEG-21's so-called Digital Items'. Users refers to both End Users and parties such as creators, producers, distributors, rights holders, etc.
MPEG's sees a Rights Data Dictionary as a dictionary of key terms which are required to describe rights of all Users, including intellectual property rights, that can be unambiguously defined using a standard syntactic convention, and which can be applied across all domains in which rights need to be expressed. A Rights Expression Language is seen as a machine-readable language that can express rights and permissions using the terms as defined in the Rights Data Dictionary. . . The RDD-REL shall support all operations throughout the entire life cycle of Digital Items including creation, publishing, distribution, consumption, and invalidation/disposal.
Recent developments within MPEG, and also within Open e-Book Forum (OeBF), indicate that the need to deal with the upstream rights issues is now more widely appreciated. One way to address these issues has been articulated within MPEG-21; this calls for the creation of an extensible dictionary and language for the expression of semantic sets of rights definitions. This approach (described in the MPEG-21 documentation [1]) contains the following steps: (1) Adopt or extend existing rights expression languages, where appropriate, for describing contractual usage rules for Digital Items. Start from the work being done in MPEG-7, but develop new languages if needed. (2) Expand these languages to allow the expression of rights and interests in personal data. (3) Expand these languages to allow the expression of public policies and rules stemming from sources other than Rights Holders, such as governments and other relevant rule-making bodies. This work item may require more time than available in the first phase of the development of MPEG-21. As soon as time and resources are available, this item should be undertaken.
"The Rights Data Dictionary and Rights Expression Language are intended to provide flexible, interoperable mechanisms to support transparent and augmented use of digital resources in publishing, distributing, and consuming of electronic books, digital movies, digital music, interactive games, computer software and other creations in digital form, in a way that protects digital content and honors the rights, conditions, and fees specified for digital contents. It is also intended to support specification of access and use controls for digital content in cases where financial exchange is not part of the terms of use, and to support exchange of sensitive or private digital content. The Rights Data Dictionary and Rights Expression Language are also intended to provide flexible interoperable mechanisms to ensure personal data is processed in accordance with individual rights and to meet the requirement for Users to be able to express their rights and interests in a way that addresses issues of privacy and use of personal data." - From the consolidated submissions.
From the collected requirements: "The RDD-REL shall be defined in open, standard meta-language. This will enable interoperability, machine readability, easy adoption, and fast development and deployment. It will also make it easy to do integration with IPMP-aware systems and services. XML and BNF (Backus Naur Form) are examples..."
It is MPEG-21's aim in the IPMP area to provide a uniform framework that enables all users to express their rights and interests in, and agreements related to, Digital Items and to have assurance that those rights, interests and agreements will be persistently and reliably managed and protected across a wide range of networks and devices. The requirements for technology to accommodate this are the same as for MPEG-4. MPEG-21 will be developed consistently with MPEG-4 (and MPEG-7), which is notably important in the IPMP area, where many overlapping requirements exist. The notion of users expressing their rights again leads to the necessity of defining a rights description language. Note that a 'User' in MPEG-21 context can be any party in the chain, not just the end user... [Multimedia Description Schemes (MPEG-7) defines the following elements: Descriptors (Ds), Description Schemes (DSs) a Description Definitions Language (DDL - based on XML Schema Language) and again a Systems layer.] From Rob Koenen's report, cited below.
Principal/General References
[Note: some references may be broken, as the MPEG website has migrated from 'mpeg.telecomitalialab.com' to 'chiariglione.org']
MPEG-21 (Multimedia framework (MPEG-21) Programme of Work Allocated to ISO/IEC SC 29/WG 11.
Information technology -- Multimedia Framework (MPEG-21). Part 1: Vision, Technologies and Strategy. [Technologies de l'information -- Cadre multimédia (MPEG-21). Partie 1: Vision, Technologies et Stratégie.] Reference number: ISO/IEC TR 21000-1:2001(E). JTC 1.29.17.01 (TR 21000-1). Copyright (c) ISO/IEC 2001. First edition. Date: 2001-12-15. 70 pages. Canonical source: ZIP file, referenced from ISO Publicly Available Standards.
"From MPEG-1 to MPEG-21: Creating an Interoperable Multimedia Infrastructure." By Rob Koenen. December 2001.
