h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3578851.stm

Is Bill Thompsons take on things.

I have (probably like many people interested after the media hype)downloaded the Grey Album and listened to it a few times. I must confess that it is not my sort of thing... but having listened extensivly to the "White Album" I personally think it is patently ridiculous to say that the Grey Album is anything other than a new creative work...

What do others think?

Does no one on hootoo have an opinion on this?

Haven't heard it myself but anything that gets up the nose of surviving Beatles, "keep music live" bores or record execs is alright in my book.

...No-one gives two shades of S*** about this thread do they?!

Shame really.

I am having a look at it now, rather than just the Gray Album maybe this thread should be a bit broader and look at what the article was about - copyright and the laws that support it? Now copyright is a good idea, however is the 70 years after the author's death a bit too long for it? Until later...
BCNU - Crescent

Crescent it think thwer pertinent point with regards to copyright is has the EMI copyright really been breached?

Allthough the sounds have been sampled from the white album; I would contend that this does in fact represent a *new* piece of music; destinct from that which it was sampled and is in fact Danger Mouse's own work.

The fact that I don't like it is irrlevant (sort of Voltaire; May not like what you say but I will defend your right to say it...). The digital age represents a massive shift in how intellectual property must be seen. Personally I think that EMI's attitude demonstrates the music industrys total lack of any willingness to move with the times.

This is the point I think Bill Thompson is making and I agree wholeheartedly with it.

*puts hand up*

I have The Double Black album. It's pretty damn good. I also listen to digital hardcore music, which is sample/loop based music.

It's much like the Turner Prize fiasco. The first comment I hear other people say about it, is that "I could do that" - yet they don't. Reassembling other people's work into a new and listenable format is just as valid as artists that use the same kind of imagery as other artists; or William Burroughs' cut-up method; or just media collages in general. If it works, then it is an exceptionable piece of art. If it doesn't, it's a failure, just like anything else.

There's a great theory that I heard once about poetry - that no verse is truly finished, that it's just waiting to be picked up by someone else and carried on to the next generation. Or something like that.

The only legitimate problems that arise, are when everyone and their mother think that they can do it (see all and every Ibiza dance music) or when copyright legalities come into question. I personally think it's better to make your own samples yourself (remake the sounds you hear as opposed to just using them directly), but if you sample something, you should credit it. But then you have the problem that 995 of DJ's can't afford to sample more known music - so how can they make the tracks they want to make legally?

http://www.bannedmusic.org details a lot of this information (no, it's not an illegal download site)

hey good site Sat...

I shall be reccomending it to my pals.

>>But then you have the problem that 995 of DJ's can't afford to sample more known music - so how can they make the tracks they want to make legally?<<

They can make them, they just can't play them in public or distribute them. How is this a real problem? Chances are the work of those 995 DJs wouldn't be of any merit if it didn't contain a chunk of something better.

The Grey Album may be an exception to that to some extent, in the sense that he's created something interesting, but it's also pretty likely that if he'd used a couple of sources no-one had heard of, no-one would have bothered listening to the album either.

I meant to say 99% (percent) not 995.

Plenty of DJ's make their own music and sample other sources, and it rarely gets noticed, because it is so good.

Nine Inch Nails and Fatboy Slim are good examples.

Alec Empire however (of Atari Teenage Riot) makes his OWN samples based on original sources to avoid having to pay the money. And yes, his music is of merit, if you like digital hardcore. I've seen him live, I've bought his albums. He also owns his own record company because other record companies were unwilling to carry the music that himself and his aquaintances wanted to distribute. And he is making enough mney to support various artists, Atari Teenage Riot and his own releases and tours. If this music wasn't successful, he wouldn't be.

The point is, that more DJ's would have the freedom to do it, if the laws were changed. There are more than enough people who want to listen to these mixes; just because it's not chart music (well, it can't be chart music) or contenders for the top ten list on Radio One, it doesn't mean to say that no one is listening to music based around samples and looped music. Right now though, it's a supressed format because most can't afford to use samples and then distribute the music that the samples are used in.

Saturnine, Alec Empire would seem to prove my point: he doesn't need to use others' samples to produce something worthwhile.

Artistic freedom's not an absolute right: if I feel the urge to sculpt a ten metre high solid gold statue, I can't afford to do that either. If someone genuinely thinks that the quality of their creation suffers because an approximation of a copyrighted sample isn't as good as the real thing, it just serves to demonstrate the intrinsic value of the original sample. Why should musicians have to give away the fruits of their labours when no-one else has to? I'll try whipping out the MK2s when the plumber comes and tell him that unless he unblocks my drains for free he's stifling my creativity, but I don't hold out much hope...

I don't validate ripping off the original artist either.

I really recommend http://www.bannedmusic.org

Alec Empire proves my point too. He doesn't *need* to use them, he chooses to. It's a part of how he works. Why can't there be a way that both parties are happy? It's hardly a big weight on an original artists shoulders or pay packet if a 3 second part of their music is used by someone else. Why can't both benefit without either being ripped off?

And most DJ's do get along without the denied samples. Of course they do. There wouldn't be that kind of music otherwise, would there?

IMO, Artistic Freedom may not be absolute, but then, it's not about that. It's about trying to make it more agreeable, trying to push it forward so that people have more freedom without breaking the laws or ripping off anyone else. That's not so bad.

"IMO, Artistic Freedom may not be absolute"

I think though that the problem is that the pendulum has swung to far the other way, biased to much in favour of protecting existing copyrights at the expense of artistic freedom.

The current copyright situation is cr*p IMHO it benefits neither consumers or artists only record companies that sucks if you ask me.

There is something about how its the record companies that are getting this money. Unless their name has an airship or dense metal in it, random 1960s band no-one has ever heard of are not going to get any money if their record company decides to chase after some trip-hop band that sampled a second of their song, slowed it down and turned it into a bassline.f

Damn that website, I can't use BitTorrent, hardware firewall and all that.

What exactly is a "Hardware Firewall" and is there really no way aorund it?

Well its a piece of equipment that filters your internet traffic, as opposed to a software firewall which is a program that does the same.

As far as I know there's no way to make BitTorrent work with it. Although I haven't exactly made an exhaustive attempt.

Hard lines... usually with a software firewall you can set it to allow certain programmes access can you not?

Is the no comparable thing on a hard ware one?

Weeeellll:

#1 I don't actually have access to it. I'm getting my internet access via a wireless lan off the bloke up the road...

#2 I think most hardware firewalls are done on ports rather than specific programs, and since BitTorrent has to open all sorts of random connections to other computers its not likely to get through.

ahhhh IC...

Oh well hard lines