Wesnoth Music Source Files
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Re: Wesnoth Music Source Files
Yes, such a license should work. I guess the easiest way would be to contact the debian guys. They're very strict about legal matters and should have pondered this question before.
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Re: Wesnoth Music Source Files
Well, relicensing will only affect new (and not old or altered) works. All the music/art/etc that is currently in Wesnoth is under the GPL.
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Re: Wesnoth Music Source Files
I am not a copyright expert, so you should really leave this to someone else. However, at least in the United States, I believe that one can transfer copyright under an implied/non-exclusive license simply verbally, without a written document. Exclusive licenses must be in writing. Complete transfers of copyright (assignment) require a written contract or deed. Contributors to Wesnoth retain their copyright so this is not a matter of copyright assignment. I assume that your license was not exclusive to Wesnoth, in which case it does not even have to be in writing. If it was exclusive to Wesnoth (which doesn't make much sense), then I am unsure if a forum post would count as being "in writing".Aleksi wrote:Ok, but what does it really mean? I agreed to the terms, but under what form? Posting on a forum and uploading a music? Don't you usually sign a contract when agreeing to something such as this? Pretty vague for me...
All this licence thing seems to be very confused.
EDIT: Copyright is the exclusive rights given to the author of a work (i.e. rights to copy, distribute, display and perform creative works). Let me make this clear, a transfer of copyright does not necessarily mean a complete transfer of copyright, as you can transfer some of these exclusive rights if you wish. A license is considered a "transfer" of copyright. Transferring under a license means you keep the copyright, but license specific exclusive rights from the copyright. Complete transfer of copyright is assignment. Contributors to Wesnoth retain their copyright so this is not a matter of copyright assignment.
That is why I suggested the Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike (CC-BY-SA) license as a possibility. See all of the Creative Commons licenses here.Aleksi wrote:I don't understand why we just can't propose music, that we can distribute to Wesnoth, and other games, that is protected by a licence made for music.
Would it be a real problem if i copyrighted my music under an adequate licence and then let Wesnoth use it and whom ever wants to? It wouldn't be called GPL, but the principle is the same, apart form the source submitting issue, which can be discussed...
About the Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike license, it says:
The Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike license is considered "free" by the Definition of Free Cultural Works and the current version (3.0) complies with the Debian Free Software Guidelines (DFSG)-- see Debian background to Creative Commons version 3.0.This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work even for commercial reasons, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms. This license is often compared to open source software licenses. All new works based on yours will carry the same license, so any derivatives will also allow commercial use.
See The Case for Free Use: Reasons Not to Use a Creative Commons -NC License which explains why commercial use should be allowed. Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial (and Attribution Non-commercial Share Alike) do not permit commercial use, but are non-free by both the Definition of Free Cultural Works and the Debian Free Software Guidelines (DFSG). For an example, imagine someone wanted to put Wesnoth on a CD and sell the CD (perhaps for the cost of the medium). If the music is CC-BY-NC (Non-commercial) it cannot be placed on the CD.
Now for my question. The CC-BY-SA 3.0 license is compatible with the DFSG, but does not require source code (at least the way I saw it). The second requirement of the DFSG states "The program must include source code, and must allow distribution in source code as well as compiled form." How is this so? Is the assumption made that the work released under the CC-BY-SA 3.0 license has the same "rendered/output" and "source" file? What if, hypothetically speaking, someone released a binary program under CC-BY-SA 3.0 (is that even possible)? Would the argument be made that the program cannot be modified (to a practical extent) because only binary executables are provided?
Last edited by daradib on April 27th, 2008, 7:47 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Wesnoth Music Source Files
You don't sign contracts for licensing stuff, because there is no contract involved. One important thing here is that you still are the copyright holder of the music (unlike daradib might have sound in his last post), in mostly every sane country of the world the copyright can't get taken away from you. So you still "own" your music. Though, you can't revoke permissions you have granted to others that you did in the past.Aleksi wrote: Ok, but what does it really mean? I agreed to the terms, but under what form? Posting on a forum and uploading a music? Don't you usually sign a contract when agreeing to something such as this? Pretty vague for me...
All this licence thing seems to be very confused. I don't understand why we just can't propose music, that we can distribute to Wesnoth, and other games, that is protected by a licence made for music.
Would it be a real problem if i copyrighted my music under an adequate licence and then let Wesnoth use it and whom ever wants to? It wouldn't be called GPL, but the principle is the same, apart form the source submitting issue, which can be discussed...
Aleksi.
And yes, I totally agree with that license stuff is pretty confusing and hard to get right. That's one of the reasons why one shouldn't invent their own license but choose one that's out there already - there is too much stuff to be done wrong and in the end you might be hurting yourself.
Your music in fact is still copyrighted by yourself and will stay that way (unless you are from the US and act a bit stupid by claiming it to be in the public domain). And in fact the GPL does protect you pretty well: Noone can come along, use your music, mix it up (or even use it plain), claim that it's theirs and get away with it. People doing that stuff have been reported several times already and had to stop doing so.
