The main thing for me was that someone didn't earn money with my work. So my soundsets were resold, hence the "resale prohibited" ban. But since I know someone will buy a soundset from me and the next day, if you see it everywhere for free download, I have decided to offer everything for free. This is how my music comes into the world and I am happy to contribute something to the diversity of music with my artistic work.

 

what you did here is to keep the conjunction to laws (=government) in your license contract (that´s what every comment with a works is) as low as possible. that is what i like most about it.

 

ASCAP is the same type of organization as your GEMA in Germany. They have absolutely nothing to do with copyright, they only collect publishing and performance royalties and send them to you. Here in the US, you still need to have your work covered on your own by registering it with the US Copyright office, they will not do it for you.

 

Whatever it may or may not be "so-called", I know many writers who did this from the 80s until the present, along with many other things to strengthen their proof. Why not? As well as doing it with a service after?
And now, as someone else mentioned, we also have irrefutable daw project proof if needed.

 

why does nobody mention uploading it private to youtube?
every big distributor cross checks with google.

 

2x no ^^

 

nope. that law has been changed in 1989. now U.S. copyright is equalized to the rest of world.

 

a question,

Let's say you didn't register copyright protection or anything, just upload it to streaming service like usual after you finished the album. You always remember your mother told you that you are the most talented musician on earth but in real world you are not, you are just like everybody else, trying. Your work, the album you uploaded to the streaming service is merely simple lo-fi tracks that can easily remake/recreate by anyone here in less than 2 hours, but you were just born lucky, the album become a hit somehow and the play count is nearing your 1st 100million on every platform. Apparently a lot of 17YO is doing tiktok video with your song.

Then one day you get a lawsuit, someone accused you of stealing his work. His lawyer said that they have all the solid proof including all the production Pro Tools session of each song in that album to prove that his client wrote all the song.

You on the other hand have everything ready in your computer, all the REAL sessions from start to finish, nicely organized, with timestamp and zipped ready to bring it to the court.

..and then you remember you are using Studio 1 that registered to TEAM B2B and another 1000 plugins/samples from some shady vstcrack site.

You have real proof and can easily win (your export will easily null the tracks) but is that proof viable/reliable in the eyes of the judge because that asshole that sued you, he knows you are using all the pirated software (that shady site backdoor), and determined to make it clear to the court what you did. Even if you get lucky once more, say the judge dropped the case, surely the opposition will report you for using stolen software as the final FU to your face.

is there any other way ?

TLDR; sessions with k'd plugins/samples, can it be used (will it stand) in courts ? will it backfire ?

 

Not to mention if other people performed on your music who were paid with receipts/invoices if applicable. The beauty of today's technology is also time-stamping which is fairly solid proof if needed.

I read what you posted, all of it. Stevie, if you can afford to go to court and sue someone or defend yourself for stealing your tune, this means you have money. This would also beg the question why would a DAW which would cost less than probably a 50th of this procedure, not be owned? The time-stamps on the recorded file won't change unless you overwrite it or delete it. Even overwriting it, as in saving over the top of it, the original creation date is still in the file. It pays to own your DAW. The vst's and everything else are irrelevant. The final mix/masters and score if you can notate are. If you have a score that is time-stamped that is even more valuable because it is a form of publishing.

EDIT - If you use a vst that has become (or produces) a trademark in every tune you write which is also a form of proof and are using it non-stop, it also makes sense to buy it.

 

Last edited by a moderator: Sep 6, 2021

It is really

It also varies from country to country to at least some extent.

@Stevie Dude, where I live, if you write a novel on a stolen laptop with k'd office on it, you own the copyright.

Not on the same trial.

My bad. I didn't explain it. I was just citing my "to do" list. I wouldn't exactly say that They have absolutely nothing to do with copyright, because their work of distributing royalties (even among multiple authors, e.g.) is based on that.
But I agree with you - they wont protect you, whether someone steals your work or someone sues you for doing so.. These are not "enforcement authorities". The civil and/or criminal courts are usually responsible for the enforcement.

Sadly I can see that, not only here in EU, but also US the "expert witness" is becoming the decisive factor

At the end you should bear in mind, a forum like this cannot be a substitute for professional legal advice. And everything above is just a personal opinion.. ;)

 

Even if you produced everything with stolen software, the stolen software is not part of the process. It's all about proving who created the music.

 

Yes, it's right. Fighting arainst it is fighting against windmills. But somebody consider this necessary and possible.

I'd prefer not to cope with courts at all.

 

When the World Wide Web (WWW) was invented, people wanted to generate and offer "knowledge and wealth" for everyone.
Question: what is left of the basic idea?

- Google is free = but collects your data (Google finances itself through advertising)
- YouTube is free = but collects your data
- Wikipedia is free = funded by donations and other things
- Facbook is free = Financed through advertising and collects your data

In short, the Internet is a huge statistic and the data are all analyzed.

The use and connection of the Internet is not free and is paid for by the user.
The advertising expenditures of the companies are paid by the buyer when he buys a product.
If you gave $ 1,000 to everyone in the world, you would no longer need software pirates because you could buy the products you need. Well, is poverty the problem or is it redistribution? How do we want to live in the future?

 

I am repeating, it's court, people defend themselves even if they are liars. And any additional argument is good.

I talk about a specific case. Do you really think that reproducing a musical composition with all timbres, melodic lines, harmonies is an easy task? How fast you could make a reproduction of any famous song? I mean making an indistingishable copy, not just copying a melody.

If you open a project and it sounds exactly as audio version and contain all MIDI info and samples/patches it's a good proof. It's not evidence but any expert will confirm that this composition is yours. But yes, it works if we talk about a composition in whole.

What you forget it's property of files (dates of their creation, recording etc.). This is also important.

Somebody accuses you of a theft of a melody. You are showing an OLD file with this melody. The oldest file you can show. You can proove that propreties of this file (its date of creation etc.) have not been changed. Can your opponent "beat" it? Can he/she show an older file? It's not important whether it is a MIDI file or a project file or an audio file. Your opponent needs to show an older file then yours is. It might be a good evidence.

Any copyrhight organizaion acts this way. You registered files, scores etc. with them and if you made it earlier (you were first) you win.

The best way (may be) is preparing both proofs. Who knows?

 

often also =

= How much money ya got/or are worth? hehe
Personal professional experience are on these pages.
As varied as legal advice; up until they are working for you.