deserves its own thread for sure, a digital rights aggregator moving on to suing fans is a whole new thing
old articles about corporations / owners who buy oft-sampled songs entirely to profit from lawsuits against those who have already sampled them: Bridgeport, TufAmerica, etc
http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2006/11/jayz_versus_the_sample_troll.html
― Milton Parker, Monday, 21 May 2012 16:59 (1 year ago) Permalink
Fuck , Bridgeport is who screwed George Clinton over in the 70s I think
― it looks like something rupert the bear would wear (Algerian Goalkeeper), Monday, 21 May 2012 17:03 (1 year ago) Permalink
yup it is, it even says so in the article
― it looks like something rupert the bear would wear (Algerian Goalkeeper), Monday, 21 May 2012 18:44 (1 year ago) Permalink
It's foreboding that the bands name is All Shall Perish and they got sold out by a label called Nuclear Blast. Like, is this the first bomb dropping from digital rights enforcement corporations that are just going to sue the pants off of everyone?
― BrianB, Monday, 21 May 2012 18:54 (1 year ago) Permalink
big article on patent trolling today - interesting to make connections to copyright trolls in music:
http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2012/05/rockstar/
― geeta, Monday, 21 May 2012 19:15 (1 year ago) Permalink
^^ exactly the same philosophical issue as with sample trolls, and affects the development of science in ways that directly affects our lives in ways that almost no one is paying attention to. those dots really need to be connected, because people pay attention when a famous musician gets sued but the real issues go much deeper
Because it doesn’t actually produce anything, some knock Rockstar as a straight-up patent troll. “This deal is indicative of a much larger fundamental problem that we see today,” says Julie Samuels, a staff attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation. She says she hears from small companies regularly who get pressured out of the U.S. market because they simply can’t defend themselves against massive patent claims, whether legitimate or not. None of them want to talk to the press, though, for fear of drawing attention — and possibly more legal troubles — to themselves. Ultimately, Samuels worries that patents — especially software patents — will hurt innovators rather than help them. And that’s exactly the opposite of what patents are supposed to do.
“The creation of these conglomerations of patents … what this does is create a barrier to entry for the little guy,” Samuels says. “It makes it so much harder to break into the market if you are a creator or an innovator.”
― Milton Parker, Monday, 21 May 2012 21:49 (1 year ago) Permalink
"copyright troll"?
― Word of Wisdom Robots (Abbbottt), Monday, 21 May 2012 22:06 (1 year ago) Permalink
I gather that it's a term reserved for douchebags who buy up copyrights with the sole intention of making money from infringement lawsuits. Sounds pretty much like a version of spam that requires a lot more time, energy, and money.
― Quiet Desperation, LLC (Deric W. Haircare), Monday, 21 May 2012 22:33 (1 year ago) Permalink
yep
― Autumn Almanac, Monday, 21 May 2012 22:36 (1 year ago) Permalink
derives from patent troll I think - companies have been doing this in the tech space for years
― diamanda ram dass (Edward III), Monday, 21 May 2012 22:47 (1 year ago) Permalink
TufAmerica is a borderline case in that they do seem to directly market the music they've acquired to individual customers -- they do more than just sue other labels for releasing music that they own the rights to. But they also (notoriously) acquired the rights to a whole bunch of songs that had already been widely sampled by other artists, such as 'Impeach The President', and then began aggressively suing all the hip hop artists who'd used the loop. Perhaps the original artists are getting their microcut, but it underlines the truth behind the argument that the original artist have rights that need to be respected; the only artists whose rights are getting respected are the ones who have signed them over to someone else, usually entirely
(the best example of 'entirely' being Bridgeport; among the countless defendants Bridgeport have filed against for sampling George Clinton is: George Clinton)
― Milton Parker, Monday, 21 May 2012 23:20 (1 year ago) Permalink
we shouldn't joke about this, but: if anyone evil ever acquires the rights to the Winstons' 'Amen, Brother'...
― Milton Parker, Monday, 21 May 2012 23:23 (1 year ago) Permalink