KVR Audio

soulkraka · Post by **soulkraka** » Sun Nov 20, 2005 9:38 am

rounser wrote:
If you were the talented drummer who laid your grooves down on some classic soul/funk track back in the 60s/70s and you were now maybe short of work to support your family in your latter years, how would you feel to hear YOUR work being commercially exploited by someone with a sampler who just lifted a few bars of YOUR work off some old record and re-packaged it as their own creation?
It's shades of grey, though, and the law comes down like it's black and white - and heavy - basically because it neither understands nor wants to understand the details of sampling nor new technology, and loves extending precedents set decades earlier, then generalising them over similar, but-not-exactly-the-same territory.

Copying an entire song and passing it off as your own is not the same as sampling a single guitar note and making an entirely new composition out of it, but the law would treat it as such.

Your example would make more sense if it were the talented drummer doing the suing rather than his record company (and maybe passing on nothing to said drummer) and if a differentiation was made between sampling entire bars, or sampling a single drum sound...or sampling entire bars and effecting them beyond recognition...or putting them in a totally new context such that they're beyond recognition. But sampling gets no respect - there's no art in it, you're just a dirty thief.

The same RIAA suing these thieves then goes and makes millions off of them selling hip hop.

Said drummer (or drummer's record label) would never have seen a further cent if his work wasn't sampled. If it weren't for the concept of creative control over how his work could be used (which is arguably tenuous, because from a certain point of view he put it in the public domain by selling it in the first place) he should be thanking the samplist for the new income.

You do have a point, but the laws as they stand are oppressive because they serve silliness like demanding 100% of the profits of a track for a single sound. You paint it like it's the little guy suffering, but the laws seem to be more in the interest of some suit scrounging more dough. e.g. Disney extending copyright perpetually so their hold on Mickey Mouse doesn't run out.

Compromises can (and should) be made, such as in the example of parody. The US Supreme Court understands parody, and wouldn't want a world without it, so they make exceptions to copyright law for it. They don't understand sampling, and can quite easily imagine a world without it, and so there are no exceptions for it.

word

hollowsun · Post by **hollowsun** » Sun Nov 20, 2005 9:07 pm

rounser wrote:It's shades of grey, though, and the law comes down like it's black and white.....
<snip>

All very good and pertinent points, rounser

However, to simply perpetuate the practice and hope you'll get away with it, ain't gonna change anything... somehow, some movement is gonna have to try and change the law - to highlight that there are degrees of 'sampling' as you describe.

As for the original musicians not suing the 'samplist' themselves, I suspect that few could afford to do it themselves.

As for the big corporates, well... yes - you have have a point and I have fallen foul of them myself. The weirdest one was with the BBC eight years ago..... my 1-year-old daughter loved the Teletubbies and for a laugh (and for her amusement), I made a few Teletubby icons for my Mac. I also gave 'em to a few nutty adult friends of mine who found the surreal activities of the Tubbies amusing. One of those happened to know the writer of the Tubbies and showed them to him and he thought they were great as well and, knowing that the Beeb were making some Teletubby game CD, suggested I show them to the appropriate BBC department. I was given a contact number and phoned and explained the situation and the person I spoke to was interested and so asked me to send them in to them for their evaluation and possible inclusion in the forthcoming game. So I did and waited to hear from them. Their response was very swift but not what I was expecting - a letter from their legal department saying that by the very creation of these icons, I had transgressed their international copyright and had therefore committed an illegal act ... that I was to destroy every copy that had been made ... etc.!! As it happens, the whole thing blew over (this was a stock letter they send out automatically in cases like this) but all the same, it stank of corporate bully-boy tactics!

And there is a curious irony in all of this 'copyright usage' - you contact the copyright owner to ask permission and (assuming they don't refuse point blank) they will ask for an example which, when you provide it, technically puts you in contravention of their copyright

The whole issue of copyright is only going to get worse before it gets better though and it is no exaggeration to say that there are organisations who employ people whose sole job is to seek out copyright contravention. You can take a chance and you might get away with it ... equally, you might not! It will take a strong individual to argue their case of 'acceptable use' in a court of law when faced with a team of corporate rottweilers determined to nail your arse to the wall!!

Steve

vurt · Post by **vurt** » Sun Nov 20, 2005 9:19 pm

its the bbc they just dont like kvr members obviously

hollowsun · Post by **hollowsun** » Sun Nov 20, 2005 10:29 pm

vurt wrote:its the bbc they just dont like kvr members obviously

No! No conspiracy theory there vurt! This was a long time before I joined KVR!

vurt · Post by **vurt** » Sun Nov 20, 2005 11:56 pm

hollowsun wrote:
vurt wrote:its the bbc they just dont like kvr members obviously
No! No conspiracy theory there vurt! This was a long time before I joined KVR!

but the bbc have a tardis

hollowsun · Post by **hollowsun** » Mon Nov 21, 2005 1:22 am

vurt wrote:but the bbc have a tardis

Emmmmm ... vurt.... I don't want to burst any bubbles but.....

That isn't real. It's all pretend!

Or didn't you know. Sorry if I have spoilt the illusion

Steve

Treeper · Post by **Treeper** » Mon Nov 21, 2005 1:28 am

Next you'll be telling us Father Christmas isn't real!

vurt · Post by **vurt** » Mon Nov 21, 2005 1:31 am

hollowsun · Post by **hollowsun** » Mon Nov 21, 2005 1:44 am

herodotus · Post by **herodotus** » Mon Nov 21, 2005 1:56 am

hollowsun wrote:
vurt wrote:but the bbc have a tardis
Emmmmm ... vurt.... I don't want to burst any bubbles but.....

That isn't real. It's all pretend!

Or didn't you know. Sorry if I have spoilt the illusion

Steve

If it's all pretend, then why does it seem that kvr is caught in a chronic historysis?

Maybe its more real than you know.

The Chase · Post by **The Chase** » Wed Nov 23, 2005 2:21 am

Best thread ever

djsubject · Post by **djsubject** » Wed Nov 23, 2005 2:52 am

Chase wrote:Best thread ever

+1

i might even sample it

The Chase · Post by **The Chase** » Wed Nov 23, 2005 3:11 am

opia · Post by **opia** » Wed Nov 23, 2005 10:53 am

Chase wrote: The only reason you throw personal attacks is because of how ridiculously insecure you become when threatened intellectually.

Spe3D · Post by **Spe3D** » Wed Nov 23, 2005 10:55 am

You got nothing better to do opia?

Best regards,

Spe3d

:O)

Sample whatever you want!