Thank you to the following supporters of ICASSP 2007
Philip R. Wiser, President and Chairman, Building B (Former Chief Technology Officer of Sony Corporation of America)
The past decade has been an incredible period for the global media industry. We have seen the onset of network media distribution in print, music, gaming and now video. The growth and resultant impact for each type of media varies as a result of underlying content types, consumption patterns and supporting hardware systems. Additionally, the intersection of key technical developments in network capacity, storage cost, processing power and media compression have accelerated these new digital businesses differently. Nonetheless, the inevitable direction is one that reduces distribution friction for consumers and grows the market. In addition to the technical enablers for distribution, a key industry limitation continues to center on digital rights management (DRM). Many systems have been created to address the myriad legal and business requirements set forth by rights owners and other stakeholders. The result has often been a poor consumer experience due to restrictions and incompatibilities. Another unintended consequence of DRM has also been the unbreakable monopoly of Apple in digital music. A key question now facing these industries is when and how DRM should be applied to digital media to address these issues going forward. This discussion will explore these media revolution issues through Mr. Wiser’s experience. Mr. Wiser has been at the center of network media from his launch of the first commercial Internet music download through creation of the of Sony’s billion dollar digital media businesses. Mr. Wiser has seen the positive technologies and challenging market conditions that accompany the growing impact of digital media industries. He will use this history as a backdrop to explore the future direction of network media. Finally, the discussion will cover the opportunities for new technologies in this ongoing media revolution.
Philip R. Wiser is President and Chairman of Building B, a new
home entertainment technology and services company based in Silicon Valley. As
a founder of Building B, Mr. Wiser is once again creating new technologies and
solutions to accelerate the consumption of network media. Building B has
developed a disruptive approach to media network technology that will
dramatically open the home video and television markets. Prior to starting
Building B, Mr Wiser served as Chief Technology Officer of Sony Corporation of
America (SCA). In this role, Mr. Wiser led Sony’s overall technology strategy
and was responsible for coordinating technology efforts across Sony’s content
companies and growing digital opportunities for Sony, including efforts in
mobile entertainment. Mr. Wiser joined Sony in 2002 as the Chief Technology
Officer and Senior Vice President, Digital Services of Sony Music Entertainment
Inc. He was oversaw all digital media initiatives, including digital music
distribution, mobile music businesses, new physical music formats and
anti-piracy technologies. Prior to joining Sony Music, Mr. Wiser co-founded
Liquid Audio, Inc., in 1996 and served on its Board of Directors and as Chief
Technology Officer of the Company through June 2001. He has also worked in key
industry standard groups such as MPEG, SDMI, and AES to accelerate the adoption
of networked technologies for media distribution. Prior to Liquid Audio, Mr.
Wiser worked extensively in the Silicon Valley. During this time he developed
audio algorithms and audio processing systems for several professional and
consumer audio organizations. He directed audio compression work at Chromatic
Research, a multimedia semiconductor device company. He also served as director
of digital signal processing research for Studer Editech Corporation, a
professional audio recording equipment company. Prior to that, he developed
audio software systems for Sonic Solutions and Euphonix, both developers of
professional digital audio products. Mr. Wiser holds a summa cum laude B.S. in
electrical engineering from the University of Maryland and a M.S. in electrical
engineering from Stanford University in 1993. He spent time at the
world-renowned Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics (CCRMA)
during his tenure at Stanford. He focused his research on digital audio signal
processing algorithms and technologies. Mr. Wiser has developed several patents
covering digital rights management, music distribution systems, and signal
processing. He has also published research in the area of auditory neural
processing and other areas of neurophysiology.