Free Music

Free Music

Postby farcodev » 19 May 2012, 18:19

I don't know if it has been posted here, but a musician decided to share free game music to the community.
I see his post on gamedev, here's the url: http://www.nosoapradio.us/

Copy/Paste of the License and FAQ:

"Nosoapradio FAQ

All songs free for personal and commercial use in games/video.
About

All songs copyright 2010-2011 Deceased Superior Technician.
Songs were made using FLStudio version 9 and encoded using LAME mp3 encoder.

Songs contain no unlicensed samples. All songs are free to use in videos and video games, both free and commercial. Songs may not be redistributed or sold.

This collection is comprised of songs that I feel might be good for your game. If you have no music, 'borrowed' music that you don't own copyright to, or bad music, you can use these to upgrade the music in your game. You do not have to put a link in your credits; though i would appreciate it if you did. Thanks, and Enjoy! -DST
FAQ:
Q: Can I sell a game that uses this music?
A: Yes, you can use it for commercial games, and sell your game.

Q: How can I download the track i want?
A: Simply right-click on the filename in the xspf player and select 'Download this song'.

Q: May I add these songs to my own 'free games music' resource or website?
A: No, you may not. You can post a link to this page however.

Q: My I hotlink to these files?
A: No.

Q: Do these tracks loop seamlessly?
A: Most of them do. Many aren't meant to, such as ending credits type music.

Q: How often is this page updated?
A: New tracks are constantly being added!

Q: Why is your name Deceased Superior Technician?
A: The name is originally a quote from the Sci-Fi comedy "Red Dwarf". I feel it
has a good second meaning as a tribute to great minds of the past, like
Albert Einstein, Nikola Tesla, Alexander Borodin.

Q: What software has gone into the making of this music website?
A: Audio software:

FlStudio 9
Synth 1 vst
Endorphin vst
Soundfonts from HammerSound
Audacity
Lame mp3 encoder

Website software:

Ajax tabs from DynamicDrive.com
Mp3 Tag v2.48
Rename us
DST xspfLister
Notepad++
xspf Jukebox

Graphics software:

Inkscape
Gimp "
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Re: Free Music

Postby amuzen » 19 May 2012, 19:03

However, the music isn't Free™ since the author doesn't allow modifications and undiscriminated redistribution. That makes it practically unusable to us license nitpicks. :p
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Re: Free Music

Postby farcodev » 19 May 2012, 20:07

amuzen {l Wrote}:However, the music isn't Free™ since the author doesn't allow modifications and undiscriminated redistribution. That makes it practically unusable to us license nitpicks. :p

Okee dokee :(
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Re: Free Music

Postby dstgames » 05 Jun 2012, 06:18

amuzen {l Wrote}:However, the music isn't Free™ since the author doesn't allow modifications and undiscriminated redistribution. That makes it practically unusable to us license nitpicks. :p


I don't understand - I thought the CC Attribution license allows that. I'm not much on licenses - perhaps you can explain to me what is lacking?

and what you mean by 'Free™'?
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Re: Free Music

Postby amuzen » 05 Jun 2012, 12:53

At the time of posting, they only offered the FOSS-incompatible license that is detailed in their FAQ page. Since then, the site seems to have gone through an update and also gotten the CC BY license option.
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Re: Free Music

Postby qubodup » 05 Jun 2012, 12:53

dstgames {l Wrote}:I don't understand - I thought the CC Attribution license allows that. I'm not much on licenses - perhaps you can explain to me what is lacking?

and what you mean by 'Free™'?

It could be that the license has been added only recently.

You are right that CC-BY 3.0 is free as in freedom and Debian-approved for example. However, on the FAQ, a statement exists, which is in conflict with the CC-BY 3.0 license:
Q: May I add these songs to my own 'free games music' resource or website?
A: No, you may not. You can post a link to this page however.


CC-BY 3.0 allows re-distribution. If you would change that statement to not conflict with the license, there would be no more doubts that you really intend the CC-BY 3.0 license to apply to the music. For example you could write:
Q: Can I sell a game that uses this music?
A: No. At least not, unless you 1. Give credit to the artist, 2. Link back to the site 3. Make it clear that the music is licensed under CC BY 3.0 and link to it.
Refer to section 4. b. of the license text for exact requirements.

and you could add an example of how to credit you too.

PS: quite some cool tracks on that site!
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Re: Free Music

Postby Cire » 05 Jun 2012, 21:31

Yeah, I noticed the license and it has been added only recently. I'm glad the chose a free license! :)
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Re: Free Music

Postby farcodev » 06 Jun 2012, 01:35

cool news about the CC license o.O !
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Re: Free Music

Postby dstgames » 06 Jun 2012, 05:52

I'm am not sure how to proceed here. I thought the cc license was itself cc licensed, so that i could modify it too, using an 'additional permissions' url.

