[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
> > Mutopia is an archive of public domain music, free for all to
> > download, modify and redistribute. It should be based on free
> > software. It is similar in spirit to the Gutenberg archive.
>
> I think it would be much better to have a call for _copylefted_ music. Then
> it would be based on the spirit of free software. There already exists a
> growing body of free, copylefted music; why not build on that?
> Releasing music in the public domain is a bad idea if the reason you are
> doing it is to engineer a free society, because it will allow uncooperative
> people to take the music and use it in propietary works. If you make the
> music free, via GPL copyleft, then you ensure that the music will always be
> free.
There are a few different forms of music. Let me start off by saying
that I am interested in sheet music, and not in performances (eg. .wav
or .midi recordings).
There are a few different forms we can consider:
1 Transcriptions of PD music
2 New editions (with editorial changes) of PD music
3 New compositions.
(anything else?)
I agree that 3. should indeed be copylefted, and 2. preferably as
well. But what about 1? What would it mean that transcriptions be
copylefted? Taking the music and putting it in propietary works is
done anyway (since the music itself is PD), we could only prevent
editors from creating propietary editions based on our transcriptions.
Is that a likely scenario? Is preventing this desirable?
And isn't it unfair that we take things out of the PD? TeX and X11
are also part of the GNU project, despite the fact that they are not
copylefted. Is that bad?
I think that we should open the archive to any form of music that
comes with
* sources
* permission to modify and redistribute
* does not require use of non-free software
I agree that we should encourage copyleft for original contributions,
but I am unsure about transcriptions.
> If Mutopia does end up using only music that is free in the GNU sense, I
> volunteer to donate my entire archive of recorded, copylefted music, which
> goes back to 1993 (much of it is not online yet, but we can arrange to work
> this out later).
Recorded, does that mean audio? I think we are talking about sheet
music, and not wave data.
--
Han-Wen Nienhuys, [EMAIL PROTECTED] ** GNU LilyPond - The Music Typesetter
http://www.cs.uu.nl/people/hanwen/lilypond/index.html
