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So the conspiracy theorist in me believes they may see this archiving as a threat for their current copyrights. So often modern copyrights holders get their cop

• marcus_holmes 3y ago
  It's interesting because it implies that music is finite. Or possibly that commercial music is finite - there's an infinitely long tail of weird shit that we don't want to listen to, but the stuff we do want to listen to is confined to a finite segment of possible music. If so then eventually all music will be free, because it will be repeating a previous iteration of the same tune. This also implies that music is discovered, not invented.
  • cosmojg 3y ago
    These guys tried to generate every possible melody and then released them under Creative Commons Zero in an attempt to thwart industry rent seekers: https://www.vice.com/en/article/wxepzw/musicians-algorithmically-generate-every-possible-melody-release-them-to-public-domain https://www.vice.com/en/article/wxepzw/musicians-algorithmic...
  • nottrobin 3y ago
    Do you mention the distinction between creation and discovery because it's a distinction in law? Cos it seems intuitively obvious to me that distinguishing between creation and discovery has no philosophical merit - creativity happens within many finite domains, the size of the problem domain really has little relevance to something's artistic value. The exhausting of useful chords as you describe has both already happened and will never happen. There are countless songs already based on the most common chord progressions, but new ones will also continue to be found for the foreseeable future. We're nowhere near knowing the size of this domain.
• jcranmer 3y ago
  > The Happy Birthday song got invalidated by an older work of "Good Morning to All" [1]. That's an incorrect rendition of the underlying facts. Happy Birthday was based on the tune of Good Morning to All, and this history was well known even when Warner was on a warpath demanding licensing fees for singing it. The invalidation instead arises from the fact that available evidence indicates that the words to Happy Birthday were not written by the Hill sisters and thus the song was never properly copyrighted.
• slaymaker1907 3y ago
  It’s certainly finite when you have ridiculous copyright claims over very trivial elements like chord progressions and short ostinatos. There’s also the element that composers, intentionally or not, borrow elements from earlier works all the time. I’d even argue that “remixing” is really the default state of affairs. I cannot name a single composer who hasn’t borrowed a melody from somewhere else. The only people that actually want complete originality are corporate lawyers.
• autoexec 3y ago
  > So the conspiracy theorist in me believes they may see this archiving as a threat for their current copyrights. The media industry has had it out for the internet archive for a long time. I don't think they see this collection as a threat any larger than anything else the archive is offering. They've also been endlessly pushing for more and more control over the internet. They've been largely successful getting ISPs to perform vast amounts of work for them entirely for free and without question. They can force ISPs to permanently disconnect users based on nothing but unproven accusations. ISPs who fail to cut their customers off from the internet risk an endless barrage of massive lawsuits. Courts have so been agreeing with the RIAA that this is acceptable. They've been able to force ISPs in many countries to censor and block access to online content on demand based on nothing but their assurance that something is infringing. In the US they've had less success with content blocking and blacklists but they keep pushing and pushing. It's insane how much power they've been able to get already, but they aren't satisfied. I see this attack on the internet archive as just another push for control over online media. > A certain cord progression or beat or a creative lyric and rhyme long forgotten in this old music could endanger parts of their current music catalog. The conspiracy theorist in me believes that this is actually a feature for them! Anyone who dares to make music without paying the cartel is forever at risk of having their works challenged for sounding too similar to something else. If you're a musician and don't want to pay up and hand your creative works over to the RIAA you'll be giving up the protection of RIAA lawyers. Most of the other copyright owners who might sue you are also in the RIAA (or their international equivalents) which can make it easier to reach "an understanding" outside of the court system avoiding expensive lawsuits a struggling independent artist can't afford. The constant threat of having your songs challenged helps them operate as a protection racket and keeps independent artists in a very vulnerable position which drives up membership and discourages competition.