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Stock Music Artists Aren't Always Happy About How Their Music Is Used (wired.com)

Posted by msmash on from the crux-of-the-problem dept.

mirandakatz writes: If you're a stock music composer, you sign over the rights to whatever music you put up on a variety of hosting sites. That can get complicated -- especially when your music winds up being used to soundtrack hate speech. At Backchannel, Pippa Biddle dives into the knotty world of stock music, writing that stock music is 'a quick way for a talented musician to make a small buck. But there's a hidden cost: You lose control over where your work ends up. In hundreds, if not thousands, of cases, a tune becomes the backing track to hate speech or violent videos. Often such use violates the license the buyer agrees to when purchasing the track. But nobody reads the licenses -- and, more importantly, no one enforces them.'

10 of 147 comments (clear)

  1. Hate speech by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Nobody has clearly defined what hate speech actually means. In practice, it is taken to mean anything that conservatives say.

    1. Re:Hate speech by Scroatzilla · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The most accurate definition I've seen/heard is "speech that I disagree with."

    2. Re:Hate speech by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Thus spake someone who's never been the victim of targeted racism, people calling for your death due to your sexual orientation, or stating that you should be denied basic human rights because of your religious beliefs.

      It's easy to dismiss a defense you don't need personally, but for some of us the ban on hate speech means that there can't be a neo-nazi like rally in the streets calling for people like us to be treated as subhuman.

    3. Re: Hate speech by hackwrench · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Blank pages are visual silence.

    4. Re:Hate speech by Archangel+Michael · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I've been actively targeted with Hate speech. "White people just need to die" is hate speech, but it is okay, if uttered by a minority. Followed by "You're old, and you just just die" also uttered by some PYT who didn't like that I made sense to idiotic emotional vomit she was spewing.

      The point is, it is only "hate" if you disagree with it, or affects white straight cisgendered males.

      In other words, you idea of hate is probably not inclusive enough. Which is itself "hate" (or so I've been told)

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    5. Re:Hate speech by boudie2 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The concept of hate speech contradicts free speech. You can't believe in both. You either have free speech or you don't.

  2. There's only speech. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

    Hate speech is that which someone doesn't like.

    Also, yelling "fire" in a crowded theater is perfectly acceptable; let the theater owner sue the perpetrator in civil court, and let the stampeders also answer for their behavior .

    Here, in the West, we respect people's minds; in the west, your speech is what's sacred.

  3. Simple solution by religionofpeas · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If you don't want to lose control, don't put your music in a place you don't control.

  4. Not limited to music by Comboman · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Stock photographs also get used for things the photographer (or model) didn't anticipate and may not approve of. Are you a programmer? Guess what, a neo-nazi may be using your software to organize their mailing list. If your are an architect or builder, you may find that building you created is now a porno store, or an abortion clinic, or an NRA office. If you create something, you have little to no control over who uses it and for what once you sell it.

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  5. It's not a bug, it's a feature. by king+neckbeard · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The whole point of stock music and photos is so they can basically be used as a neutral commodity. Same goes for fonts. Nazis (or whatever you fear) might use your fonts, too.

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