Protecting Your Institutions' Lecture Podcast/Vodcast?

[Tantantiniiin]

Is there a way to prevent a lecture in podcast / vodcast form from being downloaded/copied by non-enrollees in an educational institution? Im trying to think of ways to prevent competing institutions from getting a copy of our material and plagiarizing it.

How about legally? by devoting a couple of seconds for a legal warning (sort of a disclaimer)?

Can these lectures podcast/vodcast be programmed to have a "self-destruct" period? So that after a certain period for the programmed learning of the lecture, or after the term, the lectures will just auto erase itself?

Or is it more secure to own the iPods and make it a loaner unit to the students which they will return after the end of the term?

Thanks

[bon]

Digital Rights Management can make it harder to copy content and create self-destructing podcasts after a certain period of time, and of course legal warnings are useful, but in the end there is no effective way to absolutely prevent podcasts from being plagiarized due to the analog hole; i.e., connect your MP3 player's output to a computer or a cassette player and record. Also, the only DRM that works with the iPod is the FairPlay technology that Apple refuses to license to anyone. Likewise, the WMV and WMA DRM technology of Microsoft won't work on iPods.

Perhaps loaning out iPods would be a good way to distribute content (since copying MP3 files off the iPod isn't a straightforward process and requires third party software), but again, it isn't foolproof.

[Tantantiniiin]

Ah yes, the ever present analog hole. Im just wondering how much congruency can be considered plagiarism (that's why Im also following the plagiarism case on the Da Vinci Code)

[macdizon]

As the copyrightholder, your institution can prevent and sue other persons and entites from using its work without permission or authority. Copyright vests at the moment of creation without any need to comply with any formal requirement like registration. If you can prove that a work is yours and somebody is using it without your permission, you can sue for copyright infringement, which includes, among others, the right to: an injunction against the infringer; payment of actual damages; seizure, impounding or destruction of infringing materials; and payment of moral and exemplary damages.

[itungsten]

A more geniune solution to your problem will be the deployment of a Content Management System (like Moodle) so that there is actually an "enrollment key" that students have to key in, in order to download the podcast/vodcast.

HTH