A wierd copywrite law question

[james0tucson]

As to your rant, stealing is stealing. You can justify it anyway you wish (obviously), but you're still a thief.

In my country, stealing is theft, which is a criminal offense, and copyright infringement is a question of civil responsibility for damage, which is dealt with very differently in the court system.

It is disingenuous and misinformative to dismiss the poster's question by simply stating that "stealing is stealing."

If you were to actually expore this question, you would probably find that the doctrine of Fair Use makes it acceptable to use arbitrarily small excerpts of copyrighted works in an academic or critical mode.

Wanker. Look in the mirror. That's what a jerkoff looks like.

If KVR had a killfile, you'd be in it, as would anyone who sinks to ad-hominem.

I understand that copyright is a hot-button issue, but I understand better that it's a sword that cuts both ways (slices a 2*pi radian path, even), and that ascribing too much power to copyright will bring the ultimate destruction of the arts.

How will music textbooks be written, if the people writing them are afraid to touch music?

Works are published routinely with excerpts from other works, and as long as they are properly attributed, the case to be made for damages is very thin, at best. Certainly, it is not regarded as "stealing", and it is irresponsible and dangerous to equate copyright with property crimes. Holding this mindset will not serve you either as an artist or as a consumer.

To be fair, I suggest the original poster pass a freshman-level English course before embarking on a book project.

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[james0tucson]

bottomline, even though your just copying the bars the old fashion way its still illegal to do so and try to benifit from it. DOH thats what COPYRITE means dont copy ppl stuff in any way shape or form.

I don't believe you've studied copyright law yourself.
I think it's dangerous for the blind to be leading the blind, since there's a lot of disinformation, myths, misconceptions, and outright lies going around.

Consult a lawyer, a literary agent, a talent agent, or anyone who has ever published anything of any substance, for useful advice.

The kind of advice you get in this forum will just get you in trouble, provoke so much fear that you won't ever write anything, or cost you dearly if you try to sue someone, with no case.

[deleted]

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[Equilibrium]

As to your rant, stealing is stealing. You can justify it anyway you wish (obviously), but you're still a thief.

In my country, stealing is theft, which is a criminal offense, and copyright infringement is a question of civil responsibility for damage, which is dealt with very differently in the court system.

It is disingenuous and misinformative to dismiss the poster's question by simply stating that "stealing is stealing."

If you were to actually expore this question, you would probably find that the doctrine of Fair Use makes it acceptable to use arbitrarily small excerpts of copyrighted works in an academic or critical mode.

Wanker. Look in the mirror. That's what a jerkoff looks like.

If KVR had a killfile, you'd be in it, as would anyone who sinks to ad-hominem.

I understand that copyright is a hot-button issue, but I understand better that it's a sword that cuts both ways (slices a 2*pi radian path, even), and that ascribing too much power to copyright will bring the ultimate destruction of the arts.

How will music textbooks be written, if the people writing them are afraid to touch music?

Works are published routinely with excerpts from other works, and as long as they are properly attributed, the case to be made for damages is very thin, at best. Certainly, it is not regarded as "stealing", and it is irresponsible and dangerous to equate copyright with property crimes. Holding this mindset will not serve you either as an artist or as a consumer.

To be fair, I suggest the original poster pass a freshman-level English course before embarking on a book project.

Thank you, that was very informative. I guess that as with most things regarding the law nothing is clear cut. I will investigate some of the points you have raised as I do have many books on classical music theory that have excerpts from famous pieces, and although it is different in that the composers are dead, I couldn't imagine them having to do anything regarding copyright laws.

If KVR had a killfile, you'd be in it, as would anyone who sinks to ad-hominem.
...
To be fair, I suggest the original poster pass a freshman-level English course before embarking on a book project

[Equilibrium]

bottomline, even though your just copying the bars the old fashion way its still illegal to do so and try to benifit from it. DOH thats what COPYRITE means dont copy ppl stuff in any way shape or form.

I don't believe you've studied copyright law yourself.
I think it's dangerous for the blind to be leading the blind, since there's a lot of disinformation, myths, misconceptions, and outright lies going around.

