Posting lyrics and scores online is a crime!

[eppie]

Hi,
From an incorrect assumption, the only valid conclusion is that the assumer is an ass.

Throughout history, art has been made because the artist needed money.  Check out the 'sponsors' of art in the middle ages and the Renaissance.  They didn't give the artists money for the hell of it.  They paid talented people for decorations in their churches and their homes. 

I think it not very valuable to compare these things. As you said yourself you are talking about decoration, not art. We call it art now.
I mean I can also start giving examples....but they usually only complicate a discussion.
But OK. I don't think Michelangelo had 50 managers behind him to help him get a smuch money as possible (and themselves even more). Michelangelo was actually good at things....Britney Spears...well..

It is a different world now.

Look at how much art is portraits -- done for he money.  Shakespeare didn't give a damn about creativity, he wanted a full house because he mostly worked on shares.  Dumas (father and son) wrote their plays for money and their prose at so much per word.  Bach's job was to create a new organ piece for each week's mass, just as the rector's job was to come up with a new sermon. And if either failed, there was no one to pass a plate to.  Scott gave us Waverly and Ivanhoe because he needed the money and that was the only thing he was capable of doing at the time.

That goes on to modern times, with RAH writing because his physical condition didn't allow him to take another job.  Money is why bands perform, otherwise there wouldn't be cover charges.  Movie theaters charge admission because everybody in the film food chain wants their bite.

Thank you for this information. Mind you I'm not against selling things you made.

Indeed, typically good art is made for money -- it must satisfy both the artist and the patron.  Art "for its own sake" is usually worthless crap that no one but the artist likes, and often not even the artist likes it.

There is a difference between art and decoration. And still, selling a painting you made is different than the music business nowadays.

Separating ignorant suckers from their money is a time honored tradition.  If you are included in that "we" then you have my condolences for your intellectual weakness.  If you are not included, then you've no right to complain.

Because I have to be selfish?

Sorry, I have neither the time nor the energy to decipher this paragraph.  But one thing I think you said is crap.  You imply that intellectual theft was recently criminalized.  Actually, that condition predates computers and copiers by a good long while.

--Pete
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No I don't imply that. I'm implying that when everybody was still taping music from the radio or friends nobody cared. Now the digital ages has surpassed the people come up with new ways to share files etc etc. the music industry realizes again that they have to get their money from other things like selling T-shirts and giving concerts.

(by the way, I don't really have the idea the music industry suffers so much from illegal copying....OK people 'own" more music....but don't spend less)

[eppie]

Snort, good effort on the joke,  :D  but it isn't theft.  Sales of junk for money is applying PT Barnum's maxim to its fullest: there is a sucker born every minute, and two to take him. 

Whoever spent the money on Spears' stuff was either happy with the purchase (rubes IMO) or was dumb enough to be sheared by any huckster.  :P 

Did you ever read Fritz Lieber's "Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser" stories?  There was a good story in one of the early collections wholse plot lampooned the selling of junk advertised as treasure.  I think the evil monsters were called Consumers or something like that.

Occhi
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I fully agree Occhi, but I don't like it. I know why these things go as they go, but for me a healthy economic system does not contain these kind of things. 1 artist, 10 commercials experts, 10 managers etc. etc., just to sell CDs.

[Guest]

I agree with 1 thing.

I never could understand why the theft of literature, software (including games), and other intellectual properties is wrong....

--Pete
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That point was not your intent, but from a moral/ethical perspective I have never bought into out modern notion of copyrights. I think it should be ilegal to sell someone else creation for your commercial gain, but copy and use should be legal.

[yangman]

Oh look! What do we have here? Google Music?

I say, google's middle finger must be getting a great workout. ;)

[Jester]

Wouldn't that mean that Shakespeare and Mozart would not yet have passed into public domain?

There has to be some cutoff date, otherwise things which are consistently popular will never fall out of copyright, including your Greensleeves example. Maybe a century would be good?

-Jester

[Jester]

Art is almost always more than a job to the artist.

It is usually (not always, but usually) a tough way to live. Perceptive, creative people could probably find a job managing your taxes or mowing your lawns, but instead choose a risky, low-income life.

They do so out of personal desire. Sure, it was Bach's job to compose original organ music for mass, but there were thousands of people across Europe with that job. It is Bach we remember, because he went far above and beyond the call of duty. He could have been half the musician he was, or put in a fraction of the effort, and kept his job just fine. And there must have been better paying jobs than church organist available for a person of his intellect.

So, he must have had other reasons for doing what he did. For Bach, I'm sure religion played a big part. For other artists, it might be expression, ambition (or, in Joyce's case, megalomania), fame, insanity, or any one of a hundred other reasons. But it's almost always a tough life to choose, and yet some people choose it over all sorts of other, more economically beneficial, options.

