[cc-licenses] Case study: Magnatune

Evan Prodromou evan at bad.dynu.ca
Tue Nov 22 10:35:45 EST 2005


On Mon, 2005-21-11 at 21:26 +0000, Daniel Carrera wrote:

> I assume you're familiar with the CC-friendly record label, Magnatune:
> 
> http://magnatune.com/
> 
> They offer free MP3s of all their albums under a Creative Commons 
> license and you can buy CD-quality WAV files.
> 
> Practical question:  Are the WAV files automatically under the same CC 
> license?

I am not a lawyer, but I think that a US court would not accept the
claim that a work encoded in one format is not the same work encoded in
a different format.

In other words, if the Work is licensed under a CC license, I don't
think the format matters. Making a business model out of the difference
between digital formats seems unwise. (I can see differences between
digital and physical formats being useful, though -- say, a painter who
gives away digital copies of their paintings but sells the physical
objects.)

That said, I hope that Magnatune (a CC poster boy) is getting better
legal advice than mine. My guess is that they're fine with people
sharing the WAV files.

~Evan

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