Copyright protection [LWN.net]

Copyright protection

Posted Aug 25, 2012 23:28 UTC (Sat) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091)
In reply to: Copyright protection by giraffedata
Parent article: Mobile patent wars: Google goes on the attack

In the first case (reprint, reusing the galleys) then I think there is no margin for interpretation: in effect it is the same copy. Re-typesetting depends on whether there is any art to it. I suppose it depends on the following question: given the same content and the same constraints, is there only one possible output, or several? For text these days typesetting is almost always mechanical, for music I have no idea, honestly.

Just curious, why do you concede that re-editing has creative content, but deny it to re-typesetting printed music?

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Posted Aug 26, 2012 21:14 UTC (Sun) by giraffedata (subscriber, #1954) [Link]

Just curious, why do you concede that re-editing has creative content, but deny it to re-typesetting printed music?

Just because re-editing involves the same kind of intellectual work as what was protected by the original copyright: writing. Composition of words. If there is any significant creativity in typesetting music, it's a different kind from what went into composing the music, which is what we generally think of as protected by sheet music's copyright.

I suppose it's conceivable that typesetting music is creative enough to be copyrightable, and if that's all that gets re-copyrighted when someone publishes Beethoven sheet music, that isn't unbelievable for me. I thought we were talking about a copyright wherein a person couldn't legally read the notes off the page, type them into a music publishing program, and print new copies of the composition.

Posted Aug 26, 2012 21:40 UTC (Sun) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]

If editing is a creative enough endeavour, why does an editor of a book not get copyright on that book?

Posted Aug 26, 2012 21:55 UTC (Sun) by giraffedata (subscriber, #1954) [Link]

If editing is a creative enough endeavour, why does an editor of a book not get copyright on that book?

Well assuming that's true, I withdraw my acceptance of the idea that re-editing a book creates addition copyright of any kind.

(Assuming "re-editing" means redoing what an "editor" does).

Posted Aug 27, 2012 0:41 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]

Because editing is usually a work-for-hire, so the copyright on the edited work belongs to whomever payed an editor. However, if an author collaborates with an editor without making any work-for-hire contracts then editor indeed would share the copyright with the author.

Posted Aug 26, 2012 21:42 UTC (Sun) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091) [Link]

Ah, now I understand: you mean something like a revised edition, not just a reprint.

I thought we were talking about a copyright wherein a person couldn't legally read the notes off the page, type them into a music publishing program, and print new copies of the composition.

That would indeed be quite bizarre. I think a new edition of an old music work can restrict e.g. photocopying the exact pages, but not protect the music score in any way. The same would be true for a text book. But I am not an expert in any way, just a puny armchair copyright amateur.

Posted Aug 27, 2012 9:42 UTC (Mon) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link]

Music publishers bring out new editions of old works all the time. Usually they add stuff like fingering or dynamics that wasn't in the original, just so they have something obvious to copyright. This is on top of re-typesetting the music according to modern customs, since the original old scores are often quite difficult to make out even if you photograph them 1:1 for reproduction.

Even »urtext« editions which try to present the music as originally written by, say, Bach or Beethoven normally add »critical« annotations along the lines of »In bar 39, the so-and-so edition of 1865 has an A where all the other editions have an A-flat«.

If you were to locate a very old copy of the music in question in your granny's laundry chest, you would be perfectly free to scan these pages and put them up on the Internet, even if modern editions of the same music exist. You would also be perfectly free to take your laptop, with a music typesetting program on it, to your friendly neighbourhood music library and type in stuff from very old scores there. This is basically what the music publishers do, anyway.

Posted Aug 27, 2012 10:46 UTC (Mon) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091) [Link]

Would you also be free to take your laptop with a music typesetting program and type in stuff from the modern edition? I assume that, as long as you don't copy the new annotations, you are good to go: the mere work of e.g. compiling the score from older sources is not copyrighteable.