[October 07, 2003] "ContentGuard Releases a Web-Based Rights Editor for MPEG REL. RightsExpress Tool to Assist Deployment of MPEG Rights Expression Language." - "ContentGuard, a leading provider of Digital Rights Management (DRM) technology, today launched RightsExpress, a web-based Rights Editor for MPEG REL, the forthcoming industry-standard rights expression language developed by MPEG (Moving Picture Experts Group) and currently at Final Draft International Standard status in the ISO process. Using this service, a user can quickly understand the features and deployment options of MPEG REL as they explore how rights and conditions can be used in various DRM application workflows. Through RightsExpress' intuitive user interface and online guidance, technical and non-technical users can quickly experiment, model and create REL licenses relevant to their business needs. RightsExpress also provides preloaded sample licenses that can be modified by the user, further facilitating the understanding and adoption of various MPEG REL deployment options. 'As the DRM industry continues to develop, content owners and technology providers need to work together to leverage the potential of digital content delivery,' said Michael Miron, co-chairman and CEO of ContentGuard. 'The MPEG REL will be an ISO standard by the end of 2003, and in order to accelerate digital content distribution, the industry can start developing and deploying MPEG REL-based solutions today. RightsExpress builds on ContentGuard's history of contributions towards developing and promoting DRM standards. It will help the DRM industry embrace interoperable standards that promote consumer choice.' RightsExpress is available now and can be accessed [online]..."
[July 30, 2003] "MPEG Standard Addresses Rights." By Paul Festa. In CNET News.com (July 30, 2003). "The Moving Pictures Experts Group has completed an effort on two digital rights management technologies intended to increase the MPEG standard's appeal to the recording industry and Hollywood. MPEG announced the completion of parts 5 and 6 of MPEG-21, a member of the MPEG family of multimedia standards that defines how audio and video files can play in a wide range of digital environments. The digital rights management (DRM) capabilities are crucial to MPEG-21, as they are to other emerging multimedia standards, so that publishers in the recording and movie industries will adopt the standard without fear of losing control of copyrighted works. Part 5 of the standard, the Rights Expression Language (REL), lets multimedia publishers designate rights and permissions for how consumers can use their content. The REL expression 'play,' for instance, would let the consumer use the material in a 'read only' mode, while other expressions could allow more flexibility in playback and reproduction. REL also lets consumers establish privacy preferences for their personal data. Part 6 of the standard, the Rights Data Dictionary (RDD), defines terms that publishers can use when working with REL..." Other details are given in the announcment "MPEG Approves Another MPEG-21 Technology." See also the note on the relationship between MPEG-21 Part 5 (viz., Information technology -- Multimedia framework (MPEG-21) -- Part 5: Rights Expression Language ) and the XrML-based 'Rights Language' targeted for development within the OASIS Rights Language Technical Committee; the OASIS RLTC was formed in March 2002 to "use XrML as the basis in defining the industry standard rights language in order to maximize continuity with ongoing standards efforts..." Since (a) MPEG Part 5: Rights Expression Language is now (effectively) an ISO FDIS [Final Draft International Standard] and (b) is scheduled to become an ISO Standard in September 2003, and (c) no draft committee specification for an XrML-based rights language has been created within the OASIS RLTC, it appears that the MPEG-21 Part 5 document as an ISO Standard will become the reference standard for the strongly patented ContentGuard/Microsoft XrML rights language technology.