So, yes. They get paid. And it's rare to find great art where that isn't the case. But the most important considerations are elsewhere.

-Jester

[eppie]

Art is almost always more than a job to the artist.


So, yes. They get paid. And it's rare to find great art where that isn't the case. But the most important considerations are elsewhere.

-Jester
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Of course artists should get paid. But, never ever has their art become better because they got paid more. (well maybe in volume, all those great masters from the 16, 17 and 18 th century that had a whole battalion of helpers to do most of the painting for them).

But what started this threat (the modern music business) has very little to do with art.
Singers see that with their well-oiled media machine can make millions of dollars with selling crap, will never be triggered to make something good.

[Jarulf]

Remember, even the movie rights to a book must be bought from the copyright holder, in spite that the movie will eventually share little more than the title and name of the main character with the book.

Not really, there is no such thing as a "movie right". If you need it, it is because you would otherwise infringe on for example a copyright or possibly a trademark. In your example, only using the title and nothing much else, it would then possibly be due to trademark issues. I really can't say if books and movies end up in the same category for trademarks, but I assume they might and hence IF trademarked, you might need to get a license for that.

If you use a far larger part of the book, story, context, characters and so on, then it would either be a direct infringement or you might end up with derivative works which again would make it impossible to really do much with the film without the original copyright holders permission. But just title and name of a character? Should be no problem at all.

[Jarulf]

As to the rest, I never could understand why the theft of literature, software (including games), and other intellectual properties is wrong,

Typically because most countries has laws against stealing things. If you steal a book from me you would typically commit some sort of crime (lets disregard the ammount we steal here as that may have importance in some cases for the definition of the crime and so on). The same if you steal one of my games, my vacum cleaner, my car or many other things I have.

I am a bit unsure what you mean about "intellectual property" though (and even more with the "other" part. It is really a very innappropriate naming but typically people refer to such divers things as copyright, patents and trademarks when they use it. Considering the context, I would assue you mean copyright but I admit that I have never heared anyone ever stealing a copyright. You have an example? Still baffled about the "other" part though. What extra do you put into it that no one else do? And why not write, for example copyright if you mean it?

but the theft of musical intellectual properties is right.

I am still a bit confused on your terminology here.

The way I see it, the creator of the work owns it.

Depend on what you mean by "own" and what you refer to by "work". Of course, it also matters if you tell your opinion or tries to tell what the legal stand point is.

Typically a "work" can't be owned at all, you can get copyright to it though. That does not mean you own the work at all though, you only have a few defined (by law) rights to it. They are VERY different to what applies to "owning" though, and that is why the "intellectual property" naming is so bad since copyright (for example) has basically nothing in common with normal property, for one, you can't own it and second, the rights that prevents others from do stuff, is things that does not apply to normal properties.

If you refer to individual COPIES of a work (it is a very different issue, I will give you link to the definitions from the US copyright laws since I believe you are american at the end of this post) then the situation is different. Those are indeed properties and of course are owned by whoever creates them. Typically, but not always, this means the copyright holder since they are the ones who normally can make copies. However, others can make copies too, for example due to various fair use provisions. In those cases, the copyright holder will NOT be the owner of the copy when it is made. Those copies can then be given away, sold and so on so that someone else becomes the owner of them. The transfer of such ownership has nothing to do with the copyright holding and the change of one does not imply the other (see link I provided). This is yet another reason why "intellectual property" is such a bad thing to call it since copies of a work are indeed normal property and normal laws and such applies. Hence you can indeed "steal" a copy of a work, but not nessecarilly form the copyright holder but from whoever ownes that copy at the time.

What I believe you actually are refering to when it comes to "theft of music" and such above is thus not really theft at all unless you talk about people running arround stealing copies of the work (for example the CDs) from peoples home. I have never heared that would be right either by the way. I assume you talk about the creation of NEW copies, that is copying, which is copyright infringement. That applies equally to music and the lyrics that is made to it (two seperate copyright by the way and when tossed together and performed there is a third copyright on that performance by the way).

  If he wants to give it away

Give what away? The copyright or individual copies? The copyright holder can give away the copyright, but I assume you mean individual copies? If he is no longer in possession or the owner of them, the copyright holder can't control or prevent that (in most cases). That is, I am free to give away a music CD or a book I have. If you talk about making NEW copies, that is something very different of course. But in that case, it does not typically matters if he gives it away or not, however, the giving away of such new copies might be an addition infringement though.

(e.g., freeware and copyleft-ed material), that's his choice.  If someone else gives it away without his permission, then that's theft.

