Musical files and chords
Hi all, I made an ITP for a software named mma. This one generates musical accompaniment based on chords. The generated files are midi files. The upstream does provides examples, based on music that are not free. He thinks that distributing chords, and not melody, is legal. I tried to find some references about this and did not found anything useful. Can some one give me some web resources where I could find informations about this ? Here is the quote from upstream : > I may be wrong ... but I don't think that I am :) The .mma files > are all permissible since the ONLY contain the CHORDS, not the melody > and lyrics. Ummm, exception on lyrics is the file twinkle.mma; and I > think that is PD. > > The .mid files are fine as well since they are all generated from the > .mma files via mma. > > Please check around on this with the legal experts, but I'm quite > sure that chord files are okay. If not, I'd like to know as well. > Certainly, lyrics are a problem and if I were to show melody on non-PD > songs that would be as well. As you can see, he's willing to know. This is good, if I can find a way to convince him with your help (or that you tell me he's right). Raphael
Re: Musical files and chords
On Fri, 2004-01-16 at 15:53, Henning Makholm wrote: > I don't think there is a single answer to this which holds in > general. Many popular tunes work with chord sequences that are so > generic and nondescript that it would be ridiculous to claim a > copyright on them. For example, something such as You're right on this part. Since the chords are associated with the song name, this is a copyright violation. If the chords were provided without reference to the song, they could be considered generic ... > Somewhere in between those two examples there is a line, with a wide > and fuzzy grey area around it. That's why I choose to not provide the examples in the debian package. > For the purpose of providing examples, it would be prudent to stick to > very generic changes, and music that has passed into the public domain. Thanks for this answer, I'll forward upstream. Raphael
Re: Musical files and chords
On Fri, 2004-01-16 at 19:27, Henning Makholm wrote: > I don't think so. If the chord sequence is not protected by copyright > in itself, it does not magically become protected by your telling what > it is. If you provide the arrangement under the name of the song ? This can be considered as derivative work. And I found evidences that derivative work from a song IS prohibited. The question is ... Is the association of the song name + chords considered as derivative work ? Raphael
Re: Musical files and chords
Hi, mma's upstream decided to provide the most generic files with the program, and to provided the others on his site, with a mention in the README file. I think this is quite good. Thanks for your help on this case, Raphael
Re: Musical files and chords
Le mar 20/01/2004 à 21:33, Jakob Bohm a écrit : > In the widely used Danish songbook "555 Sange" (555 songs), the > preface to the Second Edition reads in its entirety > (translated): Thanks a lot for this additional information :) Raphael
[Fwd: Re: [Fwd: Re: Musical files and chords]]
Hi all, Here is a mail I received from mma's upstream. He provides a link to a page giving good information on public domain musics, and how to identify them. I found the explanation useful, and have be referenced somewhere (like the archives of this list). Raphael -Message transféré- > From: Bob van der Poel > Subject: Re: [Fwd: Re: Musical files and chords] > Date: Tue, 20 Jan 2004 19:08:44 -0700 > > > >>Given that this is from a professional publisher, who has > >>obviously done extremely thorough copyright clearing > >>negotiations to get all those 555 melodies in the book, one > >>might assume that they did not remove those chord annotations > >>without strong legal advice of its necessity. > > Well, isn't that interesting. Of course, just because some says "I have > copyright on x", that doesn't mean they do ... see the SCO/Linux debate > for the truth of this. > > I wondering if in the songbook case someone wrote the chords over the PD > music? Well, it sure is interesing. > > I did a bit of searching, and figured you might enjoy reading the pages > here: http://www.pdinfo.com/identify.htm > > Thanks for the info. >
Re: License bugs for sarge
Le mar 27/01/2004 à 04:49, Nathanael Nerode a écrit : > 228085: airstrike > -- unhelpful upstream, will probably need to be removed from sid I don't know about unhelpful upstream, but I'm the one who filled the five bug reports on airstrike, this one included. Five newer upstream releases are available since end 2002. These releases are GPL'ed, but not the one packaged in debian. So the actual airstrike package should be removed, I second that. Newest upstream release does include the GPL statement, but have some sound files of uncertain origin. These should be purged from the sources before the upload. I don't know if the maintainer is willing to do this job, so I put him on CC: Raphael