I want people to be able to distribute these as an end product, or even remixes of them as a source product but

What i wish to avoid is:

1. Downloading the entire collection and then creating their own music website from it, thus bypassing my site entirely.
2. Using a significant portion of the content to bolster the content of their music site, either suggesting they're the source and/or taking traffic away from my site.
3. Uploading a significant portion of the tracks (unmodified) to their soundcloud account, etc. etc.

Basically, i just want to prevent the tracks from being used against my site.

I cannot see any way to distinguish between distribution as a product and distribution as stock in any of the licenses.

Any ideas?
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Re: Free Music

Postby qubodup » 06 Jun 2012, 12:34

I am not a lawyer, but I hope that I can help clarify some things.
dstgames {l Wrote}:I'm am not sure how to proceed here. I thought the cc license was itself cc licensed, so that i could modify it too, using an 'additional permissions' url.

You can not add restrictions, see 8. e. of the license text: "There are no understandings, agreements or representations with respect to the Work not specified here."

I don't know the license of the licenses published by the Creative Commons organization but assume that if it allowed modifications, that it would require the changes to be listed and the name of the license to be changed.

dstgames {l Wrote}:What i wish to avoid is:

1. Downloading the entire collection and then creating their own music website from it, thus bypassing my site entirely.
2. Using a significant portion of the content to bolster the content of their music site, either suggesting they're the source and/or taking traffic away from my site.
3. Uploading a significant portion of the tracks (unmodified) to their soundcloud account, etc. etc.

Basically, i just want to prevent the tracks from being used against my site.


Let me sum up: You want to
1) maximize traffic or 2) not lose any traffic
and
3) You don't want to be given insufficient/wrong credit.

1) Having your work hosted in other places will expose it to more people, people which otherwise might never find your site. The hosts would be bound to name you and link to your site (and name the license and link to it), which would give you more traffic.

2) One case when you lose traffic is when people find your music on site X, but were about to find your personal site and then they decide not to check out the link to your website (not having a link to your website would be a violation of 4. c. (iii)) However, I predict that the gained traffic would outweigh the lost traffic.

3) Suggesting being the source is covered by 4. c. of the license: "For the avoidance of doubt, You may only use the credit required by this Section for the purpose of attribution in the manner set out above and, by exercising Your rights under this License, You may not implicitly or explicitly assert or imply any connection with, sponsorship or endorsement by the Original Author, Licensor and/or Attribution Parties, as appropriate, of You or Your use of the Work[...]"

All other cases would be caused when hosts do not respect the license and decide not to give credit by name and URL to you and/or will claim an incorrect license on your music. The probability of this to happen is unrelated to the license you pick.


I recommend you
1. remove your answer to the "can I host this?" FAQ entry and replace it with detailed instructions on how to give credit, including a statement that you require your website to be linked to, and refer to the full license text and
2. if you have the time and desire to do so, you should upload your music (all or parts of it) under your username to sites like bandcamp and soundcloud (both of these support CC Attribution 3.0 I believe), using the description texts to give credit to yourself exactly the way you would like it.


If allowing re-hosting is unacceptable to you, you will want to stop using any of the licenses by the Creative Commons, as allowing redistribution (and preventing works from disappearing, because the exclusive host suddenly went off-line) is one of the central points to the licenses.
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Re: Free Music

Postby sireus » 06 Jun 2012, 17:58

Or just ask people in a friendly way to not do what you don't want them to do. Although that wouldn't be legally binding, I guess most would respect that. On the other hand, those who wouldn't are also unlikely to respect your current terms (and remember, if you're not willing to actually sue them, you'll have to cope with that).

Also, I personally wouldn't use any assets licensed under such a "questionable" and non-OSI, non-CC license.
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Re: Free Music

Postby dstgames » 06 Jun 2012, 23:14

Thanks for your help, qubodup.

The faq has been changed to reflect the terms of the cc license.
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Re: Free Music

Postby qubodup » 07 Jul 2012, 17:37

Glad you kept the CCBY3 license!

