Copyright Laws

Okay, so I've been learning somewhat how the copyright laws work, but I have a question.

We hosted a Harry Potter Competition on this website.

Was it okay to do an arrangement of a copyright piece? Obviously, we are not making any money off of it, but what's the law?

I know some people don't care, but I do. I just recently rid my CD collection of all illegally burned CDs. Because it is basically stealing. I don't care if the people are already filthy rich...stealing is stealing.

Maybe I get too technical about all of this, but I don't want people photocopying my sheet music or songs.

If you make money off of a copyrighted piece without permission and/or royalty payments, that's illegal. Unfortunately, it's that simple.

What's not simple is determining if a piece is in copyright. Anything published before 1923 (I think) is in public domain. Since that big international copyright agreement in Stockholm though, the majority of the world goes by life + 70 years of the creator and that copyright is assigned upon creation not upon registration like it used to be in the US.

IMSLP has a great copyright section. I just don't have the link handy right now. You'll find it, it's dug in there somewhere.

Okay, so I've been learning somewhat how the copyright laws work, but I have a question.

We hosted a Harry Potter Competition on this website.

Was it okay to do an arrangement of a copyright piece? Obviously, we are not making any money off of it, but what's the law?

I know some people don't care, but I do. I just recently rid my CD collection of all illegally burned CDs. Because it is basically stealing. I don't care if the people are already filthy rich...stealing is stealing.

Maybe I get too technical about all of this, but I don't want people photocopying my sheet music or songs.

It's legal to arrange the music on your own computer, but it's illegal once you post it online or distribute it to anyone else. Mind you, it's somewhat of a technicality and I don't think it will ever be a problem, and you are not actually depriving anyone of any money.

You say that the people you are stealing from are already filthy rich when one burns CDs, but the problem is there are lots of people involved in the production of CDs who are not filthy rich, and you are stealing from those people as well. So it's a good thing you don't like to pirate.

If you make money off of a copyrighted piece without permission and/or royalty payments, that's illegal. Unfortunately, it's that simple.

It doesn't matter whether you make money or not! If you distribute it or present it in a public place, whether for profit or not for any money at all, it's still illegal.

That's like saying it's ok to copy and give CDs to your friends as long as you aren't charging them. That's simply not true.

One very difficult thing however is to determine whether an arrangement of a piece is different enough to count as an entirely different piece. Simply using a quote from another piece is usually not enough to require the copyright of the piece, plus copyright laws are always a slightly different matter when they concern an artistical work with an existing copyrighted piece. Take "appropriation art" and "ready mades/objets trouv

Not a derail, but a slight detour:

You can't post pictures of my mom! That's copyright infringement...!

:>!

It doesn't matter whether you make money or not! If you distribute it or present it in a public place, whether for profit or not for any money at all, it's still illegal.

That's like saying it's ok to copy and give CDs to your friends as long as you aren't charging them. That's simply not true.

I never got caught.

And I think that's the loophole that soulseek and ourTunes uses... Maybe used CD stores, too

I never got caught.

And I think that's the loophole that soulseek and ourTunes uses... Maybe used CD stores, too

That's not a loophole at all. It's still illegal. The 'loophole' they use is that they are not actually responsible for any of the copyrighted material which is exchanged using their network. They recognize that it's illegal, and sometimes superficially instruct their users not to pirate music, but they are not legally responsible for the content which users share and download using that software. So it's the user which is doing something illegal, not the software.

One very difficult thing however is to determine whether an arrangement of a piece is different enough to count as an entirely different piece. Simply using a quote from another piece is usually not enough to require the copyright of the piece, plus copyright laws are always a slightly different matter when they concern an artistical work with an existing copyrighted piece. Take "appropriation art" and "ready mades/objets trouv

Unfortunately, it's that simple.

Hm.. I'll have to disagree.

Public domain - IMSLP

meh.

Art shouldn't be sold anyway. Commodification leads to pandering.

At any rate, I highly doubt the copyright holders could give a rat's donkey about this, or any other small site.

oh, don't start this conversation again..

Read these threads:

http://www.youngcomposers.com/forum/artists-their-relationship-money-12524.html

http://www.youngcomposers.com/forum/downloading-music-11694.html

and mostly answers like this one.

Holy scraggy my post in that thread is XBOX.

http://www.youngcomposers.com/forum/downloading-music-11694-12.html#post217995

Sorry, didn't mean to start a flamewar... posting without thinking hard again.

I feel the second point was more important, though, and should be the main concern. An act is only illegal in a practical, SWAT team at the door, sense to the point that it is enforcable - intellectual property is enforcable on a large scale, but when given smaller and rather insignificant scales, it is hard to enforce equally, and so can act as a shadow market. A competition that is neither for-profit, nor even for-performance, is hardly gonna show up on the radars of those who sh/would care.

But that's just a misuse of the word "illegal". Illegal means it's against the laws, no matter how practical or enforcable it is. You might say it's a "peccadillo" or "something you can get away with", but you can't say that "in a practical sense it's not illegal".

And you can't count on the fact that you're not going to "show up on the radars". Sure, in many cases you will indeed get away with it, but there -are- cases where such "small scale copyright infringements" were prosecuted. Copyright owners/administrators sometimes do have specialised people whose only job it is to detect such copyright infringements, and if they find it and are legally in the right to prosecute you, they very well might do so if they feel they can get some money out of it. So yes, you might get away with it twenty or even hundred times, but the next time it just might not work out. The more public it is, the more likely this is going to happen.

But! As I said before, copyright laws concerning artistic use of other art are far from clear. I did realize that the topic was directly about using the Harry Potter theme/title, Dan Gilbert. But I'm still not sure whether that means copyright infringement in every case. Just take musique concr

It's like the people who post bootlegged videos on youtube with the disclaimer, "No copyright infringement intended." Saying that does not put you in the clear. It is or it isn't copyright infringement, regardless of your intent.

It's like the people who post bootlegged videos on youtube with the disclaimer, "No copyright infringement intended." Saying that does not put you in the clear. It is or it isn't copyright infringement, regardless of your intent.

There's also such a thing as fair use. But, eh, who cares. Things are too messy right now for any of this to be at all relevant unless you're a company looking to sue someone.

I save the headache, I went ahead and deleted my arrangement of Hedwig's Theme off of the competition thing I was entering.

All I want to know is if it is legal or not. That way I know for future projects.

Technically: no, it's not legal.

Can you get away with it? In most small cases like this: yes. BUT, if you get caught, it is still one-hundred percent illegal and you have no excuse.