Stanford graduate student Gary Lerhaupt has put together Bittorrent-like data transfer, Creative Commons licensing, and Paypal to create Prodigem Marketplace. Success will depend on achieving a critical mass of culture creators and paying culture consumers — but if that happens, Lerhaupt might well have come up with a viable answer to the DRM wars. Peer-to-peer distribution isn’t a crime — stealing is a crime. So why not create a p2p marketplace where people can upload their work and know that the system will mediate transactions? There’s a huge potential market out there in the long tail, once someone succeeds at what Gary is trying to do.

The Prodigem Marketplace allows Prodigem users to sell their independent media (videos, music, etc) while not concerning themselves with traditional bandwidth costs associated with repeated large data transfers. Content providers (YOU!) simply upload their work, set a price, and Prodigem does the rest. Once customers pay for access to the bit torrent peer-to-peer session for your content, Prodigem grants them access so they can begin their download (no DRM). Prodigem collects this revenue, removes 10% + transaction costs (PayPal) and then sends you a monthly check. Ever considered making a living as a Long Tailor? Check out this example for-pay torrent to see what it looks like.

The Prodigem Marketplace is currently in a limited beta mode. We are currently looking for a small number of people who would be interested in selling their content in this fashion and believe they have a pool of demand that they can bring with them. In the future when this service is made generally available, it will carry with it a small monthly fee, but until that time it is being offered free of charge. Please contact our request address if you are interested in more information or watch the blog.