Robert J Posted January 18, 2005 Report Share Posted January 18, 2005 (edited) A forum I've been to lately because of my interests - Piano World - has recently had an ethical hosting question thrown at them. One of its members posted a link to a site that is located in Spain. The author of the site is a pianist, from Barcelona (It's all in Spanish so I am being basic here). He's a young long-haired European pianist who seems to know his stuff as a performer and arranger. He also has a page that links to various videos of classical pianists – solo and w/ensemble. It is a treasure for music lovers. He also has links – I think unknown to PW because no one dug deeper – to PDF files of classical music for piano. Again an astonishing collection. All the Real Book PDFs and others I've never seen before - Art Tatum sheet music, Bill Evans fake book (!!). (Funny thing is there’s this one modern composer in there: Collins, Phil. I think he’s a minimalist.) Many members jumped in to download the videos (They are massive though, 10MB – 800MB). Others condemned it as stealing. Just to demonstrate how tempting it would be to download these, here’s a title in the Miscellaneous section: Jazz Piano Workshop. Berlin, 1965. Earl Hines, Teddy Wilson, Bill Evans, John Lewis, Lennie Tristano, Jackie Byard (588 megas). The moderator/owner of PW eventually deleted the thread. He’s a very reasonable guy from what I can tell. I won’t paste his reply, but it was to the effect that he’d rather not have his site link to something that may be pushing illegal copies of music. Secondly, he’s read an article (heavily Kaaza influenced) that suggested these video sites are spyware laden. He’s wrong on that count in this instance. The guy’s web page seems legit: a performer who’s excited about the videos he’s found on OTHER websites. If you click on a file to the musician’s website, you can see clearly that the files are hosted on his server, not linking to where he got them. Lastly, the moderator said he’s heard the big studios (music and video) are going after people for pirated copies and copyright infringements. So he didn’t want to be targeted. That’s fair enough. So my question is: Is there a problem linking to these sites on any webpage, not just a forum? –to me, you are just linking, not hosting. [OMG - I know I will go to hell for downloading the piano video - but Earl Hines in Duet with Teddy Wilson and Jaki Byard! I'm in heaven] Edited January 18, 2005 by Robert J Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leeway Posted January 19, 2005 Report Share Posted January 19, 2005 I can't speak to the legal issues to any great extent, but it occurs to me that at one time, this was what the Internet was all about-- the open-ended, cross-pollinating exchange of information and ideas. Now it is tied up by laws, lawyers and bureaucrats of all kinds. I guess it had to happen, but a situation like describe is what the Internet should be all about. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Claude Posted January 19, 2005 Report Share Posted January 19, 2005 If you link intentionally to content that infringes copyright, you participate in the infringement act. The Jazz Piano Workshop. Berlin, 1965 video was probably never sold commercially. I saw it on german TV years ago. So no studio was harmed by the downloads. But this doesn't matter from a legal point of view. One of the most often asked legal questions on TV/Cinema-related message boards is "Can a share on the internet some TV shows that I have recorded from free TV?" The answer is clearly No, but it is difficult to explain why one can't make available to others what is already available for free. Music fans often think its ok to share bootlegs and OOP records, but not to do it with commercially available recordings. Those are valid ethic considerations, but from a strict legal point of view it doesn't make a difference at all whether you share the latest Hollywood movie ripped from a reviewer DVD or a movie taped from a free TV station. That being said, the important question is, who has an interest in sueing the copyright infringer, in the case of material that is not commercially exploited? I haven't heard of free TV stations that went after those who share TV shows in file sharing networks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robert J Posted January 19, 2005 Author Report Share Posted January 19, 2005 (edited) [ If you link intentionally to content that infringes copyright, you participate in the infringement act. Is this true? And where? The EU? North America? I don't know myself. It seems absurd that if you are not hosting the files, you should not be "punished" as those who do. I recall this debate a few years ago when servers were put on tropical islands etc to avoid certain taxation laws of the originator. Edited January 19, 2005 by Robert J Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted December 20, 2005 Report Share Posted December 20, 2005 does anybody know the name of the drummer with bill evans in this "jazz piano workshop" - video? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted December 22, 2005 Report Share Posted December 22, 2005 Semd me a PM with a link would ya'? No, I'm serious. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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