[August 21, 2002] "Queries of Digital Content Descriptions in MPEG-7 and MPEG-21 XML Documents." By Peiya Liu and Liang H. Hsu (Siemens Corporate Research, Inc). Paper presents at the XML Europe 2002 Conference, Barcelona, Spain. "The paper shows certain critical query specification issues for MPEG-7 and MPEG-21 XML documents and illustrates a logic method to handle the limitations in current text-oriented XML query languages for retrieving multimedia content and digital items... MPEG-7 is an emergent ISO/IEC standard and formally named as "Multimedia Content Description Interface". Unlike the previous MPEG[MPEG Web Site] compression standards MPEG-1, MPEG-2 and MPEG-4, MPEG-7 aims to create a standard for describing the multimedia content to enable the integration of production, distribution and content access paradigm. This MPEG-7 standard uses an XML Schema to describe multimedia objects such as video, audio images, etc. as spatial, temporal or visual XML datatypes. This type of multimedia XML documents may include descriptions about both static/spatial media (such as text, drawings, images, etc.) and time-based media (such as video, audio, animation,etc.). The content can be further organized into three major document structures: hierarchical, hyperlinked, and temporal/spatial structures. A related ISO/IEC standard MPEG-21 is defining a multimedia framework to support the content delivery chain. This multimedia content delivery chain encompasses content creation, production, delivery and consumption. To support this, several key elements have identified: digital item declaration, identification, description, content handling, intellectual property management, digital item rights management, etc. Digital items are defined as structured digital objects, including representation, identification and metadata description. This paper will focus on two types of MPEG-21 XML documents (Digital Item Declaration, and Digital Item Identification and Description) and illustrate the relationships to MPEG-7 XML documents for digital content and item queries. MPEG-7 and MPEG-21 standards have posed an interesting challenge to XML query language design in covering different XML aspects. This paper shows some critical specification issues in forming MPEG-7 and MPEG-21 XML queries. In addition, a logic formalism called Path Predicate Calculus is illustrated to handle the limitations in current text-oriented XML query languages for multimedia XML queries. In this formalism, the atomic logic formulas are element predicates rather than relation predicates in relational calculus. The queries describe a desired document tree by specifying path predicates that the tree document elements must satisfy. Spatial, temporal and visual datatypes and relationships can also be described in this formalism for content retrieval and identification in MPEG-7 and MPEG-21 XML documents..." Also available in PDF format. [cache]
[February 06, 2002] "Freedom of Expression: Emerging Standards in Rights Management. [Feature Story.]" By Neil McAllister (Senior Technology Editor). In New.Architect: Internet Strategies for Technology Leaders Volume 7, Issue 3 (March 2002), pages 36-39. ISSN: 1537-9000. "... In November 2001, the ODRL 1.0 specification was submitted to the ISO/IEC MPEG standards body for consideration as the rights expression language component for the developing MPEG-21 media distribution standard. The submission was backed by companies as diverse as Adobe, IBM, IPR Systems, Nokia, and Panasonic. Surprisingly, RealNetworks also supported it, choosing to merge the XMCL specification into ODRL rather than submit its own language independently. But in the end, it was XrML, and not ODRL, that was chosen as the starting point for the eventual MPEG-21 rights expression language... One way or another, consolidation amongst the various rights expression languages seems inevitable. ContentGuard's track record of success, though limited, makes it the current front-runner. Yet the reputation of the MPEG group may draw more attention to its own eventual, XrML-derived language, which will be specified with the input of both RealNetworks and the ODRL Initiative members. Whatever the outcome, a standard rights expression language is but one brick in the foundation of a viable DRM platform, albeit an important one. True, gaining the support of standards bodies is an essential step. But the long-term goal -- gaining the support of consumers and business customers alike -- still lies ahead..."
[February 05, 2002] Status of MPEG-21 and XrML 2002-02. Posting from Brad Gandee (XrML Standards Evangelist, ContentGuard). 2002-02-01. "At Thailand we processed all of the submissions in response to the CfP [MPEG Call for Proposal]. After a series of experiments to test various aspects of the proposals, XrML was selected as the base architecture for the REL development going forward. We are currently developing core experiments to help establish whether certain other concerns can be met by XrML as it was proposed or if additional development is required... We are in the process of defining what are referred to as Core Experiments employing detailed Use Cases to establish areas for focus in the development process. It is expected that we will have a fairly substantial Working Draft, in MPEG parlance, coming out of the Korea meeting in March and a largely stable specification by July of this year. After that the formal review, comment and voting procedures of MPEG are expected to extend the process of getting to a published ISO standard through to June/July 2003..."
