Highest German Court Says Sampling Is Not Copyright Infringement

[Deleted User]

@carol said:

I haven't got an issue with mangling and chopping a sample into something new , though if you're going to do that why not just make your own thing ? As I've said about 8 million times I don't see value in taking a big chunk of someone else's tune , without their permission , that's still recognisable as the original ( e.g the Under Pressure example ) and passing it off as your own work .

it doesn't matter if you see much value in it or not,
it doesn't fit my taste but

others can see the value in it.
and they don't care if you don't approve and they shouldn't care.

its 40 years of sampling now, deal with it and get over it.
if things went bad you have listened to another bad cover version, lol
thats not the end of the world, lol

gee I feel like I am arguing with a different generation. how old are you?

carol

@lala said:

@carol said:

I haven't got an issue with mangling and chopping a sample into something new , though if you're going to do that why not just make your own thing ? As I've said about 8 million times I don't see value in taking a big chunk of someone else's tune , without their permission , that's still recognisable as the original ( e.g the Under Pressure example ) and passing it off as your own work .

it doesn't matter if you see much value in it or not,
it doesn't fit my taste but

others can see the value in it.
and they don't care if you don't approve and they shouldn't care.

its 40 years of sampling now, deal with it and get over it.
if things went bad you have listened to another bad cover version, lol
thats not the end of the world, lol

gee I feel like I am arguing with a different generation. how old are you?

What's my age got to do with anything ? Are you going to have a problem with that as well as the fact I don't like something as much as you do ?

As for value - you brought that up , not me , and when I questioned you on a particular example you ducked the question .

Really bored with this thread it's getting nasty and like the rap thread I'm seeing a less pleasant side of some of the members here , I really am ducking out this time .

[Deleted User]

copyrightlaw is nasty business
your age matters because I think you didn't grew up with sampling and sampled music.

kobamoto

why don't we all just sit down, have some coffee and work out our differences politely

supadom

@kobamoto said:
why don't we all just sit down, have some coffee and work out our differences politely

Agreeing to disagree should definitely be on the table

nick

@supadom said:

@kobamoto said:
why don't we all just sit down, have some coffee and work out our differences politely

Agreeing to disagree should definitely be on the table

I agree

And it is a complex matter, with no absolute right or wrong and a large gray zone. Also, there is the legal, the ethical, the philosophical side as well.

nice coffee, by the way.

supadom

@theconnactic

Now compare Germany's laws with the US, where you cannot jailbreak your iPad and Disney's lobby threatens the very existence of public domain, and where stupid lawsuits - usually started by people who never created a thing! - is slowly turning attorneys into the main protagonists of the music industry, and you'll see where decadence is rearing its ugly head.

You're definitely onto something here. It is the fuckin fat record companies which are part of ever-growing capitalist matrix that we should be worrying about, not the guy with the ipad

One thing Orwell' s got wrong is that it's not the governments but the corporations are who will be watching us through big brother's eyes

synthandson

You're definitely onto something here. It is the fuckin fat record companies which are part of ever-growing capitalist matrix that we should be worrying about, not the guy with the ipad

One thing Orwell' s got wrong is that it's not the governments but the corporations are who will be watching us through big brother's eyes

wait, so you do not think that capitalism is THE solution to all our problems?

a fine example of sampling art:
Coldcut and Hexstatic - Timber

TGiG

@syrupcore said:
No one expects a drummer to be completely original. It's realllllllllllllly common to say 'like the drum beat from blah. No one bats an eye. But if you sample the beat from blah... you're a thief.

A guitarist can play the exact same riff as 20 people before them and it's pretty much fine. Meh.

I think there's some murkiness in all of this due partially to not liking the idea of a machine doing it. It's 'lazy' on the part of the sampler (person) and they're undeserving because they haven't worked for it.

Another source of murk in all of this that we can't seem talk about is race and class. Dangermouse was a genius, Hank Shocklee was a thief.

