CC licencing for in-game music with samples?

[fisk0]

Well, I am something of an amateur musician and thought some of my stuff might work in Warzone, but there is one thing, a few of my songs uses samples from 'commercial' sources, generally they are nothing but short <1 second samples of orchestral drums, one tone played on a string or horn which is then pitched to form melodies and so on.
So far I've kept most of my stuff for myself and a select few friends of mine (one of which is developing a game of his own, which I also might do some music for), but I wonder how the licensing works - could I license a song for all to use if it contains short samples of commercial works? I'd say I've used the samples in a "fair use" manner, not stealing any melodies or such, just a snare here, a horn there - but of course, early in the sampling era people could get fined for just about anything.

So, does anybody know how this would work? Could I release a song as public domain, CC or such containg such samples, or would I have to remove them an re-create similar sounding ones using only my own musical instruments?

I'm not sure which of the forum topics this would fit in, or if I should ask it on a more music oriented board instead.

Then of course, since you are allowed to use the original EIDOS music now, other music might not even be needed anymore.

[Buginator]

Hmm, I think your best bet is to ask the FSF ( http://www.fsf.org/) guys, or some group like that.

[fisk0]

Okay, yeah, I should have guessed this wasn't the right forum for small details in licenses for music which isn't a very big part of the game anyway.
Thanks for the reply, I'll check them out.

[Chojun]

The FSF probably will not be able to help you.

The licensing depends on the program you're using. In my experience, the orchestral packs that you're referring to are quite expensive but offer royalty-free licenses because you're paying them quite a bit for the program anyway.

If you've bought the program then you're free to distribute the music you derive from it as you see fit but you likely are not allowed to distribute the actual samples or patches that ordinarily came with the program or the pack that you bought. You would still be free to distribute copies of the project file you create, though.

[fisk0]

The FSF probably will not be able to help you.

The licensing depends on the program you're using. In my experience, the orchestral packs that you're referring to are quite expensive but offer royalty-free licenses because you're paying them quite a bit for the program anyway.

If you've bought the program then you're free to distribute the music you derive from it as you see fit but you likely are not allowed to distribute the actual samples or patches that ordinarily came with the program or the pack that you bought. You would still be free to distribute copies of the project file you create, though.

I don't use those kinds of orchestral packs, but rather I have sampled short things off classical music CD's and such that I own, and well, for the software I've only used open source/freeware software and free VST:s, but it's the unlicensed samples I am concerned about.

[EvilGuru]

Might also be worth trying asking on the CC IRC channel #cc on irc.freenode.net (same network as #warzone2100), assuming you use IRC that is.

I suspect that clips under a certain length are okay to use — however it depends heavily on your geographical location and most likely intended use.

Regards, Freddie.

[Rman Virgil]

----------------->

* fisk0 here's a resource which I think you may find very useful.

* http://www.musopen.com/

* Pre-twentieth century music all exists in the public domain.... this site (which has been a round several years now) has the ambitious goal of putting both classical recordings and sheet music into the public domain for use by anyone in the world without any restrictions.

* It's an all around fantastic resource and you can do what you've expressed liking to do without having to worry about copyright infraction whatsoever.

Then of course, since you are allowed to use the original EIDOS music now, other music might not even be needed anymore.

* There can never be enough good music to enjoy while playing the game, IMO.

- Regards, Rman

[Per]

I suspect that clips under a certain length are okay to use

I do not think that is a safe assumption. In general, I would say that unless you know that you have a license that allow you to use samples, or the work is public domain, do not use it for samples.