From: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org (fegmaniax-digest) To: fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Subject: fegmaniax-digest V19 #16 Reply-To: fegmaniax@smoe.org Sender: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk fegmaniax-digest Sunday, February 13 2011 Volume 19 : Number 016 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Re: My name is "Eb", and the Dollar-Shop shoppers broke the lock, and they knocked me down (but I keep on stealing...until there's nothing left to steal) [] Two hours of RH Monday night [David Witzany ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 9 Feb 2011 22:13:10 -0600 From: 2fs Subject: Re: My name is "Eb", and the Dollar-Shop shoppers broke the lock, and they knocked me down (but I keep on stealing...until there's nothing left to steal) On Wed, Feb 9, 2011 at 7:54 PM, Eddie Tews wrote: > > down. Some examples: > > Plagiarism (where there are many, many, many similarities verging on > identity, and no sense that we're dealing with an homage, allusion, or > quotation) the "Buddy" song serves as a fine example if you ask me.> > > [...] > > sense > of homage etc. ought to be irrelevant, legally: that's the way music > works.> > > first, i presume the buddy song was released on a label. would it really > be > released without first obtaining the rights? and if so, wouldn't a&m > already have sued buddy's label's pants off? > Well, I wouldn't assume it was released on a label - and even if it was, I wouldn't assume the label necessarily searched every last nook and cranny of music to see whether someone else hadn't arrived at those chords, melodic fragments, etc., earlier. I don't believe labels are legally liable for plagiarism anyway, so it would seem a waste of effort... > > second, is it really possible to plagiarise music? 'cause buddy's band > performed the song, right? even if it's note for note, it's still their > own > performance. i mean to say, it can't be an exact duplicate, the way the > written word could. besides, it's an entirely different lyric, isn't it? > Plagiarism in other fields does not require exact duplication: if I claim I'm creating an original poem and all I do is plug a few words from the original into a thesaurus and maybe change a bit or two of phrasing, I'm still plagiarizing. I mean, obviously, plagiarism is a judgment call: there are degrees of similarity. This one is *so* close, and so close at so many different levels, that it seems to me blatantly obvious that Buddy both knew the Robyn song and intentionally borrowed extensively from it. > > third, why should outright plagiarism be legally relevant? we're all > opposed to "intellectual property" here, n'est pas? sure, i'll grant that > it'd be a cool thing to do to say (in both liner notes and performance), > "you know, if you like this song, you should check out the original, upon > which the music is based; by a very great singer/song-writer called 'robyn > hitchcock'." > > but no way in hell should it be a legal obligation -- neither in music, nor > in any other form of cultural dissemination. > I think it's entirely possible to argue that the current notion of "intellectual property" leans entirely too much toward the "property" half of that equation, and that it's often used as a battering ram against artist's actual intellectual efforts in favor of corporate "ownership" of ideas...but also assert that there is such a thing as intellectual property, and that there are some bounds that ought to be respected. If I come up with a fantastic new design for some device that makes it work 200% better, and also makes it cheaper and more accessible to everyone, are you really going to defend someone else's right to see that design, claim it as their own, and sell it to someone else? Because if you do, then you would have to defend (say) Microsoft hypothetically stealing some innovative software or bit of code that some poor shlub came up with...because hey, ain't no such thing as intellectual property, right? In other words, for me, at least: there are legitimate bounds to the notion of "intellectual property," and in some cases I would say they *should* be enforced legally...because they amount to theft. And again, consider this: if there truly were no such laws, Microsoft or other megacorps could *always* steal other people's ideas, re-present them as their own, and no one could do jack. At some level, then, intellectual property law serves as a bulwark against monopoly: you can own an idea even if you don't own a cent. W/o intellectual property law, the wealthy and powerful would have us all by the bunghole (I mean, even more than already). - -- ...Jeff Norman The Architectural Dance Society http://spanghew.wordpress.com ------------------------------ Date: Sun, 13 Feb 2011 22:11:28 -0600 (CST) From: David Witzany Subject: Two hours of RH Monday night Hey all, I've been invited to help out on a two-hour review/revue of Robyn's music this Monday, Feb. 14 on Champaign's community radio station, WEFT. Thought I'd give everyone a heads-up, in case you'd care to tune in and hear a couple of hours of the man's music, loosely themed. I hope to keep the Valentine's Day portion brief, but I expect that there will be trains and bombs. The program is called "Rock Geek FM"; it'll be on from 8 until 10 PM tomorrow night (almost today, now); we stream our signal at our website, weft.org. Now, a request. I was hoping to play the cover of "Astronomy Domine" from the bonus 45 that Matador included with their vinyl re-release of Underwater Moonlight, but I'm not coming up with it. If anyone out there can help me get hold of it, I'd be much obliged. Blinking on and off, Dave. David Witzany ...one of nature's witzany@uiuc.edu bounds checkers ------------------------------ End of fegmaniax-digest V19 #16 *******************************