[February 05, 2002] "MPEG Decides To Adopt ContentGuard's XrML as the Basis for the Rights Expression Language (REL) Component of MPEG-21." From "DRM Watch" [GiantSteps/Media Technology Strategies]. February 1, 2002. Edited by Bill Rosenblatt. "XrML originally had two competitors for adoption in MPEG-21: Open Digital Rights Language (ORDL), from the consultant Renato Iannella in Australia, and RealNetworks' eXtensible Media Commerce Language (XMCL). Shortly before the MPEG-21 meeting in Thailand, RealNetworks dropped XMCL -- which had never even gotten as far as a version 1.0 spec -- and decided to embrace ODRL. MPEG-21 is now working with ContentGuard to address issues it would like to see resolved. Among these issues is the overly large size of XrML expressions that would be downloaded to the small portable devices to which MPEG-21 applies, which is a byproduct of XrML's high complexity. XrML's lack of simplicity will continue to be an issue for ContentGuard to address as it positions the language for further success. XrML's adoption as part of MPEG-21 is good news for ContentGuard and for the cause of badly-needed DRM standardization, but the news should be taken in context. Although the MPEG-21 blessing is important, it is not guaranteed that MPEG-21 -- which is mightily complex itself and is not scheduled to receive ISO standard status until Summer 2003 -- will have much of an impact on the market. Furthermore, perhaps the more important outcome is the demise of XMCL, which was RealNetworks' attempt at mounting an anti-Microsoft initiative by aggregating support from many other firms who compete with Microsoft..." Note: Rosenblatt's 'DRM Watch' summaries of events related to content rights management and their significance in the market.
[February 05, 2002] "MPEG-21 Adopts XrML as Rights Language." By [Seybold Staff]. In The Bulletin: Seybold News and Views On Electronic Publishing Volume 7, Number 17 (February 6, 2002). "The Motion Picture Experts Group (MPEG), the standards family for the encoding of digital audio and video content in a compressed format, has selected ContentGuard's XrML as the basis for the Rights Expression Language (REL) component of its MPEG-21 standard. The purpose of the MPEG-21 standard is to 'define a multimedia framework to enable transparent and augmented use of multimedia resources across a wide range of networks and devices used by different communities.' Rights management and secure delivery are a component of that infrastructure, and XrML will now be the recommended language for expressing rights within MPEG digital content... [additional editorial comment from Bill Rosenblatt; see previous reference]
Open Digital Rights Language (ODRL) Submission to the MPEG-21 CfP for a RDD-REL. 9 pages. [Edited] by Renato Iannella. Submitted by IPR Systems, Nokia, and Real Networks to MPEG (International Organisation for Standardization/Organisation Internationale Normalisation. ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29/WG11. Coding Of Moving Pictures and Audio.). Document Reference: ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29/WG11 M7598. For evaluation at the MPEG Meeting in December 2001, Pattaya, Thailand. "This document outlines the response from the submitting organisations (IPR Systems and Nokia) to the MPEG Call for Requirements (CfR) for a 'Rights Data Dictionary and a Rights Expression Language' (RDD-REL) [N4335]. The submission is based on extensive research, development, and implementation experience with digital rights management systems by the submitting organisations. Nokia's Mobile Rights Voucher (MRV) and Real Network's Extensible Media Commerce Language (XMCL) have been merged into IPR System's Open Digital Rights Language (ODRL). The submitting organisations are confident the resultant submission meets and exceeds the expectations of the CfP and is committed to working with MPEG-21 in developing the RDD-REL international standard. Other supporters of the ODRL submission include IBM, Adobe, Panasonic, MarkAny, Simpsons Solicitors, OzAuthors, Pipers, ARPA, Vienna University, and Information Management Australia." In addition to the five normative parts, the submission contains a directory with ODRL Examples and other documentation for the XML schemas presented in the (normative) appendices of the version 1.0 ODRL specification.
"Call for Requirements for a Rights Data Dictionary and a Rights Expression Language (Re-issue)." ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29/WG11 N4044. March 2001 - Singapore. [cache]
N4045 Draft. MPEG-21 Requirements for a Rights Data Dictionary and a Rights Expression Language. [cache]
On November 26, 2001, ContentGuard, Inc. announced the release of XrML (Extensible Rights Markup Language) version 2.0, confirming also that XrML has been submitted to MPEG and to TV Anytime. XrML is a "general-purpose, XML-based specification grammar for expressing rights and conditions associated with digital content, resources, and services; it is based on years of research at Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), which invented the rights expression language concept. XrML 2.0 expands the capabilities of a Digital Rights Language -- usually thought of in connection with authorized use of protected digital content -- to now also allow developers to establish the rights and conditions needed to access various Web Services. As part of a trusted environment, XrML can be used to apply rights to a wide variety of content and services to enable custom tailoring of digital offerings. For example, a Financial Services company can expand its online products from simple password access to customized and personalized offerings that combine services and content such as portfolio analysis, real time video, on-line consulting, or research reports. Each offering can use different rights (e.g., view, save, forward), conditions (e.g., free, fee based, limited time) and delivery methods (e.g., downloaded, streamed, ASP). New services with specific rights can be added to individuals or user groups through use of XrML. ContentGuard is owned by Xerox Corporation, with Microsoft Corporation holding a minority position." ContentGuard is licensing its patents (which enable developers to deploy applications based on XrML) "throughout the world on reasonable and non-discriminatory terms and conditions" [RAND].
