Licensing confusion

[Mattias Westlund]

This is a problem I've encountered on several occasions over the years, certainly when creating SSO but also at other times later on: what do you do when a set of samples are released under a particular license, and then somewhere down the line the author changes that license into something else that may not be entirely compatible with the orignal one?

Example 1: The MSLP samples.

The version I have from years ago is Creative Commons Sampling Plus licensed, the very same license that I ended up using in SSO. Now that the MSLP samples are back online after having been gone for years, they're under a Creative Commons Attribution non-commercial 3.0 license. Sure, Sampling+ has been deprecated but still. It makes me wonder which one I'm supposed to adhere to because it's the exact same samples as before, they have just been republished as-is.

Example 2: The FluidGM Soundfont

I'm 98% sure that this sf2 bank was released as Public Domain somewhere down the line, but the only places where it's still available for download states that it uses an MIT license. Which AFAIK is fairly permissive but definitely not the same as PD. Sadly I have found no evidence that supports my claim, as basically all the classic soundfont sites are dead and gone, so I'll have to admit that I might be wrong. Maybe Fluid never was PD at all.

Basically it seems strange to me that you can release something under one particular license and then years after the fact suddenly change it into something more restrictive. That's kind of like if I would suddenly re-release SSO completely as-is and state that it's a copyrighted library (which I couldn't legally do, but for the sake of argument). Why should anyone care about this when the CC-licensed version can be had from many other sources? And what about the people who already have the library?

Are you even legally obliged to respect such changes? Common sense says no, but IANAL.

[Paul Battersby]

This might help:

Creative Commons FAQs

From one of the FAQs at the above link:

What if I change my mind about using a CC license?

Quote:CC licenses are not revocable. Once something has been published under a CC license, licensees may continue using it according to the license terms for the duration of applicable copyright and similar rights. As a licensor, you may stop distributing under the CC license at any time, but anyone who has access to a copy of the material may continue to redistribute it under the CC license terms. While you cannot revoke the license, CC licenses do provide a mechanism for licensors to ask that others using their material remove the attribution information. You should think carefully before choosing a Creative Commons license.

[kmlandre]

[WARNING - NOT A LAWYER]
From what I've read, the rules on this are pretty clear - you can't make a *more* restrictive license apply retrospectively to someone who downloaded it under a previously agreed upon set of terms.

If you could, what would prevent someone - let's pretend it was the evil genius behind the SSO ;-) - from offering his library for free for years, then suddenly publishing it with a license that said "Anybody who uses this automatically owes me $1,000,000, payable immediately. Also, I get the right to name all your children."

Unless there was something in the ORIGINAL license that said something along the lines of "the creator reserves the right to preemptively and retroactively change the terms of this agreement at any time", I don't see how it would enforceable (at least in the US). The user would simply have to flash the original terms of agreement and say "Hey, these are the terms we *both* agreed I was signing up for when I downloaded this."
[/WARNING - NOT A LAWYER]

That's my two bits.

-- Kurt

---

(07-08-2016, 06:09 PM)pbattersby Wrote: This might help:

Creative Commons FAQs

From one of the FAQs at the above link:

What if I change my mind about using a CC license?

Quote:CC licenses are not revocable. Once something has been published under a CC license, licensees may continue using it according to the license terms for the duration of applicable copyright and similar rights. As a licensor, you may stop distributing under the CC license at any time, but anyone who has access to a copy of the material may continue to redistribute it under the CC license terms. While you cannot revoke the license, CC licenses do provide a mechanism for licensors to ask that others using their material remove the attribution information. You should think carefully before choosing a Creative Commons license.

What Paul said.  I knew I'd read that someplace...

Kurt

[Mattias Westlund]

(07-08-2016, 06:09 PM)pbattersby Wrote: This might help:

Creative Commons FAQs

From one of the FAQs at the above link:

What if I change my mind about using a CC license?

Quote:CC licenses are not revocable. Once something has been published under a CC license, licensees may continue using it according to the license terms for the duration of applicable copyright and similar rights. As a licensor, you may stop distributing under the CC license at any time, but anyone who has access to a copy of the material may continue to redistribute it under the CC license terms. While you cannot revoke the license, CC licenses do provide a mechanism for licensors to ask that others using their material remove the attribution information. You should think carefully before choosing a Creative Commons license.

Thanks Paul! That was exactly what I wanted to know. CC-licenses are non-revocable. Which means basically that you can ignore the present license of the MSLP samples (not that it's problematic, but as permissive as the old one it's not) because you can't change your mind about it unless, I think, you're moving to a LESS restrictive license. Like, say, going from an attribution license to public domain where people aren't required to name their sources or anything.

