Copyright v. the

Democratic Right to KnowLa propriété intellectuelle contre

l’accès démocratique au savoir

Philip Tagg — Colloque Éthique, Droit et Musique, Université de Québec à Montréal, 2007-10-20

Online version (no media files)

Version internet (sans fichiers média)

P Tagg (Oct 07) — Copyright v. knowledge (2)

• 3.5 hours music per day on average• 2 hrs/day: music with moving images • Audio(-visual) material mainly under copyright

Understanding music in today’s world: the basic problem

• Teachers can’t legally duplicate viewing/listening materials (= no actual music to study!)

• Libraries/students can’t possibly buy the repertoire• ‘Free enterprise’ (competition) impedes ‘legal’

production of listening/viewing repertoire

Understanding how all this music works presupposes access to copyrighted audio(-visual) recordings

Examples of the basic problem

Illustration of central concepts in musematic analysis method: gestural interconversion and connotative precision

Video ex. The Dream of Olwen: reception tests and responses

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Teaching context: courses Analyse de la musique populaire and Musique et images en mouvement (Faculté de musique, Université de Montréal)

1. Tagg v. YouTube & C20 Fox

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www.tagg.org

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click !

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This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation

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View the offending clip at

http://tagg.org/!temp/OlwenSofMusicYuTu.mov

For more information, seehttp://tagg.org/YouTubeFox0710.html

andhttp://tagg.org/articles/xpdfs/filminternat0412.pdf

an ongoing case...

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2. Tagg v. Universal StudiosDoctorate (1979) in musicology.

Kojak ▬ 50 Seconds of Television Music: towards the analysis of affect in popular music

Access to the original score denied by Universal.

Access gained by contacting Universal’s local publishing representatives and by quoting the Helsinki agreement to the U.S. information service.

P P Tagg (Oct 07) — Copyright v. knowledge (9)

3Sheila Whiteley v. Abkco • “I’ve tried’ -- £70 “and I’ve tried” + £70

• “I’ve tried’ -- £70 “and I’ve tried” + £70 (but I can’t get no....) = £280 Payment demanded for right to quote lyrics only of Satisfaction in scholarly article!

4Hroar Klempe v. Coca Cola • En stil-analytisk innfallsvinkel til forståelsen av musikken i reklameuttrykket (musicology PhD, 1992, focusing on Coca Cola jingles; Universitetet i Trondheim; in Norwegian)• Prohibited by Coca Cola’s lawyers from producing more than the minimum no. of copies required by Norwegian universities.

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The repertoire teaching problem

Music heard, often recognised, sometimes even sung or played by billions of people, cannot legally be taught.Essential, representative listening / viewing materials cannot be copied

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The research publication problem

• Extracts from musical “texts” quoted by musicologists cannot be legally reproduced in learned publications without permission from copyright holders.

• Who owns copyright to what in which part of the world?

• Will publishers reply?

• Will publishers give permission?

• Will permission be afforable?

+ the repertoire teaching problem!

Compounding problem:Corporate bullying, terror and

criminalisation

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Submissiveness and lack of legal expertise

• librarians, administrators, university legal deparmnets

• professors, researchers and students

brimades?

Part 2: What to do.

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Don’t let them scare you!

Wise up legally!

Part 2a: Don’t be scared!

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• You have allies (next part)

• The law may be on your side (next part)• Media corporation legal departments have much bigger fish to fry than you: software pirates, DVD pirates, etc.

Part 2b: Wise up legally!Allies (1)

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• British Academy

• Lessig’s Free Culture

• Wikipedia on Copyright and on WIPO

• Open Rights Group (Doctorow, Toronto) • Creative Commons

• WIPOUT (incl. Chomsky)

Part 2b: Wise up legally!Allies (2)

• EFF (eff.org) = Electronic Frontier Foundation• Legal guide for bloggers (eff.org/bloggers/lg/)• Chilling Effects (chillingeffects.org) including counter-claim templates

• Mass-media Music Scholars’ Press (mmmsp.com) counter-claim templates: legally safe book publishing

Part 2b: Wise up legally!The march of history

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• From notation to recording to internet• Radiohead!• CCIA (Computer & Communications Industry Association, Washington, DC. Backed by Google, Microsoft and others)

• One 6th of U.S. GDP derived from companies depending on Fair Use, open source, etc.

• Universal, C20 Fox, &c. are fighting a desparate rearguard action!

Part 2b: Wise up legally!

FAIR USE & SCHOLARLY USE

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Section 107 of Title 17 of U.S. Code (federal law): 5 points

1. Nature & character of use(scholarly, non-profit, non-commercial, etc.)

2. Creative or factual? (informative “or” entertaining, etc.)

3. How much of the work is taken?

4. Adverse effects on market for plaintiff?

5. Is “offending” work transformative or not? (solely repackaged or fundamentally different)

In short1. Educate yourself

2. Educate your authorities

3. Educate your students

4. Do not succumb to corporate terror

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Everyone has the right to know how music can influence them to think, feel, react and evaluate people, situations, environments, actions, etc.

A musicological principleworth going to jail for!

Copyright versus the Democratic Right to Know

Philip Tagg — Faculté de musique, Université de Montréal, 2007

END

www.tagg.org