On July 20, 2001 MPEG issued a "Call for Proposals for a Rights Data Dictionary and Rights Description Language" [cf. cache] with the following documents; see also Hot News:
- ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29/WG11 N4335. "Call for Proposals for a Rights Data Dictionary and a Rights Expression Language." [RDD-REL] 13 pages. Sydney - July 2001. "MPEG has identified the need for a Rights Expression Language and a Rights Data Dictionary in the context of three of its standards: (1) MPEG-4, in the efforts to create more interoperable IPMP; (2) MPEG-7, to describe, as a part of content descriptions, the conditions to access content, and; (3) MPEG-21, to achieve the goal of expressing rights for all Users of MPEG-21's so-called 'Digital Items'." Submissions due 21-November-2001.
- ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29/WG11 Nxxxx. "MPEG-21 Requirements for a Rights Data Dictionary and a Rights Expression Language. Final v1.0. 33 pages. Sydney - July 2001. "The purpose of this document is to express the requirements within the context of the MPEG-21 Multimedia Framework for the specification of a Rights Data Dictionary and a Rights Expression Language. These requirements will be used in two ways: Firstly, as a basis for comparison against submissions in response to a Call for Proposals to evaluate the ability of each proponent's solutions to fulfil the stated requirements; And secondly, as a guide to measure the functionality and scope of an MPEG specification for a Rights Data Dictionary and a Rights Expression Language..."
- ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29/WG11/N4318. "MPEG-21 Overview." Edited by Jan Bormans and Keith Hill (Requirements Group). 10 pages. Sydney, July 2001.
- MPEG: Fifty-Eighth WG11 Meeting Notice. "The 58th WG11 meeting will be held in Pattaya, Thailand at the kind invitation of TISI (Thai Industrial Standards Institute). The MPEG meeting will take place from Monday, 3 December 2001 through Friday, 7 December 2001. The meeting will be preceded by a special pre-meeting on RDD/REL Evaluation. The RDD/REL Evaluation pre-meeting will take place from Friday, 30 November 2001T09:00 through Sunday, 2 December 2001T18:00."
- An IDF Service Announcement of November 2001 said that "Rightscom, the digital rights strategy consultancy, had been appointed project manager of the Rights Data Dictionary Consortium and that < indecs >2RDD would be submitted to MPEG for its December Pattaya, Thailand meeting. The scope of < indecs >2RDD embraces the rights description framework, including rightsStatements, rightsAgreements, rightsTransfers, permissions, prohibitions, requirements, legal terminology, creation descriptions and financial terms and conventions..."
