Slashdot Mirror
Roland Backs Down On MT-32 Emulator
canadacow writes "This is a follow up to the cease and desist letter the MT-32 project received (Original Story). Roland, unable to find documentationg establishing a copyright on the MT-32's ROM, has yielded to the project and allowed distribution of the emulator to continue. On my page www.artworxinn.com/alex I've again posted the emulator along with the legal developments as they happened after the receipt of the initial C&D letter. This development was largely due in part to the legal support of the Electronic Frontier Foundation."
Before you all get excited about this, note that this is not a win for OSS -- not really. Notice that no legality was established. Roland simply gave up because they have not been able to find their documentation establishing copyright.
Company Lawyer: "You're violating our copyrights! We order you to cease and desist distribution now, or face your utter doom through further legal action!"
Corporate underling, walking in, sullen looking...
Corporate Underling: "Uh, sir, we may have a problem, uh, here, sir. We can't find the copyright information, uh, on our rom, uh, sir..."
Company Lawyer's face suddenly shows his confusion, wonder, and amazement about having to completely retract his previous statement...
Company Lawyer: "Okay. We'll continue to allow you to distribute this time, but be warned, young project, that we'll meet again, Oh yes, we'll meet again!"
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
Horay. We get to use iformation that an organisation has no further need for and no longer uses yet stll jealously guards.
Not quite sure it's a major victory.
Rolands Lawyer imitating terminator: We'll be back!.
Ahm.. what's a MT32?
In a world where companies are always trying to squeeze every last marginal penny out of us "consumers", they usually want to do so by abandoning valid and proven technologies in order to force us to upgrade to the latest doo-hickey for the sake of upgrading. Musicians generally don't need "the lastest thing", much to the chagrin of big companies who are trying to get us to go digital. Tube guitar amps, transistor-based effects pedals, well designed classic style guitars from the 50/60's (Fender Stratocasters, Telecasters, Gibson Les Pauls, Martin acoustics), class A discrete mic preamps, pre-World War 2 German microphones, these items are still in use today and still built this way because quite simply, they work. Not to mention the quality factor. If companies had their way, they'd be making wood *veneer* electronics guitars a la IKEA instead of with solid ash/mahogany bodies. But oh, since it doesn't sound as good, they'll make up for it by putting in digital pickups and then running it through a mock tube circuit which really is just a little light show to trick the plebs. As a synthesizer player, I still like my old analog synths (Roland Jupiter, ARP 2600, Oberheim Matrix). Yet it's funny because these days, companies make these digital synths to emulate what was already done and call it "progress".
Dude, there is no such thing as "IP".
It's public domain, so it's not *other people's* IP, it's *our* IP.
Don't worry, though -- Disney and their paid representatives in the government are working hard to ensure that nothing more will ever become public domain.
-- Help Digitise the Public Domain at DP.
The sad thing is, this depends on so many technicalities, it is not likely there will be another "victory" like this for a long time to come, becuase the relevant laws have all been strengthened in the last 20 years. In the US, Copyright lasts (practically) forever now, with no registration or renewal requirements. Unless there is a major shift in the laws, there is nothing being produced today that will come this close to becoming public domain in 20-30 years.
So, while I'm glad the MT-32 emulation project can continue, I don't see much chance of any other more cheerful stories like this coming out.
the n and g aren't that close to each other ....
RFC 791 begs to differ
Of course it runs NetBSD. BTC: 1NT7QvbetmANwaMzhpVL6
The emulator won't work unless you have a copy of the required ROM file, mt32_pcm.rom
:-)
So, don't slaughter their bandwidth/server by downloading the emulator unless you've got this file. Since I already made this mistake, I thought I might try to spread the word and cushion their Slashdotting, if only a little.
OtakuBooty.com: Smart, funny, sexy nerds.
"Roland, unable to find documentation establishing a copyright on the MT-32's ROM, has yielded to the project and allowed distribution of the emulator to continue."
That wouldn't stop SCO. I mean, at this point, can you really imagine the following sentence appearing anywhere:
SCO unable to find any code in Linux that matches code in Unixware or System V, has yielded to IBM and the Linux community and will no longer threaten Linux users with suing. "We goofed," Darl McBride, SCO CEO, admitted. "Sorry about that guys. No hard feelings, right?"
So then you could distribute your emulator. It may still be infected with decimal literals, or decimal spread out through number outputs and documentation. But abolishment of copyright would be a good step.
