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The Place Of Modern MIDI Music?

Posted by Zonk on from the cue-zelda-theme dept.

-1-Lone_Eagle writes "With the free availability of literally thousands of MIDI files on the Internet, and increasingly powerful home desktop systems and software, virtually anyone can take a MIDI file and using a program such as GarageBand or Reason create a near-studio-quality rendition of their favorite song. This opens up an interesting discussion, is a remixed MIDI file an original creation? Or is it simply a copied work with the rights belonging to the original author? Is it piracy? What do you think?"

2 of 261 comments (clear)

  1. not piracy by allanj37 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It's not like these midi files are going to take away sales from the artists. "Oh, no, I'm not going to buy that cd. I've already got the midi." But, if I heard a really good midi song, it might get me to buy the cd.

  2. Isn't it obvious by kentrel · · Score: 5, Insightful
    I'm not sure Slashdot is the place to even ask a question like this. No, taking a midi file of Tubular Bells and sampling in real instruments does not make it an "original creation". Really, did you think for a second it even might be?

    Even if the original work is out of copyright, for example Beethoven's works, the rights to the "notation or manuscript" is owned by whoever printed or published it, since classical music can be notated in different ways according to different interpretations. This goes for any piece of music. Also, the midi file, even of an out of copyright piece of music is the intellectual property of the author. I've created my own versions of several pieces of classical music, made them available on the internet and I've noticed in the years since I've come across those files under different names. It's the same midi I made, just someone has put their own name as author\tracker in the file. It's not cool.