Likewise, metering and subscription technologies are directed at end-use or consumer access, solving the distributor's problem of collecting payment for use without solving the multimedia developer's production issues. Proposed solutions have little to do with collaboration and sharing and everything to do with keeping information under lock and key. The goal of attribution has always been to ensure that credit is given where credit is due. Attribution can be as simple as identifying a work and its creator, or it can be quite complex and extensive, listing the variety of source works from which a derivative work is composed and the creative contributors. Today some works are distributed with licensing terms and conditions clearly noted to facilitate collaboration and re-use.
Enhanced attribution is more than a verifiable stamp of identification for a work.
It bridges the gap between the creator and user, facilitating real-time rights transactions and other networked communications. Minimum permissions represent a unique, systematic way to provide for free and fair use, options which metering and subscription solutions do not consider. As derivative works are prepared the attribution records for source works are accumulated and become part of the final attribution for that work. Enhanced attribution is different because it focuses on making compliance and related communications extremely easy rather than on making cheating hard. Multimedia developers and electronic publishers are in large part honest people who spend a large percentage of their production costs in the effort to be honest as they produce great works.