posted
It's funny... I can't see to get really into a writing project unless I have a song to go with it. The music makes me more passionate about what I'm writing, it makes the emotions in it stronger. Whenever I'm having writer's block, I just listen to the song and then I know what to write.
For my current project, the song is "Songbird" by Fleetwood Mac.
posted
I know exactly what you mean. I often go for a walk and listen to music when I'm developing a story.
Copyright? really? There are a thousand and one sites all over the web that have the lyrics for every song ever written. Some have been around for over a decade. It could be true but I dont think its the same as literature. I dont think the artists care if you quote their lyrics. But... I could be wrong, it happened once before back in 78.
posted
OSC has a rule that you can't post more than 3 lines of a song, or something. Most forums don't have that, but Hatrack does.
Posts: 46 | Registered: Dec 2006
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posted
In this matter, copyright is a crock. Something that keeps one from constructing the proper feel of a period. (Ever see those movies set in the sixties that don't use Beatles music on the soundtrack?) For professional publication, you've got to secure permissions---and often pay for them.
If you must use lyrics in your work, either write your own, or dig up something in public domain.
(I should also say I did plenty of lyric snatching when I was writing Internet Fan Fiction. As of yet, nobody has contacted me about it. Probably because there's so much of it going on, and, again, in this matter, copyright is a crock.)
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Well, whether it's a crock or not, we support copyright here as much as we possibly can.
When it comes to song lyrics, the copyright often doesn't belong to the author anyway. If someone wants to quote lyrics, or even make their own record of a song (which, I understand is something lyricists of "popular" songs hope for), that writer, singer, or band usually has to negotiate with the record company for permission, for which a significant fee is usually charged. Ever heard of barracudas?
posted
Well, in most cases, the artist doesn't care, but the businesspeople do. There are books, or stories, or recordings, or videos---particularly videos---that I would love to have, that I either (a) can't get a hold of, or (b) have to pay a massive and excessive price for. I figure there's a lot of people out there like me. And for us, copright is a restriction, and not a benefit.
I read something a while back, in a Weird Tales editorial I think, about how somebody wanted to reprint the Charlie Chan novels, but could not locate the Earl Derr Biggers estate to secure permission. So the books remain in limbo, and the publisher in question is waiting for the copyrights to lapse (probably about ten years from now) to take on the reprinting task.
Now, I can certainly restrain myself where lyrics or lengthy quotes are concerned---the box size here, I guess, would be the maximum.
(I've never taken to downloading songs---I haven't yet acquired the proper support gear to do it right---but I do have nearly two thousand songs loaded on my computer from my CD collection---all paid for.)
(Another aside: there have been a lot of videos put out, where songs have been crudely excised from the soundtrack, sometimes just killing the flow. I remember a bit from "Bob Newhart" which made a joke about a character whistling the theme from the movie "The High and the Mighty." A few scenes later, the character does whistle that theme---on the TV version. On the DVD version, it's missing. Copyright concerns here are only killing someone else's work.)
posted
When I use lyrics in my writing I use them as an example. Like the song by Led Zep Achilles Last Stand. The beginning starts “It was an April morning when they told us we should go. As I turn to you, you smiled at me How could we say no?” I used that to describe how one of my characters felt about going to War. He was going for the first time and was extremely nerves and couldn’t say how he felt about it in words. I see no reason why you or any one can do that. Rommel Fenrir Wolf II
[This message has been edited by Rommel Fenrir Wolf II (edited March 07, 2007).]
posted
Because the recording companies will rake you over the legal coals if they catch you at it.
Posts: 8826 | Registered: A Long Time Ago!
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You all do as you choose, but please, PLEASE, don't do anything that will get Hatrack in trouble with the lyrics people, okay?
Posts: 8826 | Registered: A Long Time Ago!
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posted
Well let them come I could care less. I cant see why a few words from a song used to describe how a character feels would bring on any lawsuit from the recording companies. Unless they were greedy over money. i ment that for the last reply not the reasont and i dont want to get any one in truble unless it was me. Rommel Fenrir Wolf
[This message has been edited by Rommel Fenrir Wolf II (edited March 07, 2007).]
[This message has been edited by Rommel Fenrir Wolf II (edited March 07, 2007).]
posted
Well, I saw a case where they're raking this woman over the coals because, near as I can tell, her son's friend came over and fiddled with their computer and downloaded some stuff. Apparently the companies send letters-of-demand for a few thousand dollars...apparently most people they hit up this way pay up rather than fight...apparently this woman didn't and they're trying to make an example of her.
If I'd'a been the judge, I'd'a thrown the whole thing out...but I'd'a thrown out a bunch of cases I've seen go all the way through.
posted
I prefer writing to instrumental music. Classical pieces or movie soundtracks, because they tend to be very emotional and usually are trying to tell a story, also I find sung lyrics distracting.
quote:Well let them come I could care less.