About "source submission", I've also read that you have concerns about others modifying your music. I'm not part of the wesnoth team, but I would guess they wouldn't be happy about that and propably remove your music, how unfortunate that might sound because you did really a great job here.
I still don't consider your paper scores the source, though. I guess noone would be able to come up with the same even if they had your sound bank and your paper scores. It's related to timing and other stuff, so you won't have to worry about that if you still want to fulfill the GPL. From your paper scores noone practically will be able to reproduce the ogg files that you provided, and that's what has to be possible with the "sources". They have to be in electronic form, everything else sounds like a total awakward request to me and you can simply ignore those.
About what you wrote in your first post:
Your music is protected under copyright law, and the GPL is also written in the intention to actively protect you as author. Please notice that it explicitly means that people using your work have also to put it under the GPL meaning that they have to share it the same way as you did. They can't use it for work they don't want to put under the GPL, meaing whenever they use your tune for something, you can always get it back, it will always stay free, there is no way for them to close it away again. That's the core of why the GPL is so popular and strong, it does protect you very well.Aleksi wrote:I prefer that every composer protects his own music under adequate licences and give authorization to the game for the use of the music.
Re: Wesnoth Music Source Files
Personally I think this strict adherence to the GPL in this case is impossible, because there is no way the "sources" could be provided in such a way as to make it so that another person could reliably reproduce the same result on a different machine. It is quite possible for one to take the recording and modify it in different ways such as changing the volume, speed, and pitch, or even slicing it up and adding it to a Hip Hop song. Thus the recording itself might be considered a source file. The water is so muddy here that there is no clear answer. I concur with what the other artists have said so far here: I think that releasing the so-called "source" files would not be very beneficial, and I also do not feel comfortable releasing the so-called "sheet music" or MIDI files for the music. Though I happily agree to allowing the music to be used in the Battle for Wesnoth free of charge and for others to use the recordings as long as proper credit is given.
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Re: Wesnoth Music Source Files
I am quite sure that it is a very tough topic, and I'm sorry about it. But even then, a single-track music file is far from something you might want to consider a source file. I am pretty sure you are using different tracks for different instruments, or similar things. It is similar to multi-layered graphics, the flattened image can hardly be considered the source. And I like to repeat it once again, I myself am far from wanting to enforce the "source" requirement that the GPL brings, and often enough it is usually ignored as long as the other parts of the lincece are understood and not discussed away. I'm far from being "against" you, but:jeremy2 wrote:Personally I think this strict adherence to the GPL in this case is impossible, because there is no way the "sources" could be provided in such a way as to make it so that another person could reliably reproduce the same result on a different machine. It is quite possible for one to take the recording and modify it in different ways such as changing the volume, speed, and pitch, or even slicing it up and adding it to a Hip Hop song. Thus the recording itself might be considered a source file. The water is so muddy here that there is no clear answer.
... the "free of charge" request here is one of the restrictions that brings up another sever misunderstanding of the used licence: The GPL doesn't forbid to sell things, and non-commercial clauses are a big headache for quite a lot of people, especially distributors. By saying that it has to be free of charge one couldn't sell a CD that contains your music, and even if one wants to request an immense amount of money for your music they would still have to find someone "stupid" enough to pay for it instead of downloading it from someone else through the web. You see, the GPL offers the same terms to the receivers of the stuff, that is, they also have the freedom to share it with others. So even if technically one could "sell" your music for a huge price they usually wouldn't find a lot of people that would buy it from them, because they would have to give it to them under the same terms, and they will quite easily notice that they had been tricked.jeremy2 wrote:I concur with what the other artists have said so far here: I think that releasing the so-called "source" files would not be very beneficial, and I also do not feel comfortable releasing the so-called "sheet music" or MIDI files for the music. Though I happily agree to allowing the music to be used in the Battle for Wesnoth free of charge and for others to use the recordings as long as proper credit is given.
Re: Wesnoth Music Source Files
Unless I'm parsing jeremy2's sentence incorrectly, he wasn't saying he wanted his music distributed only free-of-charge, but rather that he would allow BfW to use his music free of charge, i.e. he didn't expect reimbursement from BfW for writing the music.Rhonda wrote:... the "free of charge" request herejeremy2 wrote:I concur with what the other artists have said so far here: I think that releasing the so-called "source" files would not be very beneficial, and I also do not feel comfortable releasing the so-called "sheet music" or MIDI files for the music. Though I happily agree to allowing the music to be used in the Battle for Wesnoth free of charge and for others to use the recordings as long as proper credit is given.
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Re: Wesnoth Music Source Files
Jeremy, this is not against you, as you probably didn't mean only free of charge. I just want to clarify for other people, who might take free of charge to be the only point, which it is not.