-Libertarian secular transhumanist
While it's true that the laws on this subject are pretty messed up in the United States: the United States is hardly the world! In fact, there's a coalition of canadian and other non-USian organisations working on reform -and making some amazing headway, I might add!
32 , after its been used.
Before reading this story, I had never heard of Roland's MT-32. So this was initially quite confusing. But I have perused the site and can inform those who would still be in the dark. Never fear, all has been made clear.
The MT-32 is a product sold by Roland. It was originally sold in Japan and, some time after that, was also sold in the US. It contains some software which seems to also contain sound files. Of some kind. Oh, and it is probably quite an old model in its line of products. I think. From what I gather.
My guess is it is an old keyboard. And the fact it is now emulated seems to really be quite something. For some reason.
Hope this helps.
This is interesting. Note that restored works are only an issue in the United States, and the original copyright gained in Japan by way of Berne should still be legitimate not only in Japan, but in just about every other Berne signatory (the restored work issue results from US non-compliance with Berne).
This would mean an interesting situation that you could be considered in infringing copyright if you take your work outside the USA, or if anyone downloads your work from outside the USA (many of the similar ITAR issues).
Since they couldn't find the copyright of the ROM, it seems it can be freely distributed.
"This development was largely due in part to the legal support of the Electronic Frontier Foundation."
Let's hear it for the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Without the EFF, there'd be much more doom and gloom on Slashdot than there already is.
Although, "largely due in part" is an odd statement.
Long live Schrodinger's cat...
Does anyone know if there are plans for a Linux port of the emulator?
Roland is the Nintendo of musical instruments. .jp that they could ...
Not "hi-tech flashy" like Yamaha, but they
understand what "play value" means in the same
way Nintendo does, in a way that transcends
language and cultures. They designed the
drum machines (808, etc) that put the raw
sonic tools behind a lot of cool music, written
in cultures far away from
never understand except sonically. I honestly
think if the right (non-lawyer) types spoke to
them, they would get what was really going on
here and be cool
No. They are responsible for what their lawyers do. When they say they are sorry, then we can begin to think about being nice to them again.
Could this get rolled into the SCUMM VM for our auditory pleasure?
just a friendly reminder to toss some extra change towards the EFF...thanks to them alex and others are able to stand up against this sort of corporate legal pressure.
donate here:
https://secure.eff.org/
He'll know them once the GNAA sets loose its members on the McBride.
Use ISO 8601 dates [YYYY-MM-DD]
Dude, there is no such thing as "IP".
A sentiment shared almost exclusively by people who can't create anything anybody would bother to pi^H^Hcopyright infringe.
If "there is no such thing as 'IP'", can I go ahead and violate the GPL now?
Copyrights are in force, whether registered with the US Library of Congress, or not. Every crayon scribbling you've ever made, every photograph you've ever snapped, every recorded karaoke performance you've ever warbled, is protected by the force of law. Registration is a paper trail for the courts, but not a necessary element of a copyright enforcement lawsuit.
[
Okay, I've now got a soft MT-32 available on my PC. Has anyone got a link to any archives of old MT-32 tunes? I used to have a LAPC-1, so I know there's some sweet stuff out there...
True for creations past a certain date. Before that, creations had to be registered to be protected. Unlike bogus copyright extensions, this change is not retroactive. I suspect that this is exactly the case here.
I recently pulled a Roland MT-32 that I paid way too much money for back in the early 1990's out of the closet and played for a while.
What a disappointment. The instruments are mediocre and very noisy. The MIDI implementation is unnecessarily difficult and poorly documented. The editor programs still available are awkward to use and impossible to alter (no source code anywhere for MT-32 editors).
The unit has no backup battery inside. All modifications to any sounds are lost at power-down. The internal firmware writes the mediocre internal voices over whatever is in RAM so just adding a battery to the RAM's VCC won't save your work.
The internal synthesizer is just a square wave and a sawtooth with a gritty filter, amplitude envelope, and pitch tweeker (fire engine siren generator). So-so reverb and precussion patches. That's the whole thing.
Of all the synthesizers to select to emulate, this would be my last pick. Fifteen years ago, when it was released, it might have been impressive. But not now.
In fact, of all the synth tone modules from that period, the MT-32 sells for the least amount of money on Ebay. Someone is always trying to unload one for $40-$50 US.
