155:, "to promote the progress of science and useful arts", had been perverted by the music industry to maximise profit over creativity resulting in a huge burden on society (the control of copying) simply to ensure its profits. Third, as copying became rampant, it was argued that musicians would have no choice but to move to a different economic model that exploited the spread of information to make a living, instead of trying to control it with limited government enforced monopolies.
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organic in its growth, the ethical basis of limiting its distribution using copyright laws was questioned. That is, an existential responsibility was fomented upon music creators who were drawing upon the creations of countless others in an unrestricted manner to create their own. Second, it was observed that the basis of
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or free music, since there were no copyright restrictions. In practice however, music reproduction was generally restricted to live performances and the legalities of playing other people's music was unclear in most jurisdictions. Copyright laws changed this gradually so much so that in the late 20th
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The Free Music
Philosophy used a three pronged approach to voluntarily encourage the spread of unrestricted copying, based on the fact that copies of recordings and compositions could be made and distributed with complete accuracy and ease via the Internet. First, since music by its very nature is
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The Free Music
Philosophy generally encourages creators to free music using whatever language or methods they wish. A Free Music Public License (FMPL) is available for those who prefer a formal approach. Some free music is licensed under licenses that are intended for software (like the
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were devising numerous licenses that offered different flavours of copyright and copyleft. The question was no longer why and how music should be free, but rather how creativity would flourish while musicians developed models to generate revenue in the
Internet era.
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and coincided with nascent open art and open information movements. Up to this point, few modern musicians distributed their recordings and compositions in an unrestricted manner, and there was no concrete rationale as to why they did it, or should do it.
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The crossed out copyright symbol with a musical note on the right hand side is the free music symbol, signifying a lack of copyright restrictions on music. It may be used in the abstract, or applied to a sound recording or musical
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as a compression standard for recordings, and despite the efforts of the music industry, free music became largely the reality in the early 21st century. Organisations such as the
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century, copying a few words of a musical composition or a few seconds of a sound recording, the two forms of music copyright, could be considered criminal infringement.
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Note that some licenses, such as CC-BY-NC, are not free by definition. However, works under these licenses are listed here as being related to the topic.
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in the early 18th century and its subsequent application to music compositions first, all music was "free" according to the definitions used in
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or licensed under a free license by the artist or copyright holder themselves, often as a method of promotion. It does
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Schulman BM. The song heard 'round the world: The copyright implications of MP3s and the future of digital music.
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881:"The Twisted (Helices) page – in 1993 it was called "The Twisted Page" and it made sense – exploratory music"
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48:, can freely be copied, distributed and modified for any purpose. Thus free music is either in the
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In response, the concept of free music was codified in the Free Music
Philosophy by
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Oakes C. Recording industry goes to war against web sites. Wired, June 10 1997.
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Notable bands distributing their music under free or close-to-free conditions
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The Free Music
Philosophy was reported on by diverse media outlets including
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929:: etree pioneered the standards for distributing lossless audio on the net.
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mean that there should be no fee involved. The word free refers to
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Stutz M. They (used to) write the songs. Wired, June 12 1998.
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Durbach D. Short fall to freedom: The free music insurgency.
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800:"Creative Commons, Copyright & The Independent Musician"
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Story of a
Revolution: Napster & the Music Industry.
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556:"NET Act: 17 U.S.C. and 18 U.S.C. as amended (redlined)"
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Creative
Commons NonCommercial, any version (#CC-BY-NC)
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229:Record labels and websites distributing free music
16:Music in the public domain or under a free license
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452:List of musical works released in a stem format
204:licenses, the explosion of the Web and rise of
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602:Reece D. Industry grapples with MP3 dilemma.
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403:Creative Commons Zero license – Public Domain
773:"Dogmazic.net, musique libre – Les licences"
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136:in early 1994. It was based on the idea of
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298:Category:Creative Commons-licensed albums
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691:Napoli L. Fans of MP3 forced the issue.
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249:– free and non-free CC licenses, GNU GPL
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724:Samudrala R. The future of music. 1997
582:Harvard Journal of Law and Technology
220:with free information champions like
706:Just T. Alternate Kinds of Freedom.
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255:– free and non-free CC licenses
243:– free and non-free CC licenses
904:"The Open Goldberg Variations"
824:. Loca Records. Archived from
775:. Dogmazic.net. Archived from
634:Levi's Original Music Magazine
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214:Electronic Frontier Foundation
172:Levi's Original Music Magazine
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861:. Ophur.com. 22 January 2008
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510:"The Free Music Philosophy"
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200:(a free operating system),
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902:Ishizaka, Kimiko (n.d.).
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110:Creative Commons Licences
76:) or other writings (the
751:"About Audition Records"
122:advent of copyright law
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883:. Twisted-helices.com
641:June 1, 2010, at the
427:Free Culture movement
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44:is music that, like
21:For other uses, see
933:Free Music Licenses
761:on 25 January 2011.
695:, December 16 1998.
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566:on 14 January 2012.
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86:Free To Use License
927:The etree.org wiki
802:. Soundonsound.com
711:2014-09-03 at the
693:The New York Times
589:2012-04-09 at the
253:Free Music Archive
189:The New York Times
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218:Creative Commons
177:The Free Radical
144:Richard Stallman
108:and some of the
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863:. Retrieved
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432:File sharing
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338:Ghosts I–IV
265:Incompetech
235:Free To Use
120:Before the
82:Free To Use
42:libre music
948:Free music
942:Categories
859:"RIPIntro"
515:26 October
488:References
462:Open music
296:See also:
64:), not to
38:Free music
737:MusicDish
604:Billboard
311:Licenses
276:Magnatune
161:Billboard
709:Archived
658:47, 2001
639:Archived
587:Archived
533:(2011).
508:(1994).
442:Libre.fm
417:Copyleft
411:See also
345:BY-NC-SA
330:BY-NC-SA
323:The Slip
247:Dogmazic
202:copyleft
98:LinuxTag
909:15 June
887:13 June
865:13 June
832:13 June
806:13 June
783:13 June
472:Podsafe
286:Musopen
281:Opsound
259:Jamendo
116:History
60:(as in
58:freedom
739:, 2000
619:Forbes
437:Guvera
422:Deezer
167:Forbes
104:, the
351:Ophur
308:Title
198:Linux
183:Wired
66:price
911:2012
889:2012
867:2012
834:2012
808:2012
785:2012
542:2011
517:2008
216:and
196:and
186:and
78:GFDL
477:We7
343:CC
328:CC
210:mp3
206:P2P
142:by
100:'s
92:'s
90:EFF
84:'s
74:GPL
54:not
40:or
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25:.
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