Re: (OT) Copyright in a Sampled World...

["Jonathan El-Bizri" <ssrndpty@hotmail.com>]

> >
> > The usual rate for sample usage is currently around 7.5 cents per copy.
> > With an average of fifty samples in a track, that's $3.75 per track and
> > $75 on a 20-track CD. Then you add in the cost of production and
> > packaging, and it gets up to about $85. Shipping and handling will kick
> > it up to $90, and I still haven't made a dime. But who the hell is 
>going
> > to buy a $90 CD?!
> >
> > Clearance is almost impossible. Contacting several hundred artists for
> > permission to use the samples without payment will get a bunch of "FUCK
> > YOU, PAY ME!" responses, and the songs are either damaged beyond
> > salvation or have to be released unauthorised.
> >
> > Now, credit, we still have a problem. At three lines per sample and two
> > columns per CD insert page, we only get about 10 samples credited per
> > page. The sample credits alone take up 100 pages!
> >
> > Unfortunately, I can think of no good solution to this. Your thoughts
> > would be welcomed.
>
>

Sure thing, just as soon as you help my buddies solve the
'I-could-never-afford-all-this-music-I-downloaded-from-Napster,-what-should-
I-do?' problem.

This 'sample or don't sample' question is getting >very< far from what I
consider to be the real issue, which I don't think I have seen addessed in
this thread so far. Does it finished product suck, or not? This is a lot
more important to me, as a 'consumer' of music, than the painfully grey
'legitmate art question'.

Slightly more difficult to admit, it's even more important to me, from a
music consumer standpoint, than whether the artists involved 'forced'
collaboration. (and this is at the crux of the reasons that discussion has
been so heated - more on that in a moment) The music sounds the same,
whether or not you cleared the samples. I can't stand
the-ripoff-artist-formerly-know-as-puff-daddy when he's lifting or when 
he's
not, or Fratboy Slim for that matter. DJ shadow, and Matt Davignon :>, on
the other hand, can spin a mean turntable. (Some of Shadow's stuff is a bit
lame I must confess - I think he's pretty much played out. The elevator
quartet cd was >ok<.)

I could say a lot more, maybe later.

Jonathan El-Bizri