The only thing cheaper is the Yamaha FB-01. In my opinion, the FB-01 is a 'better' synth because you can at least get some really metallic industial sounds out of it, along with fair orchestral instruments. For a $50 Ebay synth, get a Yamaha TX-81Z. It's the same price as a Roland MT-32, but far more fun and flexable to play with.
I wish I could say this is a cheerfull story for me. I am certainly happy that the MT-32 project was able to go on its merry way. I am certainly happy that the author was able to continue using his spare time to make a positive contribution to both the culture and humanity. I am really not happy this played out in the usual way.
Consider the general case of legal intimidation.
1. The little guy undertakes a project/enterprise/undertaking that somehow threatens/annoys/provides a scapegoat for someone at a large company.
2. The large companies officers/representatives/agents meet with their legal representation and proceed to formulate an attack via the legal system.
3. If the activity isn't sufficiently profitable or the defendant doesn't have sufficient disposable personal resources, they either have to obtain pro-bono legal representation or face judgements that may economically devastate them.
4. Even if the defendant can defend themselves there is no assurance a victory ends the matter.
5. Even if a final victory is obtained by the defendant it is in only the most loose sense of the terms a victory. The only thing they have gained is the right to proceed in their business unmolested, they have lost a great deal of time, energy and usually financial resources to have things restored to status quo ante bellum.
I know its been said before, but the legal system is a cruel joke. To expect a class of people to place the pursuit of justice ahead of their personal profit is insane. Too allow anyone with a hair up their rear to bring suit indefinitely without the presumption of their being wrong and the built in provision for compensation is insane.
Even though MT 32 is a software layer wave table synth, if the synth then needs to access fat volumes for table data then MS will want a cut. Roland software does not like MS, never has and never will, because Gates always wants to control everything. Even your synth!
OH THE SHAME I fell off the wagon and use sigs again!
To wit, if on the high seas - if not yet on the High Internet - anyone coming across something abandoned, has rights to claim it, if the original owner has disappeared, or if the original owner has lost interest in it, or a significant portion of its value if the original owner has lost control of it.
We've heard an awful lot about "Property Rights" as applied to software - I think we need to hear a lot more about "Salvage Rights" - because that is part and parcel of the business risk assessment that insurers do for shipping lines, and that is nothing if not Property Rights.
"I his bow, and spun and wove, likes you." Vere de Vere out of my mould's mouth dragged me of the voluntary apes.
...however copyright != IP. Neither is a patent IP. Copyright and patents are a different kettle of fish. The term IP is used by those who hold neither patent or copyright, hence is bogus.
to send in the EFF's Christmas present this year.....
He's right...there is no such thing as "IP".
There is:
Patents
Copyrights
Trademarks
He's not being pedantic, he simply wants you to stop pretending this is equivalent to real property. That doesn't mean he thinks you should infringe copyright, or break the law, he simply wants you to be more specific.
I guess some people hide their ignorance by lashing out at others. People like you. You are a sad, sad little boy.
Roland should be forced to give a LARGE contribution to the EFF for bringing out this "fishing expedition" attacking innocent users! Behavior such as theirs deserves punishment. Maybe, just maybe, if a few companies got punished for harassment, it might make others think twice before doing so.
I believe that the MT-32 Emulator is a worth while project - But I am confused as to why the ROM needs to be copied at all. Why not record your own samples instead? It is not like those original samples are that great anyways. If the open source community (me included) recorded and processed our OWN samples, then none of these issues would have come up. The copyright on the originals would not be an issue at all.
--jeff++
ipv6 is my vpn
Roland (and their offspring, Boss) have always made excellent instruments. I have an SH-3 (not even an "a") that has been through the wringer and then some, but all it needs right now is a cleaning...it still sounds as sweet as the day I traded a copy of the Principia Discordia for it in the 1980s. I've had many a piece of Roland equipment over the years, and have always been happy about their quality and sounds...their Boss stomp pedals practally owned the market for many years...and with on exception, all of the Roland/Boss stuff I own still works, even if some of it is 20+ years old.
Roland giving up on the whole copyright issue, saying that can't find their proof of copyright may just be them saving face. They have have decided that the amount of bad publicity the whole fiasco would generate would tarnish their good name, and I wouldn't blame them for deciding so. I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt, and say they are just being good financial citizens realizing they wouldn't profit from going after the emulator people, and it may just have been an over-zelous lawyer's department that got overruled by the higher-ups.