Well said! I've been trying to let people understand why noncommercial licenses (such as a Creative Commons Noncommercial license) usually cause more benefit then harm and why they aren't and shouldn't be considered "free." Actually, sometimes I wish Creative Commons would make that point a little clearer, so people could see why it might not be such a good idea to to license under a Creative Commons Noncommercial license.Rhonda wrote:... the "free of charge" request here is one of the restrictions that brings up another sever misunderstanding of the used licence: The GPL doesn't forbid to sell things, and non-commercial clauses are a big headache for quite a lot of people, especially distributors. By saying that it has to be free of charge one couldn't sell a CD that contains your music, and even if one wants to request an immense amount of money for your music they would still have to find someone "stupid" enough to pay for it instead of downloading it from someone else through the web. You see, the GPL offers the same terms to the receivers of the stuff, that is, they also have the freedom to share it with others. So even if technically one could "sell" your music for a huge price they usually wouldn't find a lot of people that would buy it from them, because they would have to give it to them under the same terms, and they will quite easily notice that they had been tricked.
Not only do we have the distribution on CD and compilation issues, noncommercial licenses cause incompatibility (with Wikipedia, Wikinews, Wikibooks, Wikimedia, Open Source Definition, Free Software Definition, Debian Free Software Guidelines, etc.) and restricts what one can do. Other negative results include the lack of commercial help (probably not much helpful here though). It is important to note that copyleft (or Share Alike as Creative Commons calls it) "protects" the copyright owner, because he/she has the same freedoms with derivatives of the work. One can't really legally "rob" someone who is using such a license.daradib wrote:See The Case for Free Use: Reasons Not to Use a Creative Commons -NC License which explains why commercial use should be allowed. Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial (and Attribution Non-commercial Share Alike) do not permit commercial use, but are non-free by both the Definition of Free Cultural Works and the Debian Free Software Guidelines (DFSG). For an example, imagine someone wanted to put Wesnoth on a CD and sell the CD (perhaps for the cost of the medium). If the music is CC-BY-NC (Non-commercial) it cannot be placed on the CD.
Re: Wesnoth Music Source Files
You are correct, turin.turin wrote:Unless I'm parsing jeremy2's sentence incorrectly, he wasn't saying he wanted his music distributed only free-of-charge, but rather that he would allow BfW to use his music free of charge, i.e. he didn't expect reimbursement from BfW for writing the music.
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Re: Wesnoth Music Source Files
Thanks for confirming. Still I think this had to get mentioned because there are still people who think that a "non commercial" license is helping or even protecting them. It's rather the contrary, it's causing a lot of troubles. So thanks for giving me the chance to misinterpret and raise that point.jeremy2 wrote:You are correct, turin.turin wrote:Unless I'm parsing jeremy2's sentence incorrectly, he wasn't saying he wanted his music distributed only free-of-charge, but rather that he would allow BfW to use his music free of charge, i.e. he didn't expect reimbursement from BfW for writing the music.
Re: Wesnoth Music Source Files
I'm in agreement with several people on a couple of points:
1. "Preferred" is up to interpretation. For many tracks, the published file may actually be the preferred medium over any customized sequencer files; still, one could argue the opposite.
Actual scores drawn by hand, samples, other things would be getting much too abstract; if that were the case where they would be needed to be given, say if I painted an art piece for Wesnoth, would I then have to submit my pre-sketch, or formula for generating shades of green paint?
2. Another license probably would be better for submitted music to Wesnoth.
1. "Preferred" is up to interpretation. For many tracks, the published file may actually be the preferred medium over any customized sequencer files; still, one could argue the opposite.
Actual scores drawn by hand, samples, other things would be getting much too abstract; if that were the case where they would be needed to be given, say if I painted an art piece for Wesnoth, would I then have to submit my pre-sketch, or formula for generating shades of green paint?
2. Another license probably would be better for submitted music to Wesnoth.
Re: Wesnoth Music Source Files
Agreed, though there might be a few more sticky points to changing the license such as the different Linux distribution package policies, and the server. At one time (still might be this way), the server on which Wesnoth is hosted requires that all files be licensed under GPL.ancestral wrote: Another license probably would be better for submitted music to Wesnoth.
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Re: Wesnoth Music Source Files
I agree. I am currently working on the re-ochestration of the Main Menu, which sounds much, much better now. But since this was originally licenced under GPL, it will stay under this same licence.ancestral wrote:2. Another license probably would be better for submitted music to Wesnoth.
Howerver, i am also working on another music for Wesnoth which is coming along pretty well, and i will not licence it under GPL. So, if we have the possibility to do it this way, i would be glad. If not, i won't submit the music to Wesnoth.
Aleksi.
Re: Wesnoth Music Source Files
You know, aleksi, if you hold the GPL license (which I think you do, not sure) you can license your works under a different license to different people. There are a lot of companies who do a dual-licensing with their code.
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Re: Wesnoth Music Source Files
It's "holding the copyright", but yes, you can re-release anything you own the copyright of under any license as long there were no previous exclusive ones.jeremy2 wrote:You know, aleksi, if you hold the GPL license (which I think you do, not sure) you can license your works under a different license to different people. There are a lot of companies who do a dual-licensing with their code.
So, legally, you can replace all your music with CC-BY-SA versions. What you can't do is:
-throw them on gna (apparently it requires everything be GPL)
-revoke previous permissions granted (the GPL version is still out there and there's nothing you can do about it)