This page holds an archived discussion about licensing moved here from the main Virtual Playing Orchestra download page. This whole discussion has become irrelevant with the updated licensing information here and screen captures of support from the contributors to Virtual Playing Orchestra here. From what I know and from what is demonstrated at the above links about the sources of the samples used in this sample library, I think you can feel free to use this sample library to make music, with no concern over licensing issues or need for attribution.
17 comments on “Licensing Discussion”
NOTE FROM VIRTUAL PLAYING ORCHESTRA: The comment thread below about licensing, occurred before extra clarifying information was added to the original licensing details, to try to alleviate those concerns. Most specifically, it has now been demonstrated with screen captures at the end of the licensing section, what was always true: that this sample library has the support of the relevant sample library developers and that any concerns about licensing for the purposes of using this library to make music, are unwarranted.
Hey, the mixed licensing of the source material means that people using VPO will need to:
1. Carefully track which instruments they use
2. Include attibution for instruments using sources under CC-BY-SA or CC-Sampling+
3. Release their music under CC-BY-SA if they used any CC-BY-SA licensed instruments
4. Not get crazy in the process
This is very unfortunate. I think that to provide a legally safe instrument library for free culture artists, we need to make sure that we’re not luring them into a legal minefiled, where they’ll inevitably violate someone’s copyright.
I think non-CC0-licensed sources should be purged.
Attributing 5 different entities under each song is silly enough, and then being forced to use CC-BY-SA for your music is even sillier. This is quire far removed from free culture in my opinion.
I’d prefer to have a much mire limited set of instruments available, but under clear CC0 license that I can use in good conscience, rather than have a lot of instruments where most of them should not be touched unless I want to pay a lawyer to figure out how can I use it without being an asshole.
Please add a CLEAR LEGAL DISPLAIMER about this on the top of the page until these licensing issues are resolved.
I cannot recommend Virtual Playing Orchestra in this state.
> Please add a CLEAR LEGAL DISPLAIMER
If you follow this link: “License” from the top of the page, you will see a clear legal disclaimer which says:
“If you’re using this free orchestral sample library to make music, then licensing is easy. You can do whatever you want with the music you make, even sell it commercially.”
I’ve also added an extra line to the above quote to clarify that no attribution is needed for simply making music with Virtual Playing Orchestra. * It’s my understanding that none of the licenses apply unless you are going to re-distribute the samples.*
This is simply not true, could you re-read please the license for yourself? All the samples that has any kind of CC-By license needs attribution if you remix or use it in your own work!
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/
The term is:
You are free to:
Share — copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format
Adapt — remix, transform, and build upon the material
for any purpose, even commercially.
UNDER THE FOLLOWING TERMIS:
Attribution
you have no right to put your own license above this one if you take samples for your package which has such a license!
Your disclamer that says:
“If you’re using this free orchestral sample library to make music, then licensing is easy. You can do whatever you want with the music you make, even sell it commercially.”
Is simply wrong and violates the license rules!
It doesn’t matter what your understanding is, what simply matters is the fact how the license works!
And i want to add that all license with the addition -SA like CC-BY-SA means that all music you create with remixing or bulid up on the samples have also to be the same license, CC-BY-SA!
Every -SA license in a sample package is a violate if you say you could sell the created work, cause you build up or remix the samples in your work and it means your whole work is also CC-BY-SA after use this sample!
Consider the following: there are plenty of professional, paid sample libraries that have all rights reserved but musicians are still permitted to use that to make music without disclosing what they used or without imposing any restrictions on the created music. Using a sample library to make music is different than redistributing or repackaging samples, which is what creative commons licenses cover.
Unless you can show a court case where someone was successfully sued for making music with a creative commons sample library, I feel confident in my understanding.
Everyone can judge for himself if and how he uses something. But your disclaimer is in my opinion the big problem. It is YOUR interpretation of the license and not a shortcut how the license works!
CC-BY or CC-BY-SA doesn’t cover the difference how the license is applied between samples packaging/redistribute… or samples used in a whole work.
At least you should delete the following part or write that it is only your interpreatation: “If you’re using this free orchestral sample library to make music, then licensing is easy. You can do whatever you want with the music you make, even sell it commercially. No attribution to Virtual Playing Ochestra (though always appreciated) or to any of the original sources of the samples is required.”
See the updated license info, and beneath that, proof that my library is supported by the relevant contributors:
Licensing
When you “buy” a paid instrument library, you really get a royalty-free license to use that (without crediting it). It’s all an agreement. You compensate the copyright holder (could be a publisher, author or a company) with a one-time payment, and you can use it in your work – but not re-sell it, or re-license it! You don’t have copyright, you only have a license.