Ah! You cleverly unintentionally revealed that you *do* care. For if you could not care less you would not care at all, your caring level would have approached 0. But since you can care less (are able to) then your caring level must be >0, so therefore you *do* care. As you should. Since they will sue the crap out of you.
[This message has been edited by Zero (edited March 07, 2007).]
posted
The idea that you would write something and quote verbatim from other texts without attribution is laughable. It's wrong on so many levels. It makes me physically upset. It's wrong morally. It's wrong legally. And it's wrong in "cool" factor. You're so inane and incapable of own thinking that you have to verbatim steal from someone else? Please, go inhabit some other corner of the room!
quote: Like the song by Led Zep Achilles Last Stand. The beginning starts “It was an April morning when they told us we should go. As I turn to you, you smiled at me How could we say no?” I used that to describe how one of my characters felt about going to War.
I pray that you at least have someone comment "It makes me feel like that Led Zep [Huh?] song...'It was...'."
[This message has been edited by Phanto (edited March 07, 2007).]
posted
Like it or not, copyright exists. You can copyright lyrics. As writers, I think we care about copyright. I don't want my work posted on random websites or blogs without my permission. It's my work, and I want payment!
There may be grand ideas that our work is more important than money. We may say that we write to write, and that money is a trivial concern. Really, the desire to write IS my first concern, and it should be. But I also have bills, and I have this thing about eating. Someday I'd like to have writing be my sole career. To do that, I either need my wife to make enough to support both of us, or I need to get paid for my writing.
If you google “are lyrics copyrighted” you’ll find they can actually get nasty about it. BUT that wasn’t my original point. It was the power of Alison Shaw’s poetry. My eyes still well when I hear her sing this song (even when, from the Cranes ‘future songs’ album). She carries the lament in her voice so well. The emotion is strong enough it has to be just as worthy of writing about, as say, questioning the point of existence. Decisions you made about relationships, etc, the life changing stuff that you can’t fix (and maybe don’t want to if the experience made you who you are). If I had turned to the right instead of to the left. If I had realized that when I sent her away, I was sending away a part of myself, a part that in the folly of youth I myself gave her. “Even though you’d like to, go back and try to, mend all the times you, let fall beside you. There’s no sense here at all”
If you download music it will be 99 cents well spent.
posted
Yeah, we did shift the topic quite a bit. Have I got any songs that inspired me? Mmm...no, nothing offhand that I can think of. I like a lot of songs, I've incorporated them into my self and my work, I've felt better for hearing them, but inspiration? Not sure...
Posts: 8809 | Registered: Aug 2005
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posted
If I care about anything it is that I am fine with getting in trouble and suing me will only spell the end of them. I have to may strings to pull. I have done it before and it won’t be the last. I am fine with angering people it makes no difference to me who they are. If it gets my point across than fine. I am who I am, if you were to ask anyone in my unit they will tell you I don’t care about how other people think, feel or act like. They will also tell you I am Insane. It is true I am insane and there is nothing that can be done about it. To me in writing there is no real profit to gain but the idea you wrote something and others read. Copywriting is an anther reason I have never published anything I don’t care if someone rewrites it and calls it their own. That is why I printed off what I wrote and passed them out. If someone wants it they can have it. People are just too greedy to realize whatever you do makes no difference in the end. You will never need what you have now when you take your last breath. Rommel Fenrir Wolf II Posts: 856 | Registered: Nov 2006
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posted
Did you ever pick something up that looks promising but then you realize its just soooo broken that you just put it right back down again?
Posts: 556 | Registered: Oct 2006
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No because when I find something broken I try to fix it. That is why I became an engineer. A combat engineer, but an engineer none the less, I fix things and destroy things. I have been diagnosed multiple personality disorder before, and told the shrink that he was full of it. Fix now only to destroy later. God do I hate shrinks. Rommel Fenrir Wolf II
[This message has been edited by Rommel Fenrir Wolf II (edited March 08, 2007).]
posted
My understanding of the idea behind civil disobedience is that it is basically breaking a bad law in order to be punished for it according to the law, and thereby showing that the law is bad because the punishment is so awful. (Also known as the "if you can't take the heat, stay out of the kitchen" philosophy.)
At least, this is how I perceived Gandhi to have practiced civil disobedience.
Of course, that kind of civil disobedience is not for the faint of heart. A character who is strong enough to break a law in this way and brave enough not complain about the punishment is more likely to earn the sympathy of readers than one who breaks laws and then whines about getting caught and/or punished.
Such a character can even be used by a writer to change people's minds about issues and laws and the way things are done.
posted
I note that today is the seventieth anniversary of the death of H. P. Lovecraft.
What does that have to do with any of this? Well, I'm not sure of all the ins-and-outs of it, and other rules may apply...but if the "life-plus-seventy-years" copyright rule applies here, and is strictly applied, it means that all the work of H. P. Lovecraft lapses into public domain this year.
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