Mark Cuban has some ideas on how to eliminate content theft:
The entire content industry is missing a unique opportunity to eliminate most content piracy and more importantly, to generate a whole lot more revenue by offering revenue sharing. If the NYTimes, to use them an example, were to offer 50 pct of the revenue generated from traffic delivered by affiliated websites, not a single website with half a clue would steal your content. Instead, every blogger, splogger and small content creator would look to find ways to link to your content and drive you traffic. Companies like LinkShare offer revenue sharing programs for product sales, why not offer the same for advertising sales ?
This is an interesting idea. I have no doubt that such a system would eliminate the benefit of content scraping. If I can make more money with a link to somebody’s content than with the content itself, why would I choose to steal the content?
However, I wonder if this solution would only shift the problem. Couldn’t you game such a system by renting a few thousand zombie machines to follow the link on your splog and collect a fat cheque from the content producer?
Ken Dyck 