The problem is – if you get paid to make the library, you’re compensated and you explicitly agree to not be credited on songs that used recordings you were working on.
This is why you don’t need to credit 500 people who worked on that orchestral library under every song you used in it. The copyright holder also doesn’t require a credit, because that’d be ridiculous. It’s all entirely dependant on what the parties agree on (what the license agreement is).
If you made a library and release it under CC-BY, your ONLY compensation IS the credit. And you are in your right to get it.
So when we’re using any work released under a Creative Commons license as a basis for our own work – be it a song or an instrument library – we MUST meet the license requirements, unless we can negotiate a different license agreement (!).
I was thinking about maybe making a crowdfunding campaign to buy off one of the DrumGizmo drumkits so it’d be relicensed under CC0 by it’s authors (they are CC-BY 4.0).
Maybe the copyright holders of sources used by Virtual Playing Orchestra could be contacted and negotiated with for a different license, maybe they could be comensated via a crowdfunding campaign (like Blender’s source code was once bought off to be free software).
I doubt they’d be happy to learn you’ve been telling everyone they can violate their copyright though…
I understand this must be very difficult for you, as I can tell you’ve put a lot of work into this project, and I am confident your intentions are good.
I have myself used VPO in projects, unknowingly violating the licenses. It’s because I trusted your note. And now I feel terrible.
This is why I will not use VPO again and I will tell everyone to do the same – until these licensing issues are resolved and a proper notice is issued.
I am not a lawyer, I am not giving legal advice.
This is what I think based on my personal experience and conversations with people who know much more than I do in regards to licensing and Creative Commons.
I won’t tell you what you should or shouldn’t do, but I think this is very dangerous. Even if nobody’s going to sue anybody over this – it’s not ok. And in the worst case scenario affected companies and universities could give you hell over this.
I think I’d hire a lawyer…
Please be extremely careful.
May I ask where the examples in the “Other” folder come from? You don’t say a word about it in the license and origin description above?
unfa wrote:
> This is why I will not use VPO again and I will tell everyone to do
> the same
> I am not a lawyer, I am not giving legal advice.
Please be sure to reference the relevant court cases when you do that. I would sincerely like to read about any legal decision that covers this issue.
> I doubt they’d be happy to learn you’ve been telling everyone
> they can violate their copyright though…
I can only speak for the makers of Sonatina Symphonic Orchestra, No Budget Orchestra and VSCO2, (the major contributors to Virtual Playing Orchestra) with whom I had direct discussion about my library, years ago when it was first created. They are fully aware and have expressed no issues with my library.
> I think I’d hire a lawyer…
No need because as I’ve now clarified in the updated license section, no sample contributor to my library is going to complain nor sue me or anyone else. I know for a fact the main creators of the samples have no issue with my sample library and the other samples are free to use as I’ve used them.
Varg wrote:
> May I ask where the examples in the “Other” folder come from?
> You don’t say a word about it in the license and origin description
> above?
The samples in the “Other” folder are manufactured from sources already credited elsewhere. For example, tremolo samples in the “Other” directory were created by me recording myself rapidly playing staccato notes to make a tremolo sound. I did the same for the timpani roll.
I have made a video to warn the community about the licensing trouble. I hope it explains the problem better, showing why your analogy to Royalty-Free commercial libraries doesn’t apply and your assumptions drawn from that analogy are incorrect.
https://youtu.be/y9ZLgDqIIbQ
Sorry for being a bit emotional and sarcastic in this video – before recording this I had spent a few hours trying to fix as much of the damage I could. I mean you no harm, and I hope this debacle doesn’t result in anything bad, but I think you’ve been negligent and ha lead countless people (including myself) into violating licensing without even knowing it. People (including myself) have done client work using VPO and it turns out that work is tainted with licensing requirements they cannot meet. That feels terrible, and is dangerous not just to you, but to all users of VPO, especially those doing commercial work with it.
If you’re gonna go by “nobody proved this in court” logic, then it seems to me like you’re more interested in what you can get away with, rather than what is respecting the rights of the people involved.
If you have permission from authors of the samples to use and distribute the library – get them to explicitly permit the use under CC0 in this library in writing, have them publish this statement on their websites and permalink to these statements here – otherwise this is just your word, which I do not trust at this point.
I understand you’ve put a lot of work into this, and I see you’ve taken care to write down all the sources in SFZ files – that makes it easier for whoever wants to deal with the licensing issues to do that.
This still doesn’t change how the Creative Commons licenses work – music made with VPO is considered derivative work of the source samples and has to respect the CC-Sampling+ and CC-BY-SA licenses, which is absolutely crippling to the artists.