See above. Are you arguing that giving away something is theft? How on earth did you come to that conclusion? So if I give you my vacum cleaner without some permision (from the manufacturer?) I commit theft? I am not aware of any country with such laws. Same with a music CD (for example), I don't need any permision to give it away from anyone. I think you have missunderstood the law.

I also fail to see what this has to do with the initial topic, of peeople making copies of a litterate work and making such copies available to the public, one or both of which is probably copyright infringement. If others then make copies out of that, they might in addition also commit copyright infringement. There would be no "giving away" going on at all though, yet a lot of possible copyright infringement.

  People who engage in large scale theft belong in jail.

Typically anyone who commit a crime for were there is a possibility by the law to get sentenced to jail would be long in jail. How you logically came to this conclusion from your previous text I levae as an excersize to the other readers though, there are so many holes in it that it probably can be a thread in itself :)


As to the original topic, yes, it is most likely copyright infringement in most cases to put out copies of the lyrics on the net. I read that there has been an appology from the music studio/person though for their complain:

http://www.wired.com/news/digiwood/0,1412,69856,00.html

Still what is legally right or wrong might not always be the same that is acceptable or ok to do.



Ohh, and the link I promissed above:

http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/usc...01----000-.html

[--Pete]

Hi,

Art is almost always more than a job to the artist.
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Science is almost always more than a job to the scientist.

There are jobs and there are vocations. Your statement could be paraphrased with almost any vocation :) And most of the rest of your post, suitably altered, still fits.

But we are in agreement. It does take talent and drive. But it also takes some external motivation, or we get a Cavendish, a Tesla, or a Newton without ego. And the scientific discovery, the music, the painting, the poem, etc., that is not shared might as well not exists.

--Pete

[--Pete]

Hi,

Singers see that with their well-oiled media machine  can make millions of dollars with selling crap, will never be triggered to make something good.
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Two things strike me as odd here.

First, is it the media's fault that the bulk of the population thrives on trash? Is it, or even should it be, the function of the supplier to ensure that the customer gets what he needs and not what he wants? No one, as far as I know, is forced to buy trash food, trash entertainment, trash art. So, if so much of it is being sold, it is because of the lack of taste or the weakness of will of the buyer, not the rapacity of the seller. Health food stores are in the minority not because McDonalds outdoes them in advertising, but because McDonalds gives the people what they want. And, based on my last browse through Best-Buy, classical music, old rock, R&B, jazz, etc. are all still alive and well. Your grip sounds puerile to me. You have the right to dislike the MTV crap (as do I). You have the right not to support it with your hard earned money (or even your easily acquired money). But to blame the suppliers for meeting the demands of their audience is foolish, it is backward, and it smacks of a sophomoric outlook on life.

But, second, supporting the theft of intellectual material because it doesn't meet your standard of excellence is illogical. I find modern automobile design boring, tasteless, derived, and repetitive. Does that, then, give me the right to break into a dealership some night and give their cars away? Admittedly, the auto companies give a little bit more value for the money, but I don't think any recoding company is in the Fortune 500 while at least one auto company is. So, your justification of theft as revenge for ripping off the public applies more to GM then X Label Studios.

But, even more puzzling, is the question: If the material is crap and selling it should be a crime, then why would you want to spread it, for free or otherwise? It seems like you'd want to suppress it. And one way to do that would be to, not only sell it, but to sell it for such an exorbitant sum that even a star struck teeny-booper will refuse to buy it.

--Pete

[Occhidiangela]

Not really, there is no such thing as a "movie right".  [right][snapback]97482[/snapback][/right]

I had never thought of movie rights in that light, so I took your remark and looked into a few articles by lawyers. You look to be correct.

Volokh Explains a few things about movies and "movie rights"

Thanks for contributing to my education, albeit indirectly. :)

Occhi

[--Pete]

Hi,

Wouldn't that mean that Shakespeare and Mozart would not yet have passed into public domain?

There has to be some cutoff date, otherwise things which are consistently popular will never fall out of copyright, including your Greensleeves example. Maybe a century would be good?

-Jester
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I can't speak to the others, but Shakespeare was definitely 'out of print' for a long time since only seven years after his death were (some) of his plays published. And all things 'theater' were suppressed during the interregnum.

But, I suspect, that all classical literature and music is long since in the public domain by my standard. Out of print does not mean inaccessible. The Dead Sea Scrolls are being studied by scholars to this day, yet I doubt if they have been "in print" anytime in the past two millennia or thereabouts ;)

So, if Simon and Garfunkel are looking for a song for the background to a movie, and find a canticle on the demands of love in some ancient collection, as long as that canticle hasn't been reprinted in a reasonable length of time, it is free for them to use. Of course, when they do use it, it does not give them the rights to Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme -- but it does give them the rights to their particular arrangement.

