Commodore Remix

Well indeed, Glenn's lawyers did indeed ask probing questions, and there were at least two witnesses arguing against his (ignorant) interpretation. We just have to hope the judges see through it to what really happened. The main testimony was about how unique the Commodore 64 soundchip is and how impossible to replicate a SID would be. What was interesting was that Universal had no evidence at all about (i) people in their organisation who might have achieved it, (ii) a multitrack indicating how they did it, or (iii) anything else.

So their credibility hinges on one studio guy swearing blind it isn't a sample because there are micro-differences between the Do It final recording and the SID, which are easily explained away by post-production (and even audio groove alteration), differences between individual SID chips, and differences in different SID playback engines. To my mind, he was discredited before he even took the stand given the evidence that had gone before.

But, as I said, you take nothing for granted in the legal system. You just hope that the evidence does indeed speak for itself.

Chris

Chris Abbott wrote:"it's old technology - of course you can do it with modern technology" says he

Right. And this simplicity in replicating old technology with modern technology is the reason there are so many great Roland TB-303 clones that sound exactly the same as the original. This is of course also the reason why the old original batch of TB-303s are selling at such low prices today. They're piss easy to replicate!

Just like the SID, or any other tehcnology. Ever.

so its all down to the technology now? What about the actual notes used per verbatim?

well the notes have nothing to do with it, have they ?
its like that 'writing' stuff ... sod all to do with them letters and that crap.

The complication here is that GRG's SID is a remix of a MOD. The record company settled with that guy.

So the issue comes down to "Did they sample?" and if so, "was what they sampled copyrightable"?

Chris

Hate speech? Have i missed something?

Dumper wrote:Hate speech? Have i missed something?

Yes, but it's over now. Nothing to see here, nothing to see.

Chris Abbott wrote:

Dumper wrote:Hate speech? Have i missed something?

Yes, but it's over now. Nothing to see here, nothing to see.

Let me guess, somebody advertising their own radio show perhaps?

Oh ParaPara, Don't be raggin' on the black folks.

Sure, What passes for Mass media consumption "rap" is a travesty, but I'd wager the underground has some smooth grooves that still tell it real, and live that life where the radio plays the good stuff.

More'n that, Hell if I know. Also, this right here, this is me doing the reasoned argument thing.

Chris: I take it you will keep us informed on how things go with GRG and the case on January the 24th? (one day after my birthday, I know what I'm wishing for )

FunkyM wrote:Oh ParaPara, Don't be raggin' on the black folks.

Sure, What passes for Mass media consumption "rap" is a travesty, but I'd wager the underground has some smooth grooves that still tell it real, and live that life where the radio plays the good stuff.

You're trying to convince the guy who called the Beastie Boys "pure racissm [sic] music".

hey, just wanted to know: were there any discussion about the status of SID-music as non-recorded music? i mean, it is not recorded music in the ordinary sense, since it is performed each time you play the data in a certain way. every play is a live performance which can differ depending on sids, hardware-hacks, code. from this way of reasoning, maybe glenn cannot claim copyright for the music because 1) anybody can 'do the performance' and 2) the notes are copyrighted by tempest.

does anybody understand what i am getting at?

edit: just to clarify, i of course hope that glenn wins. this is just a sort of theoretical fascination of data and copyright.

Goto80: first off, hi there and welcome

Actually, STIM counts it as live music for precisely this reason: but a performance by the guy who wrote the SID, not the guy who pressed "start".

In fact, the way it was regarded in the case is that the SID is a kind of encoded real-time presentation of information: in much the same way as an MP3 is, or the pits in a piece of vinyl. Thinking of a SID as a kind of codec for storing SID stuff is the way it goes.

And, in fact, another aspect of the case was that if you scored each of the actual notes played (for instance, chord arpeggios), the score would look quite different to the original XM. So while Tempest had creativity in the notes and patterns, GRG had creativity both at the note and pattern level, but also at the sound (created in SID, not sampled), and player level.

Chris

thanks for welcoming! that's a very interesting answer. i understand that talking about this is a bit frustrating for you, but if u don't mind i can't help myself asking some more questions.

so, glenn is in this case a performer, not a composer. the song is considered as a performance by him, and the SID-file is the 'preservation' of it. but, uhm, i didn't quite understand the difference between MP3/vinyl and SID from what you said. could u elaborate?

anyway, if STIM sees SID as a 'recording of a live performance', could i claim performance money (rather than normal pay) for every time my C64-music is played on radio/tv/etc?

as a side-note, i think it's not necessarily more creative to make C64-sounds than MOD-sounds. SID-sounds are inherent in the chip whereas Amiga sounds are basically not. creating pulsewidth modulations (like in acidjazzed evening) takes more effort (creativity?) in a MOD than in a SID.

btw, why is STIM involved in this, and not only finnish or norwegian organizations?

1) The basic waveforms of the chip might be there but it takes a lot to drive them, and more skill to create an instrument in SID than it does to import a sample into a tracker (although of course if you try to emulate PWM like Tempest did (a sequence of single cycle pulse width samples at different widths played sequentially) then it's harder to do that: but easier to do pretty much everything else. And every instrument in the SID has to be interpretive of the sound it's trying to be, and there are a lot more decisions to make as to how it's deployed. It's the difference between photography and painting.

2) In this case Glenn created a proper "arrangement" in the legal sense, which is a derivative work of which he shares composer credit. If GRG's piece didn't have musical qualities that weren't in the Amiga version, then Timbaland would have used the Amiga version: which he didn't. The TEOSTO shares that view, partially because Glenn asked for permission to do an arrangement, and Tempest granted it.

3) STIM did not get involved in this case (someone who worked for TEOSTO was there, and they obviously hadn't got the memo): the precedent for SID sound was set years ago when SID was played on the radio station P1 in Sweden during the show "Syntax Error". But if your SID was played on the radio in Sweden, you could definitely claim "live performance" rates.

4) An MP3 is a file containing coded information that is then decoded in real-time to produce an audio output. A vinyl is a physical disk containing coded information that is then decoded in real-time to produce an audio output. A SID is a file containing coded information (and a player, which is the unusual part) that is then decoded in real-time to produce an audio output: the difference between the three being the variability in output owing to the variable nature of the output devices or flaws in the medium. So while an MP3 requires a digital codec,a SID requires an emulation of the C64 environment and a real or emulated SID: and of course, it could be of varying quality.

Chris