Consult a lawyer, a literary agent, a talent agent, or anyone who has ever published anything of any substance, for useful advice.

The kind of advice you get in this forum will just get you in trouble, provoke so much fear that you won't ever write anything, or cost you dearly if you try to sue someone, with no case.

That sounds like good advice to me. I'm glad I transcribed the patterns before thinking about the legality issues, as I really don't want to give them up now.

[nuffink]

Equilibrium,

Google "Drum Tab". There are hundreds of sites and tens of thousands of tabs. Each of these sites has a legal disclaimer and they all say pretty much the same thing. I'd assume they'd done their homework.
As a big plus you won't have to put up with juvenile abuse from the armchair lawyers.

Good luck with the book.

[Equilibrium]

Equilibrium,

Google "Drum Tab". There are hundreds of sites and tens of thousands of tabs. Each of these sites has a legal disclaimer and they all say pretty much the same thing. I'd assume they'd done their homework.
As a big plus you won't have to put up with juvenile abuse from the armchair lawyers.

Good luck with the book.

I'll investigate that now. Great idea, Thanks

[duncanparsons]

When you've got your answers, do post back and let us know. We could all do with some decent advice at times, and if someone's done the homework, all the better.

You may even get one or two sales!

DSP

[Equilibrium]

When you've got your answers, do post back and let us know. We could all do with some decent advice at times, and if someone's done the homework, all the better.

You may even get one or two sales!

DSP

Will do. I'm going to send a bunch of emails tommorow and phone up some magazines. I'll report back when I hit something solid.

[shamann]

James0 speaks much sense, but you are best to discuss this with a lawyer at some point.

Fair use should extend to audio snippets in the same way it extends to book citations (argle bargle, all students are thieves, what with their essay writing). But copyright on recordings is strange and is often viewed by many (incorrectly) as infallible on the side of the copyright holder. Just take a look at some of the ill-informed rabble postings here, now imagine they were high-priced lawyers.

An example I can remember from a few years ago: I saw an interview with a film documentarian who told of having caught a few seconds of The Simpsons on the television in the background of one shot. The filmmaker thought he should cover his legal bases, and so proceeded to seek permission for the scene from Fox et al. Lawyers set a fee (somewhere round $10,000, nearly as much as the film cost to make) and the filmmaker was forced to remove it from the scene. Here's the thing, he probably shouldn't have had to pay as the laws are probably on his side, but who of limited means can withstand the law-slap of a major multinational's fleet of lawyers?

[eduardo_b]

I guess that as with most things regarding the law nothing is clear cut.

I think you best ignore the rantings of those who can't discern the difference between fair use and stealing. You are on solid ground by using small excerpts, but even this isn't going to be an issue given that drumming styles are not copyright protected. If you replicated most of or all of a song, that might be an issue, but the courts have consistently sided with fair use when material is used as excerpts meant for education and example And, of course, parody and satire of existing works are also protected fair use despite being copyrighted.

Much of the clamor over plagiarism in the last 10 years or so has raised awareness of the fact that there are degrees of plagiarism, and that once again fair use is in play as long as proper attribution is made. You can copy and use excerpts and passages without fear of legal action, or at least you will prevail in any court of law.

The problem with the current mania for demanding (typically excessive) fees for every little sample or whatever is that the arts have always relied upon the use of previous works to create new ones that are unique. Anyone willing to make even a cursory effort at researching this will discover that, as always, it's large media corporations and peripheral companies that have tried to squeeze money out of any use of anything every written even though these works invariably have themselves been built on what has come before. These companies have lobbied for one-sided legislation and tried to sue anyone and everyone they think they can coerce into paying for what is often legal fair use. Those here who claim using any copyrighted material regardless of size or purpose is stealing could have successful careers working for large copyright holders.

[mn]

Plagiarism /= copyright infringement. Also there is no "the courts", there are courts in each country, whose laws may differ from yours and the author's. Fair use may not be law in those "the courts", and the author must be concerned about any country in which his book will be released, as well as any country where the rightsholders of the materials he uses may reside.

I'm not saying I disagree, but you can't refute generalizations with more generalizations.