I went through all your 300+ tracks and made a list of my favorites, sorted by feel:
{l Code}: {l Select All Code}
action-dark/DST-DarkFuture.mp3
action-dark/DST-DoomCity.mp3                                                                                                                                                                   
action-dark/DST-Runway.mp3
action-dark/DST-TacticalSpace.mp3
action-technology/DST-DasElectron.mp3
action-technology/DST-MechaSelect.mp3
action-technology/DST-RailJet.mp3
action-uplifting/DST-AngryRobotIII.mp3
action-uplifting/DST-Assembly.mp3
action-uplifting/DST-Darkseid.mp3
action-uplifting/DST-MushroomRoad.mp3
calm-chillout/DST-Azum.mp3
calm-technology/DST-DarkStart.mp3
danger-dark/DST-Crow.mp3
danger-dark/DST-DarkMountainHaze.mp3
danger-sneaky/DST-DustLoop.mp3

I uploaded a track to OpenGameArt, hoping it will be more visible when somebody is looking for a 'sneaky' music piece and made a short looping cut-edit of one of the tracks:
http://opengameart.org/content/dust-loo ... den-danger
http://opengameart.org/content/railjet- ... t-cut-loop
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Re: Free Music

Postby Mute-atioN » 20 Jul 2012, 11:40

Hello everyone,

I entered this forum to get info on free game development. I'm not here as a distinct game developer. I'm more of a musician and therefore I wanted to offer free tunes. I have a soundcloud. Just google: "Mute-atioN Soundcloud" and you should find something to listen to. Most songs are still licensed for limited use. Since the spirit of this forum seems to be founded on open access to online content, I will go with that, too. But not as an overall policy. So I suggest the following:

If you're interested in me producing music for your project, write me the kind of music you'd prefer, give me some soundexamples and some time to develope own ideas. Please tell me about the project; plot, ambience, characters... what you think I should know about it before getting to work.
I am new to this, but without practise, I'll never make any progress. That's why I won't charge anything and the music will be free under the condition that I'm mentioned in the credits. You'll still be able to chop the sounds or use them commercially... as long as you don't charge for downloading the actual song! Still, this is nothing but an offer. But I promise do give my best.

My personal preferences in music are quite diverse. I am a huge "Meshuggah" fan. I am a "Noisia" Fan. I like Death Metal, Rock (pretty vage term, right), Drum and Bass, Dubstep, Hip Hop, Trip Hop... FUNK! symphonic music is also very interesting (Bach, Ravel, Tschaikowsky, Vivaldi; still just listening randomly to this stuff). I don't like Techno, House, Minimal, Hard Tech, ... blablubbedibla... It's mostly about funkyness and bass. But don't be to shy to ask for something not mentioned here.

I am also interested in sound design. By that I don't mean to discuss how to design sounds but more about how you guys use audio, how it is planted into the software or in short: I want to learn what is the best way to provide game audio for free game developers. So please, give me a hint if there already are threads related to this topic.

Best wishes to you,

MN


p.s.: these are some group pages on SC that relate to the topic. Unfortunatly, not all data is freely accessible. So be careful when downloading:

http://soundcloud.com/groups/video-game-music-1
http://soundcloud.com/groups/video-game-composers
http://soundcloud.com/groups/indie-game-music
http://soundcloud.com/groups/saga-cyberpunk-collective
...there are more. Hope, you get the idea. Well, that's my stuff:
http://soundcloud.com/mute-ation (you can write me if want something really bad. I can change the cc-licensing so everything checks out.)
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Re: Free Music

Postby Julius » 20 Jul 2012, 13:17

Hi Mute-atioN

Like I wrote in my email to you... best would be if you would just upload your (quite nice) music to http://www.opengameart.org
I guess CC-by would be the appropriate license if you want attribution but also allow remixing. Just make sure you are not using samples which do not allow use under free licenses.

For the style of your music I would say that guys behind Xonotic ( http://www.xonotic.org ) might be interested in your contributions, they usually require the GPLv2 license however (e.g. copyleft). Just check their forums, they have quite a few active discussions about music contribution.
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Re: Free Music

Postby charlie » 20 Jul 2012, 15:47

Perhaps the Red Eclipse boys too? They have a forum here on freegamedev (under Featured Projects).
Free Gamer - it's the dogz
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Re: Free Music

Postby dstgames » 12 Dec 2012, 12:29

Thanks for the explanations on this thread. Like a lot of freelance musicians I just made music - I never considered legal aspects of it all, or even that my music could be used in anything. I was just driven to create, to learn how.

As I've come to understand how it works, 'assets' released under restrictive licensing have begun to seem very useless. I know people want to protect their art, and they have every right to, but the whole "you can use it for personal but not commercial" pretend license is irritating. As if Electronic Arts is going to come in and steal the music for their latest blockbuster title.

There are more and more sites filled with Creative Commons work that is of superior quality every day, and more and more people seeking to break into the world of game development. I think some people had the idea that it was most important to help kids learn to program, thus the personal use clause.

But I feel that free, commercially viable assets help those who need it most: Developers who want to begin selling their games and expand their enterprise. By helping them get over that initial hump, we get greater returns on our investment - we get new, talented game devs producing games for us to play.
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