Your ability to access the tools of creation have a lot to do with your parents income. Good samplers aren't cheap (ok, weren't when we started getting bothered by all of this) but they're a lot cheaper than years of drum lessons, a decent kit and years of rent in place where you can bash a drumset without getting the cops called!

Excellent point! I absolutely agree.

TGiG

@lala said:

The melody is a "sample" from Mozart ...
Not very original this mister Beethoven, huh?

The Mozart piece is mostly unknown,
The Beethoven remix seams to be quite popular. Lol

Hahaha, wow.

theconnactic

@synthandson said:

wait, so you do not think that capitalism is THE solution to all our problems?

The question was not for me, but since it was related to an answer to a previous post of mine, I'll answer: there is no solution to all problems. Yes, capitalism is the very best economic arrangement ever created by humanity. No, it isn't perfect, like everything ever created by human beings. No, @supadom wasn't criticizing capitalism itself, but the crony capitalism that arises when an entity uses its wealth and power to influence the government to stop free and fair competition, that is, to break one of the main tenets of capitalism. Yes, I think @supadom was spot on, and that doesn't make him or myself a copylefter, anti-copyright activist or any other of those SJW funny types that would be better eating cat poo.

synthandson

@theconnectic: I think that both your and @supadom's posts were good posts and I certainly didn't mean to accuse him or you of making disingenious social justice arguments.

regarding the copyrights: I think it's kind of sad that sampling is illegal even if you do it just for yourself at home and have no intentions of making any money with it.

@carol said:
"I haven't got an issue with mangling and chopping a sample into something new , though if you're going to do that why not just make your own thing ?"

because it's fun to take a sample and flip it into something new? making your own sample and mangling and chopping and doing all kinds of things to it is fun too - it's just a different approach.

oh, on the topic of the music industry: here's a great track by The Pharcyde - beat made by Fatlip - "Devil music"

contains a sample of Da Mystery of Chessboxin by the Wu-Tang Clan.

supadom

@synthandson said:

You're definitely onto something here. It is the fuckin fat record companies which are part of ever-growing capitalist matrix that we should be worrying about, not the guy with the ipad

One thing Orwell' s got wrong is that it's not the governments but the corporations are who will be watching us through big brother's eyes

wait, so you do not think that capitalism is THE solution to all our problems?

a fine example of sampling art:
Coldcut and Hexstatic - Timber

Hehe, I did detect sarcasm in your tone (or did I?)

Anyway. Since I've experienced both socialism and capitalism at their fair extremes, first as a child/teenager and then as an adult and a father of a child, I have to say that both systems are viable and beneficial.

The problem is that neither is humanproof. Meaning none of them is devised to neutralise human greed and probably we'll never have a perfect system unless we start with an educational system/spot on parenting that will bring a generation that will just do it. Unlikely though, since parents will always undo what school does and other way around. There's also such a variety between countries that it would still get hijacked.

Sampling is great! Yes, it is illegal, yet...fuck it! Transgression is IT. The moment my daughter stops being shocked by my behaviour I will start saving up for a coffin.

u0421793

kobamoto

I think the moral of the story is that cold cut shouldn't be used as an example until they allow us to import our own samples into the Ninjajamm app.... which they have been saying they are going to do something about but never do

Judochopjames

Imo, it should come down to the way it is viewed in fair use law. Art is about taking existing ideas and information and transforming them into new ideas and information, so if the use of the sample is significantly transformative so as to constitute a piece of art that could be considered new and unique from the original it should be allowed.

I also think the idea that people should be able to own the rights to things like melodies or rhythms is outright ridiculous. The music industry that developed in the last 50 years of the 20th century completely distorted the public sense of what music is, and music became more about making money than making art. Thankfully that model is mostly dead and hopefully never comes back. The recording industry is the worst thing that ever happened to music, and it was a rich get richer monopoly that actually only benefited a small handful of artists.