Sure, maybe nobody’s gonna sue them or you over this, but is this ethical? Or is it opportunistic?
unfa wrote:
> it seems to me like you’re more interested in what you can get away with
I’m not getting away with anything. I’ve been very transparent about the source material and the original creators of that source material that matter, are fully aware and supportive of my use of their samples.
> Sure, maybe nobody’s gonna sue them or you over this, but is this ethical? Or is it opportunistic?
Since I know the intent of the relevant sample creators, which is only to protect against repackaging of their work without attribution, not to restrict the use for creation of music, I’m not being opportunistic at all.
It has never been necessary to trust my interpretation of the licenses. They have been plainly displayed from the first day this sample library was made available and my distribution of my sample library is in compliance with the licenses by giving attribution and by not charging for the use of my library.
I feel it’s important for us to know whether the sample authors agree specifically with the way you claim the samples were intended to be used as described in your “licensing” section. Sure, you have screencaps endorsing the project as a whole, but are the authors aware these are the standards you set?
While I’d believe so (if I myself provide samples under a certain license/intention and I stumble upon a library which uses them, I probably wouldn’t gloss over how the project is being handled), going by assumptions might be a little risky, don’t you think?
Rafael wrote:
> I feel it’s important for us to know whether the sample authors agree
> specifically with the way you claim the samples were intended to be used
As I’ve explained, I know the authors never intended any restrictions on using their samples to make music. The screen captures clearly demonstrate I have their support.
> going by assumptions might be a little risky, don’t you think?
What is the risk? This library has existed for about 5 1/2 years (since Nov 2016) with no complaints from any of the authors. Two of the authors helped test the beta version and have favourably commented on music I’ve composed using Virtual Playing Orchestra so they’re well aware how I’m using it without any concern about licensing. A third author has seen unfa’s video and think’s he’s being overly dramatic. There is no risk from the authors of the contributing samples when using Virtual Playing Orchestra to compose music.
I apologize as I didn’t really want to keep taking your time with this and I’m sure you want to move on already instead of reading the upcoming wall of text… but the situation remains a little fishy and I hope you can understand why; let me explain with a concrete example.
Sonatina is licensed under the Creative Commons Sampling Plus license, which states anyone is free to use its content, as long as attribution is made and it isn’t used “to advertise for or promote anything but the work you create from it”. Now, it is possible and even likely that Mattias didn’t intend the license to apply to, say, music derived from it, but only to libraries like this one, however the license he ultimately applied to the samples makes no distinction. It’s an old library and maybe he’d use a different license if he compiled it today, but legally speaking, music created with it is still bound to that license.
It’s justifiable unfa finds issue with that; remember he’s from the libre community, which is notorious for having high standards for licensing and permissions, and if I’m being honest they’re not wrong. Myself, I don’t hold to such high standards; if I’m convinced the creators of the libraries are alright with not having these restrictions to any music I make with them, regardless of their licensing, I won’t feel the need to bind myself to that.
What is important is to know whether the sample authors which you have proved endorse Virtual Playing are aware of your own stated usage standards, particularly in regards to music pieces utilizing the samples. You claim you have their full support, but what if one of them read your “licensing” section for the first time tomorrow and goes “just wait a minute…” at it? I know it’s unlikely, as I said before, that they, being either involved or closely aware of the library, would gloss over this, but all we got is your word, and that may not be enough for something as serious as legal licenses, especially for musicians looking for contract work.
If the sample authors are fine with it, I second unfa’s suggestion that you reach out to these sample providers and get these samples relicensed so these issues are finally put to rest. If not, at least I would be personally satisfied with proof of their specific endorsement of your licensing standards (and not a message of support at Virtual Playing as a whole).
Thanks a bunch for reading this regrettably large post
Rafael wrote:
> If the sample authors are fine with it, I second unfa’s suggestion that
> you reach out to these sample providers and get these samples
> relicensed so these issues are finally put to rest. If not, at least I
> would be personally satisfied with proof of their specific endorsement
> of your licensing standards (and not a message of support at Virtual
> Playing as a whole).
Well, all I can say is that you are free to decide for yourself if you are comfortable using Virtual Playing Orchestra or not, based on the information I’ve already provided. There is no financial gain for me if someone uses my library. I’m not personally requiring credit for every piece of music made with it so I’m not getting famous either and I’m not taking credit for any work done by the other authors. I just shared my work (a lot of work) in creating the library that I wanted to use, with anyone else who wants to use it, in the same spirit as the other authors did.
> Thanks a bunch for reading this regrettably large post
You’re welcome. I appreciate it when someone takes the time to leave a comment.