- [November 12, 2001] "Object-Based MPEG Offers Flexibility." By Rob Koenen (Senior Director, Technology Initiatives, InterTrust Technologies Corp., Santa Clara, California). In EE Times (November 12, 2001). "... All this interoperability sounds promising, but whatever is achieved may be almost completely undone by efforts to protect the digital assets. As digital multimedia spreads to many different platforms, transmission speeds increase and storage costs fall, digital rights management (DRM) becomes necessary to protect the value of content. In its current form, DRM could appear to be working against the very goal of interoperability, as it locks up the 'standardized content' using nonstandardized protection mechanisms. This development is actually not even recent: Many proprietary conditional access (CA) systems make standard MPEG-2 TV content inaccessible to people who happen to own the wrong set-top box-even when they can receive the signal and are willing to pay the associated content fees. Very early on, MPEG understood that more interoperability in DRM is crucial to the success of an open multimedia infrastructure. While recently a very popular topic in almost every digital forum, five years ago representatives from rights owners, technology providers and CA/DRM providers had already sat down together to discuss the issue in the context of MPEG-4. This gave us the 'hooks': a set of standard interfaces to proprietary Intellectual Property Management and Protection (IPMP) systems, deeply embedded in MPEG-4 Systems. These were a step in the right direction: If you want to play content you 'only' need to plug in the right IPMP system, and where to obtain it can be signaled in the bit stream... The rights information is coded using the two further MPEG-21 parts, the Rights Expression Language (REL) and the Rights Data Dictionary (RDD). These two parts together allow the expression of rights in an interchangeable form, using a standardized syntax (REL, part 5) and standardized terms (RDD, part 6). The call for proposals for these parts is out. Proposals are due at the end of November; the standards will be ready early in 2003. Probably the Rights Expression Language will be based on XML, but equally likely is that it will also have a compact, binary representation to be used under bandwidth-constrained, real-time conditions. Between parts 3 and 5, the work on more interoperable IPMP in MPEG-4 was recently added to MPEG-21 as its fourth element, because it applies to MPEG-7, -2 and -1 just as well..."
- [July 2001] MPEG Press Release. ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 29/WG 11 N4140. "At its 57th meeting, from 16-20 July 2001 in Sydney, Australia, the MPEG-7 Standard was finalized and approved. The MPEG-7 Standard defines highly structured textual and a binary forms for describing multimedia content, from low-level features (colors, shapes, sound frequencies) to high level, semantic information. MPEG progressed its specification for interoperable Intellectual Property Management and Protection (IPMP) to Committee Draft. IPMP is MPEG's term for Digital Rights Management. This specification will allow managed and protected content to be used across compliant devices. This IPMP specification, a part of the MPEG-21 standard, will allow protected content to be used across compliant devices. When completed it can be used with MPEG-4, MPEG-7 'metadata' and when extended it will also include MPEG-2 content... MPEG issued a Call for Proposals for a Rights Expression Language (REL) and a Rights Data Dictionary (RDD), after finalizing its requirements study. Technology proposals are invited by 21-November-2001, and will be evaluated during the December MPEG meeting in Pattaya, Thailand. The REL and RDD will be the 5th and 6th part of MPEG-21. The first part, a Technical Report on MPEG-21, was also finalized at this meeting, after a favorable ballot. The second part, the Digital Item Declaration (DID)' was promoted to Committee Draft, going to the first official ballot stage of three. The DID provides the tools to create a uniform, hierarchical description of how content of composed of resources, ad applies from elements (e.g., an MP3 track or an image) to complete collections. The DID is built on a normative XML Schema, and allows the Digital Item (content) to be used, managed, collected, etc. The third part of MPEG-21 standard is the Digital Item Identification and Description, which defines a unique identifier for multimedia content, and resolution mechanisms to allow discovery of (rights) information about the content. The fourth part deals with generic IPMP..."
"Intellectual Property Management and Protection in MPEG Standards." IPMP. ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29/WG11 N3943. January 2001, Pisa. Based on the position paper submitted on behalf of MPEG for the W3C workshop on DRM, held on 22 and 23 January 2001, in Sophia Antipolis, France. "The MPEG specific term for DRM is 'Intellectual Property Management and Protection' (IPMP). MPEG has a long history in dealing with DRM issues. Gradually, MPEG is moving from defining hooks to proprietary systems (MPEG-2, MPEG-4 Version 1) to more encompassing standardization in Intellectual Property Management and Protection. MPEG feels that this is necessary to achieve MPEG's most important goal: inter-operability. The need for a standard rights description language has been identified in MPEG-4, MPEG-7 and MPEG-21... While rights holders' communities have always played an important role in driving the DRM-related work items in MPEG, crafting the solutions has been a joint effort of the rights holders, manufacturers of conditional access (CA) and DRM systems, ICT and CE industries and the academic community. DRM is usually associated with content exclusively. MPEG has recognized that IP also exists in MPEG Technology. In principle, MPEG-4 IPMP technology can also be applied to manage the usage of this type of IP." [from N3943]
"Intellectual Property Management and Protection in MPEG Standards." By Rob Koenen (Chairman, MPEG Requirements Group). Position Paper for W3C DRM Workshop. [cache]
"[MPEG-21] Position Paper for W3C DRM Workshop." By Mark Rowe (Hewlett Packard) and Zachary Coffin (KPMG Consulting). Presented at the W3C meeting, January 2001. "The authors of this position paper are involved in an effort within MPEG (ISO/IEC JTC 1 SC 29 WG 11) to create an ISO/IEC standard for a multimedia framework (MPEG-21). Digital rights management will be a key component of the MPEG-21 framework. Though the authors are each employed by their respective companies, this position paper is being submitted on behalf of their involvement in the MPEG-21 effort. Mark Rowe (mark_rowe@hp.com) is chair of an outreach program within MPEG-21 that seeks to proactively identify and engage other (non-MPEG) standardization work that is relevant to the MPEG-21 effort."