[eduardo_b]

Plagiarism /= copyright infringement. Also there is no "the courts", there are courts in each country, whose laws may differ from yours and the author's. Fair use may not be law in those "the courts", and the author must be concerned about any country in which his book will be released, as well as any country where the rightsholders of the materials he uses may reside.

I'm not saying I disagree, but you can't refute generalizations with more generalizations.

Fair use is not actually plagiarism and thus not copyright infringement. I agree that in theory this is not universal and thus the legal systems in some places may not recognize fair use, but that really becomes the responsibility of the book publisher to determine, not the author.

What is most unfortunate is that these discussions so often lose sight of what is really lost when copyright holders use their influence to subvert fair use. We all lose because cultural innovation is stifled and severely limited when corporations pursue their business interests to the detriment of the society in which they reside or do business. And those with the most creativity and least resources are unable to work freely in their pursuit of their creativity. Copyright law now currently makes it essentially impossible for any works to enter the public domain, thus halting what was once a shared cultural resource of creative material.

And, I know without asking that those here who are most vocal about stealing and thievery have copied magazine articles and other copyrighted content and shared these with friends or colleagues. This is clearly illegal under copyright law, and there is a fund that those copying any copyrighted material are supposed to contribute to that then gets distributed to copyright holders via some formula. I also know they didn't pay this fee either. What does this make them?

[Equilibrium]

Plagiarism /= copyright infringement. Also there is no "the courts", there are courts in each country, whose laws may differ from yours and the author's. Fair use may not be law in those "the courts", and the author must be concerned about any country in which his book will be released, as well as any country where the rightsholders of the materials he uses may reside.

I'm not saying I disagree, but you can't refute generalizations with more generalizations.

Fair use is not actually plagiarism and thus not copyright infringement. I agree that in theory this is not universal and thus the legal systems in some places may not recognize fair use, but that really becomes the responsibility of the book publisher to determine, not the author.

What is most unfortunate is that these discussions so often lose sight of what is really lost when copyright holders use their influence to subvert fair use. We all lose because cultural innovation is stifled and severely limited when corporations pursue their business interests to the detriment of the society in which they reside or do business. And those with the most creativity and least resources are unable to work freely in their pursuit of their creativity. Copyright law now currently makes it essentially impossible for any works to enter the public domain, thus halting what was once a shared cultural resource of creative material.

And, I know without asking that those here who are most vocal about stealing and thievery have copied magazine articles and other copyrighted content and shared these with friends or colleagues. This is clearly illegal under copyright law, and there is a fund that those copying any copyrighted material are supposed to contribute to that then gets distributed to copyright holders via some formula. I also know they didn't pay this fee either. What does this make them?

Sorry I didn't reply your posts for such a time but I wasn't aware that there had been any responses since I last checked. Both your posts are wonderfully informative and precisely the type of information that I have been trying to obtain. If I may ask, can you remember or do you know where you learned that drum patterns are not copyright protected? If I could confirm that that would be wonderful.

I forgot to add (this may be quite significant, I am kicking myself for not putting it in the original post) that I was going to recreate the drum breaks at a studio. Now I'm not quite sure whether that would further my cause as I could be transcribing what I have played, or lessen it, as I am reproducing something that was on a copyrighted record? I also forgot to add that I am planing to self publish this book, as I have a very good artist at my disposal as well as a publicity agent. So the publisher, and lawyer, is me

As for your sentiments I couldn't agree more. I'm sure that my teachers were breaking the law when they played David Attenborough documentaries, or films to us on the last days of term. My local barber I grew up by used to play Disney films to the kids, for when they were waiting to have their hair cut. Disney found out about this, they didn't ask them to stop playing the films (that the kids would without doubt see about a 5th of and ask their parents to go buy the whole thing as soon as they left) no, they smashed them into the ground and destroyed what was a friendly, kind, and honest business. They are gone, and Tony and Guy is in.

In just this thread you see how people try to protect selfish and harmful laws that they don't even understand. The conformist nature of man I guess. I'm going to make sure that it is clear when I publish that anyone can photocopy portions of the book, like in Stick Control, and use the samples however they wish. I'm also going to get the TV schedule out and see what I can "Steal" off TV tonight.