--Pete

[eppie]

Hi,
Two things strike me as odd here.

F
--Pete
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And I will answer those questions.
First, as I said before I know this, people are not forced to buy something. But this is exactly the point of capitalism that I personally don't like. I would never "take advantage" of persons in this way, and I don't like people that do.
And if this music and those hamburgers are so good, and everybody wanted to have it, stop advertising them!
Also economically this is a major theme. If people would not buyt Britney Spears" record they would have money left to buy other records or not. Apparantly record comapnies find it worthwhile to spend a lot on advertisements to lure more people in buying their records. Then to my situation. I would spend a certain amount of money on music per year. If I buy "say" 6 CD's my money is finished, I will anyway not buy anything anymore. What is then so bad about me listening to some other music on my ipod. I mean it is not that they have to do anything for it, it does not cost them extra work, and if you think about it it doesn's cost them any money.

But, even more puzzling, is the question: If the material is crap and selling it should be a crime, then why would you want to spread it, for free or otherwise? It seems like you'd want to suppress it. And one way to do that would be to, not only sell it, but to sell it for such an exorbitant sum that even a star struck teeny-booper will refuse to buy it.

I don't think selling it should be a crime!?!? And I don't want to supress anything, I just don't want to be bothered by the worlds super-rich because they need a 7th house. If they can live with the knowledge that they squeeze all the money out of 12 year olds pockets, that is their own decision, but stop bothering us.

[Fragbait]

I just don't want to be bothered by the worlds super-rich because they need a 7th house
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Now if that ain't the long-stretched arm of good ol' Karl Marx speaking here... :huh:

Be careful, my friend. For a starving Ethiopian (I know I'm serving a cliché here), you might be the super-rich s.o.a.b.


Greetings, Fragbait

[eppie]

Now if that ain't the long-stretched arm of good ol' Karl Marx speaking here... :huh:

Be careful, my friend. For a starving Ethiopian (I know I'm serving a cliché here), you might be the super-rich s.o.a.b.
Greetings, Fragbait
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No not a cliche, you are right. But I don't threaten people with lawsuits. :mellow:

(p.s. what does s.o.a.b. stand for?)

[Jarulf]

But, second, supporting the theft of intellectual material because it doesn't meet your standard of excellence is illogical.

You continue to talk about some sort of theft, yet have not said what you really mean. Actually, I would say that you are the only one talking about stealing things, while others are talking about things such as creating copies or making things available to the public.

  I find modern automobile design boring, tasteless, derived, and repetitive.  Does that, then, give me the right to break into a dealership some night and give their cars away?

What does this example have to do with what he talked about? Have he claimed it is OK to break into the artists home and stealing a copy of his music? Of course not, so why do you try to compare the two things. On the other hand, if you felt the automobile was so bad, would it then be bad to build your OWN identical one? Quite a different situation.

You are trying to compare physical objects to non physical ones and of course ends up wrong. In addition, you have still not understood how copyright makes the distinction of the two and that ownership of the copyright to a work is not the same as ownership of copies of the work.

But then, I guess that since you probably feel it is theft to break into a coffe shop and steal a cup of coffe, you also feel it is theft making your own identical cup of coffe no? After all, it is all the same to steal and to make a copy, no?

[Occhidiangela]

No not a cliche, you are right. But I don't threaten people with lawsuits.  :mellow:

(p.s. what does s.o.a.b. stand for?)
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He incorrectly used s.o.a.b for s.o.b. which is an abbreviation for

Son of a bi**h, written sometimes as "sonofabi**h" and "sunnuvabi**h." The term has mutated here in Texas to where some folks pronounce it as "sumbi**h"

The literal inference is that the subject's mother was a dog, or generally of low worth as a human, though that has lost currencly. It is now a general perjorative term.

Usage is as a subsitution for a person:

"Why you s.o.b. you stole my SOJ"

It is sometimes used in an exclamatory fashion, to show surprise or amazement:

"Well I'll be a green skinned s.o.b!"

It can be used to connotate general harshness of spirit:

"I can be a real nice guy, or I can be a real s.o.b."

Glad to be of help. :D

Occhi

[eppie]

He incorrectly used s.o.a.b for s.o.b. which is an abbreviation for

Son of a bi**h, written sometimes as "sonofabi**h" and "sunnuvabi**h."  The term has mutated here in Texas to where some folks pronounce it as "sumbi**h"


Glad to be of help.  :D

Occhi
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Man!! I did not know people already used abbreviations for swearwords nowadays.
Well, we learn everyday....

[Jester]

So, the moral of the story is, don't make art if you think that Oliver Cromwell might be coming to town in the next century or so.

:D

-Jester