[June 23, 2001] "Requirements for a Rights Data Dictionary and Rights Expression Language." In response to ISO/IEC JTC1/SC29/WG11 N4044: 'Reissue of the Call for Requirements for a Rights Data Dictionary and a Rights Expression Language -- MPEG-21, March 2001.' By [David Parrott] Reuters. 1 June 2001. Version 1.0. 62 pages. "This document describes Reuters requirements for a Rights Expression Language and Rights Data Dictionary (RDD-REL) in response to the call for requirements made by the MPEG-21 Requirements Committee... Digital Rights Management has for some time been closely linked with the technique of encrypting data files and managing the distribution and application of cryptographic keys in order to limit who can access the content and the manner in which access can take place. That technique is more appropriately labelled 'Digital Rights Enforcement' since it is more about enforcing rights than specifying and managing them. Moreover, even when enforcement is the goal, one might consider a whole array of implementation techniques which may or may not rely on encryption technology. In truth, the management of rights in the digital domain is far wider than the rather restrictive case outlined above. Rights (and obligations) management touches on numerous areas close to the hearts of many companies dealing in intellectual property (IP). Laying enforcement issues to one side, the value cannot be understated of simply being able to describe in a machine readable, standard format, the requirements of an IP owner on all other participants in the value chain. Those requirements can be described, broadly, as Rights and Obligations...A basic requirement for Rights and Obligations management systems to be successful is the ability to communicate Rights and Obligations in a standard form. Machine-readability is key to the dynamic specification of electronic contracts which is, in turn, critical to the dynamic construction of value-chains. A single Rights Expression Language should be common to all aspects of commercial activity. In that way alone, straight through rules processing is made possible. Rights and obligations can be created by different participants in the value-chain and layered upon each other. Data from different sources can be mixed freely without compromising the IP Rights of any of the rights holders. At the same time, the rights of individuals and downstream recipients of content must be protected..." Document source: see the posting from David Parrott (Reuters Limited) of 21-June-2001 to the XACML TC list, and the .ZIP file. Note relevant to the XACML TC discussion: "... I am forwarding FYI Reuters response to MPEG-21's call for requirements for their Rights Data Dictionary and Rights Expression Language. A key point to note is that the response describes a number of features to be included in MPEG's rights expression language that overlap with many of the "differences" I recently heard Simon list between XACML and DRM. These include: (1) fine granularity; (2) the use of rights expressions as policies to drive all manner of enforcement implementations (e.g., file system access, database access, services such as CORBA access, etc); (3) dynamically changing rights (not limited to static objects); (4) predicating rights of access on complex contextual information. There are many others. It would be useful to get people's thoughts on just how close the XACML and MPEG-21 activities are likely to become..."
See also: W3C Workshop on Digital Rights Management [2001-01-22/23], cf. the Call For Participation and program.
See also: "MPEG-21 Part 2: Digital Item Declaration Language (DIDL)."
See also on digital rights management, access control, and authorization:
- "XML and Digital Rights Management (DRM)" - Main reference page.
- OASIS Rights Language
- Patents and Open Standards
- Extensible Access Control Markup Language (XACML)
- Open Digital Rights Language (ODRL)
- "Extensible Rights Markup Language (XrML)."
- Digital Property Rights Language (DPRL)
- "<indecs>2rdd Consortium - Rights Data Dictionary."
- Extensible Media Commerce Language (XMCL)
- PRISM Rights Language (PRL)
- Open Ebook Initiative Rights and Rules Working Group (OeBF)
- Electronic Book Exchange (EBX) Working Group
