We propose a novel platform for building off-line markets for digital content. The key objective is to enable an arbitrary user of specific digital content to resell it to other users in an off-line peer-to-peer manner so that part of the proceeds go to content’s copyright holder. Most importantly, one part of the revenues is retained by the seller as an incentive for participating in the distributed economy. To address this objective, a transaction is finalized and incentives distributed to the seller on-line using a client-server architecture. Technologically, such systems can be readily created, for example, by adding a communication tool such as Bluetooth to a portable media player such as the iPod. We present a threat model for the proposed system and devise a novel protocol that relies on traditional public-key cryptography to ensure secure and efficient off-line transactions of arbitrary digital content. As a consequence, in our system copyright holders can control the pricing and recruit a powerful marketing and sales force with marginal investment and via various types of incentives, users are offered the ability to sell or purchase content they like anywhere, anytime, and to/from anyone.

Could the blogshere's rumors some times be the ideas someone is thinking aloud ? The technology exists and can be embedded in Zune, Microsoft has it, so it is a matter of decisions to make.

You can get the full white paper from here.

Source: Gizmodo.