Copyright law was originally created for printed works, and it was designed to prevent someone from copying a printed work before it had time to disseminate into the public domain and try to claim it as their own, to protect authorship. Originally this was a small but reasonable window where one couldn't copy a new work. It was never designed to make it so the public couldn't fairly copy existing works or take parts of existing works as the basis of new works. The distortion of copyright law is in fact well known to be a result of the Disney company not wanting the original mickey mouse cartoons to be useable in the public domain, so they kept taking it to court and getting the window extended over and over, to the point that it's now like a hundred years or something ridiculous.

[Deleted User]

Every time the first Walt Disneys animated movies are falling out of the copyright time window they go to trial again and get a larger window. It's really ridiculous.

synthandson

oh - my bad! I didn't even know about the Ninja Jamm app.
and I really like home sewing too!

kobamoto

[Deleted User]

@kobamoto said:
I think the moral of the story is that cold cut shouldn't be used as an example until they allow us to import our own samples into the Ninjajamm app.... which they have been saying they are going to do something about but never do

As much as I like coldcut
But this isn't a tool to make music,
It's a tool to sell the back catalogue.

supadom

@lala said:

@kobamoto said:
I think the moral of the story is that cold cut shouldn't be used as an example until they allow us to import our own samples into the Ninjajamm app.... which they have been saying they are going to do something about but never do

As much as I like coldcut
But this isn't a tool to make music,
It's a tool to sell the back catalogue.

Yep

synthandson

@kobamoto said:

does this mean that you're shocked by me not knowing the app?
or maybe the home sewing?

kobamoto

anybody who's into sampling knows how to sew...

kobamoto

@supadom said:

@lala said:

@kobamoto said:
I think the moral of the story is that cold cut shouldn't be used as an example until they allow us to import our own samples into the Ninjajamm app.... which they have been saying they are going to do something about but never do

As much as I like coldcut
But this isn't a tool to make music,
It's a tool to sell the back catalogue.

Yep

I guess the devs shouldn't keep saying they will add the feature then huh

obiwahnkentobi

@Judochopjames said:
Imo, it should come down to the way it is viewed in fair use law. Art is about taking existing ideas and information and transforming them into new ideas and information, so if the use of the sample is significantly transformative so as to constitute a piece of art that could be considered new and unique from the original it should be allowed.

I also think the idea that people should be able to own the rights to things like melodies or rhythms is outright ridiculous. The music industry that developed in the last 50 years of the 20th century completely distorted the public sense of what music is, and music became more about making money than making art. Thankfully that model is mostly dead and hopefully never comes back. The recording industry is the worst thing that ever happened to music, and it was a rich get richer monopoly that actually only benefited a small handful of artists.

Copyright law was originally created for printed works, and it was designed to prevent someone from copying a printed work before it had time to disseminate into the public domain and try to claim it as their own, to protect authorship. Originally this was a small but reasonable window where one couldn't copy a new work. It was never designed to make it so the public couldn't fairly copy existing works or take parts of existing works as the basis of new works. The distortion of copyright law is in fact well known to be a result of the Disney company not wanting the original mickey mouse cartoons to be useable in the public domain, so they kept taking it to court and getting the window extended over and over, to the point that it's now like a hundred years or something ridiculous.

your right!
and everytime i see little kids in a sandbox fighten about something which it have found or said it the first time, answer NO i am , its mine, answer no i am first ITS MINE,answer no I AM FIRST!!...............same same
the copyright or the way it used is so childish!

[Deleted User]

so lets have some sampled music

kobamoto

[Deleted User]

@kobamoto said:

lol, I can't watch this because it may contain copyrighted music
f*cking idiots are not sure
but they are pretty sure I am not supposed to watch it, arrrgh
gee we really need to get rid of GEMA now!
up next in this theater

kobamoto

that sucks.

[Deleted User]

Have you heard the dila radio show thing that was on BBC?
Blue veils and golden sands
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b007jvh7

That was really funny and twisted.