That being said, I guess I have faith in Roland, they have always dealt fairly with me the few times I've had to deal with them, and I only hope that is happening now with this MT-32 emulator business. Think about the musical instruments that have been emulated, the Prophet 5, the Minimoog, etc. and think of the prestige that has given these companies that made the copied instruments...the only difference is that Roland is till around (although Mr. Moog has reconstituted his company, Big Briar rocks!)...having a emulator come out of an old instrument from a company give them a prestige like few things can!
CAN-CON 2019 - Ottawa's only book oriented Science Fiction Convention! October 18-20, Sheraton Hotel, Ottawa, Canada h
If you want a good synth, these days they are cheap and plentful the cheapest and most flexable for the money I can think of is the SoundBlaster Live. It's a real, no-shit, sample based MIDI playback device. Now it doesn't sound all that impressive with the included samples (better than the MT-32 but not great) but the cool thing is that you can find free and commercial samples in Creative Labs' Sound Font format all over the net. Get yourself a better one, and you are rocking. Along those lines, you aren't limited by the orignal GM spec. You can load your own instruments at your own locations to your hearts content. Quite a powerful editor for Sound Fonts too. Now, given that SBLives have be had for as little as $30 brand new, the MT-32 in no way competes.
This isn't even to mention the new synthesizers that Roland offers (under the name Edirol now) or more professional versions of the Live/Audigy hardware that Emu sells (Proteus).
The point of emulating the MT-32 is vintage sound. Many games were composed to it's unique sound. Hence if you want the true sound of old games, it's desirable to have one. So the emulator is for enthusiasts, not professionals.
This was back in the day when copyright was NOT an inherant thing. You had to actually file for it. IF you failed to do so, you had no copyright. The law was later changed so that copyright was inherant, at the moment of creation. All you had to do was make something and you had the copyright.
Since the MT-32 was made before that date and since Roland didn't file, they have no copyright.
Read my page to get an understanding of the relevant law here. While you're correct with regard to the current method of how copyright works, such policy is not retroactive in this case. And before you think I'm just talking out my butt since IANAL (no pun intended), remember that both the EFF and Roland's counsel agree with me on this interpretation of the law.
ahh yes, but anything under 60 days is not considerd a way, this was passed back in the 50's i beleave for one reason or another (sompthing about pre empting a nuclear attack) so the first 60 days are the presidents choice (it could be 90, but ill stick with the safer 60)and thus not thenically a way, all the president has to do is send the troops over there, and bomb the hell out of them for 60 days end it for 20 and go and do it again... i dont beleave there are any limits on how soon and when he can use this power again...
Noone writes jokes in base 13!
The MT-32 was the synth of choice all the older Sierra games (and others) supported. When you ran their setup program, it was quite common to get choices such as EGA or VGA display, followed by the sound selections of "Internal Speaker", "None", "Adlib", "Soundblaster" or "MT-32".
Eventually, they started offering "General MIDI" as a selection - which was ultimately more useful and better sounding on the right hardware.... but before that, MT-32 was the one to have.
As strictly a music synth though, no, the MT-32 wasn't a unit you'd use for its stellar signature sounds or anything....
How come something that emulates the MT-32 1987 sound module that most people haven't heard of gets into trouble, yet programs like Propellerheads's Rebirth, which emulates three much-sought after pices of Roland gear, seems to have no trouble? Did they pay royalties or something? What about Native Instruments cloning Yamaha's DX-7 synthesiser and Sequential Circuits's Prophet 5?
You probably should have gone anonymous before replying to your own post. Dumbass.
Maybe Roland let the copyright run out because it's a WORTHLESS PIECE OF JUNK!!
"Vintage" Sound. That's a good one.
Vintage sound. The point of the project is to have something that sounds just like an MT-32. If I wanted to improve on the sound, the easiest way would be to make a set of GM patches or a map to GM/GM2/GS/XG or the like. I mean I'm willing to bet you could write a simple mapper that would map MT-32 instruments to one of the GM or extended standards and get good results. Better yet, just make a SoundFont that has MT-32 instrumentation instead of GM instrumentation. The MT-32 speaks MIDI, just not General MIDI. So provided the SoundFont matches it's map and balance, it'll work great. As you suggest, the instruments could be made better.