(07-08-2016, 06:09 PM)kmlandre Wrote: [WARNING - NOT A LAWYER]
From what I've read, the rules on this are pretty clear - you can't make a *more* restrictive license apply retrospectively to someone who downloaded it under a previously agreed upon set of terms.

If you could, what would prevent someone - let's pretend it was the evil genius behind the SSO ;-) - from offering his library for free for years, then suddenly publishing it with a license that said "Anybody who uses this automatically owes me $1,000,000, payable immediately.  Also, I get the right to name all your children."

Unless there was something in the ORIGINAL license that said something along the lines of "the creator reserves the right to preemptively and retroactively change the terms of this agreement at any time", I don't see how it would enforceable (at least in the US).  The user would simply have to flash the original terms of agreement and say "Hey, these are the terms we *both* agreed I was signing up for when I downloaded this."
[/WARNING - NOT A LAWYER]

That's my two bits.

 --  Kurt

The "at least in the US" bit is comforting. If it doesn't fly in a country where some people make their living from sueing people over trivial matters, it is likely not viable anywhere else either

[Mattias Westlund]

This reminds me, and I need to look it up so that I'm clear on the facts, but IIRC there are points in the EULA's of commercial libraries that may or may not be valid depending on where in the world you live. Don't quote me on this, but for example I seem to remember that the "not for resale" clause in most libraries is invalid in all EU countries. Meaning, a developer may claim all they want that you can't sell your license and content to somebody else, but this is not globally valid and developers often take advantage of this (though one would think that they would be legally obliged to state that their EULA is applicable only to certain countries or regions).

Here in Sweden at least I'm pretty sure that the laws that are in place to protect customers from dodgy business practices overrides anything that any foreign company says in their EULA.

[bigcat1969]

The one that bugs me is the Philharmonia Orchestral samples. They use a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, but add a restriction that they can't be used to make a sampler instrument. This completely contradicts the rules of the CC license they are using.

The odd thing about the MSLP is it says that the readme says "THE SAMPLES ARE FREE TO USE FOR ANY CREATIVE MUSICAL PURPOSES. YOU CAN SELL YOUR MUSIC MADE FROM THE SAMPLES. I ONLY ASK YOU TO (IF POSSIBLE AND CONVENIENT!!) GIVE THE PROJECT CREDIT."

[Mattias Westlund]

(07-13-2016, 01:07 AM)bigcat1969 Wrote: The one that bugs me is the Philharmonia Orchestral samples. They use a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, but add a restriction that they can't be used to make a sampler instrument. This completely contradicts the rules of the CC license they are using.

I think that one's pretty safe to ignore as well. AFAIK you can't publish your work under a specific license then contradict the license by adding some random terms. They either need to stick to the license or come up with something of their own that dictates how the samples can be used. They can't have both.

[bigcat1969]

What is interesting is that here on 1/1/2006 they say you can't sell the samples but can otherwise use them any way you like under attribution 2.5 general which specifically says "The licensor cannot revoke these freedoms as long as you follow the license terms."

https://archive.org/details/orchestral_samples


To top it off there are more samples here under Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International with no additional restrictions.

https://archive.org/details/philharmonic...trasamples

Confusing much?

[Paul Battersby]

(07-13-2016, 01:07 AM)bigcat1969 Wrote: The one that bugs me is the Philharmonia Orchestral samples. They use a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, but add a restriction that they can't be used to make a sampler instrument. This completely contradicts  the rules of the CC license they are using.

A thought recently occurred to me. The part of the license in question reads:

Quote:... they must not be sold or made available 'as is' (i.e. as samples or as a sampler instrument)

A sampler instrument is defined by Wikipedia as:

Quote:A sampler is an electronic musical instrument similar in some respects to a synthesizer, but instead of generating sounds, it uses recordings (or "samples") of sounds that are loaded or recorded into it by the user

.wav files, and an .sfz file don't seem to me to qualify as an electronic musical instrument. An sfz file is just a text file. In no way is that an instrument. It isn't even a virtual instrument (or software sampler). If the files are converted from .mp3 to .wav (or processed in any other way - like adding eq, editing the samples), then they are not being distributed "as is" and they are not being given away as samples. They are being given away as part of a package. Samples + an sfz file.

Seems to me, we should be free to use them as part of a sound font.

[Mattias Westlund]

Paul,

I think all of that is a moot point because like I said above, you can't release something under a specific license and then add your own terms that contradict said license. If you could legally do that, the CC licenses would be practically useless. I'd say if the license says its fine then it is fine.