Well, that's all well and good, but some people aren't after that. They want the orignal sound. That is the goal of this emulator. But, to do that, you need the orignal samples. It's the same reason why people still use something like the TR-808 (or rather emulations thereof). It's purpose was to try and simulate a drum kit. It did a shitty job by today's standards. I can get MUCH more realistic sound with something like Kontakt and a 500MB drum kit. That's not the point, the point is the 808 had a unique and sometimes diserable sound. People aren't using it to try and sound real, they are using it for the sound it has.
They'd just capatalise on this sort of thing. They should make a peice of software for vintage gamers. Make it a MIDI software synthesizer that emulates classic Roland hardware. I'd give it an MT-32 mode, a CM-64 mode and an SC-55 mode. That covers basically all old MIDI games. Thing is, it'd take very little development on their part. The only thing they'd really have to write is the MT-32 engine. They already have a number of software synthesizers, who's engines would work quite well.
The problem is that Roland seems to think that the hardware market is where it's at and deliberatly cripples their software. They don't seem to realise the future is software synthesis. I say this as the owner of two hardware synthesizers, one Roland.
They have a program caled Virtual Sound Canvas that is supposed to be an emulation of a number of their SoundCanvas products like the SC-55 and SC-88. Ya, except it sounds nowhere NEAR as good as the real hardware it's supposed to emulate. This is NOT a limitation of software, as there are software synths that sound as good or better than anything done in hardware. Same goes for their newer programs and synths. Their GM2 Hypercanvas software sounds like a software version of their new GM2 synths.... Except it has less than a third of the instruments, and the ones it does have are of inferior quality. Silly, given that it's only about $50 cheaper than their SD-20.
Siller still that the main reason for the inferior sound and lack of instruments is the small sample set. Well one of the main advantages of software synths is their ability to handle huge samples. It's not uncommon to have a PC with over a gig of RAM, and with streaming from disk (which good softsynths do) you can play sample banks larger than the system RAM. It's not uncommon to see single instruments for soft synths that are over 100MB. The Hypercanvas software, on the other hand, has only 26MB for all its samples.
Well since it's clear from what we know about software synthesizers that you can have large sample banks, and it's clear form other software synthesizers that Roland makes that don't directly compete with their hardware that they know how to make high quality ones, why not have high quality implementations of their hardware? Only reason seems to be because they are afraid of hurting hardware sales.
It's a pity, really, because I think there would be a large enthusiast market for a GOOD software emulation of their old hardware like the SC-55 and MT-32. I know I'd like it. GM devices don't play old MT-32 games right and even my SD-20 doesn't sound quite right for old GM games. I'd like to have the sound of an MT-32 and an SC-55 but it's both expensive and inconvienent to buy the real sound modules. I'd certianly buy a softsynth if one existed though (and do use this free MT-32 emulator).
Sometimes the only way to carry on an intelligent conversation is to talk to oneself. Especially with anon cowards replying.
OH THE SHAME I fell off the wagon and use sigs again!
I find a lot of links for SoundFont drivers, problems, etc, on google - as well as some non-free soundfonts. Any links to some of the better free ones?
Last year I received notice of a Rebirth clone for Linux called Reborn. The programmer sent me a copy (no source, but he was planning to release it), I tested it, it was great sounding and great fun. Within days he received a C&D from Propellerheads claiming copyright infringement of their interface. I thought that was pretty outrageous, since P-heads software had copied the Roland interface. However, the programmer informed me that in fact P-heads *did* pay Roland for the right to use their interface designs on Rebirth. He also pointed out that the people at P-heads were quite civil about the whole thing and even offered him a job. All well & good, except that Linux still doesn't have a Rebirth clone. P-heads apparently have no inclination to release a Linux version of Rebirth. Bummer... Oh, btw: If someone were to create a software emulation of Roland's MKS-70 I'd really be impressed, it's still one of Roland's finest synths.
Wow, there's a lot of uncalled-for Roland-bashing going on here. Read the project history - early in development, the author anticipated the legal issues and explicitly sought permission from Roland, who somewhat predictably denied it. The author then realized that the ROM may actually not be copyrighted due to a technicality and asked for Roland to produce evidence to the contrary, which this story shows they've been unable to produce. There was a mistaken C&D letter issued but that's only part of the story. It's not like Roland came out of nowhere and decided to swoop down on an established project, the author asked for them to get involved to clear up any legal issues before he put too much work into it.
Omnes arx vestrum sunt adiuncta nobis.
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.
Hmm, interesting! Is this a constitutional amendment, or just a normal law?
P.S. Have the mods gone? :-P
YLFIOne god, one market, one truth, one consumer.