[SUBMITTED] (You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (to Sample!)

[Southland]

Hi everyone! With work on my previous issue seemingly winding down, I decided to turn to the less-heavy topic of music sampling.

I was originally going to do an issue involving the "Girls Scream Aloud" and "Agony in Pink" law cases, but to make a long story short, I and some other guys on the "Writer's Block" thread discovered that there never was an issue relating to music sampling. The closest would be Issue #473, but that's more about using people's likenesses instead of remixing copyrighted works to make new ones. With the encouraging of the "Writer's Block" users, I decided to remedy this. Let me know what you think!

Also, count all the music references

ISSUE: (You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (to Sample!)

VALIDITY: Capitalist nations with copyright laws, freedom of speech, and a judicial system

Sampling, taking snippets of existing music and audio to be used or remixed in other songs, has become the latest trend among the nation's newest and hottest musical acts. After it was discovered that several highly popular albums forwent payment on some samples to avoid their exorbitant fees, a related and not-coincidental trend among record companies emerged of lawsuits demanding compensation.

[Option 1 - Valid for countries with internet]: "Our acts form the backbone for today's most popular songs," snaps high-powered blue-haired lawyer @@RANDOMNAME@@ of the recording giant World Music Group, "and not once have we been compensated. Take Bigtopians wit Attitude's Straight outta @@CAPITAL@@, Life Slaps's The Currency Boutique, and MC MEEN's Supervilliany. Half of the songs' samples on these albums came from WMG's catalogue. How many times were they streamed on Stripeify? Over 800 million combined. How many @@CURRENCYPLURAL@@ were we paid? Exactly zero. The government must make it clear that all samples have to be cleared by the original recording label, no matter the cost or obscurity!"
Result: creating dance remixes is the newest form of conspicuous consumption

[Option 1 - Valid for countries without internet]: "Our acts form the backbone for today's most popular songs," snaps high-powered blue-haired lawyer @@RANDOMNAME@@, of the recording giant World Music Group, "and not once have we been compensated. Take Bigtopians wit Attitude's Straight outta @@CAPITAL@@, Mr. Drips and the Boys's Former SpecOps, and The M/O/P's 1984 (What the Heck is Happening?). Half of the songs' samples on these albums came from WMG's catalogue. How many sales did these albums have? Close to 30 million combined. How many @@CURRENCYPLURAL@@ were we paid? Exactly zero. The government must make it clear that all samples have to be cleared by the original recording label, no matter the cost or obscurity!"
Result: creating dance remixes is the newest form of conspicuous consumption

Option 2: "We did try to pay them for the samples," interjects "Ol' Dirty @@ANIMAL@@" @@RANDOMNAME@@ of Bigtopians wit Attitude, who you can tell is treating this seriously because the normally coarse and sloven musician is restrained and well-groomed. "We gave up when they made unrealistic demands. To sample the unknown Muddywater Revivals tune 'Crescent Moon Arises' they wanted seventy percent of our song's royalties. Then they separately demanded seventy-five percent to use five seconds of Emperor Crimson's '23rd Millennium Bipolar Dude' on the same song. It's mathematically *BLEEP*ing impossible! I beg you, make sampling covered by fair use. By sparing us this payment headache, you'll save @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ music and cause the creativity of a thousand acts to bloom."
Result: this summer's hottest singles sound almost the same as last year's

Option 3: "Yo my name is Minister @@RANDOMNAME1@@ and I'm here to say, that I have a sweet idea that involves equitable pay!" freestyles your Minister of Compromises. After seeing that @@HIS@@ verse was met with dead silence, an embarrassed @@LASTNAME1@@ clears @@HIS@@ throat and continues. "Sorry, don't know what came over me. Anyway I suggest that the government set a flat fee for all samples, regardless of length or popularity. The labels will get paid and half of @@NATION@@'s emerging acts won't go bankrupt. It'll even let us sneak in a tax. Sure the labels will feel they're not being properly compensated while some artists will still chafe about paying, but you know what they say about a good compromise."
Result: the budget option for getting the latest album is buying the rights to the artist's entire discography

Option 4: "I have a proposition for you boss," says multimillionaire artist and entrepreneur Dr. Me, who just wrapped up an 18-hour concert with the @@CAPITAL@@ Symphonic Orchestra. "Me and my boys back at the studio have been recording instrumentals for our talent. If you're willing to pay us to create a free music catalogue for all of @@NATION@@'s up-and-coming artists, we'll get right on it. Our beats will surpass that of copyrighted music and you'll create jobs for the @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ music community. What's not to love? I'll throw in some of my 'Tempos for Me' earbuds for your staff to sweeten the deal."
Result: creators of stock elevator music are making it rain with taxpayer @@CURRENCYPLURAL@@

ISSUE: (You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (to Sample!)

VALIDITY: Capitalist nations with copyright laws, freedom of speech, and a judicial system

Sampling, taking snippets of existing music and audio to be used or remixed in other songs, has become the latest trend among the nation's newest and hottest musical acts. After it was discovered that several highly popular albums forwent payment on some samples to avoid their exorbitant fees, a related and not-coincidental trend among record companies emerged of lawsuits demanding compensation.

[Option 1 - Valid for countries with internet]: "Our acts form the backbone for today's most popular songs," snaps high-powered blue-haired lawyer @@RANDOMNAME@@ of the recording giant World Music Group, "and not once have we been properly compensated. Take the albums in question, Bigtopians wit Attitude's 'Straight outta @@CAPITAL@@', Life Slaps's 'The Currency Boutique', and MC MEEN's 'Supervilliany'. The main instrumentals and choruses on half of the songs on these albums were sampled from WMG's catalogue. How many times were these albums streamed on Stripeify? Over 800 million combined. How many @@CURRENCYPLURAL@@ were we paid? Exactly zero. This is completely absurd. The government must make it clear that all samples have to be cleared by the original recording label, no matter how obscure or costly they are!"
Result: originality among wealthy @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ musicians is deader than disco

[Option 1 - Valid for countries without internet]: "Our acts form the backbone for today's most popular songs," snaps high-powered blue-haired lawyer @@RANDOMNAME@@, of the recording giant World Music Group, "and not once have we been properly compensated. Take the albums in question, Bigtopians wit Attitude's 'Straight outta @@CAPITAL@@', Mr. Drips and the Boys's 'Former SpecOps', and The M/O/P's '1984 (What the Heck is Happening?)'. The main instrumentals and choruses on half of the songs on these albums were sampled from WMG's catalogue. How many sales did these three albums have? Close to 30 million combined. How many @@CURRENCYPLURAL@@ were we paid? Exactly zero. This is completely absurd. The government must make it clear that all samples have to be cleared by the original recording label, no matter how obscure or costly they are!"
Result: originality among wealthy @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ musicians is deader than disco

Option 2: "We did try to pay them for the samples," interjects "Ol' Dirty @@ANIMAL@@" @@RANDOMNAME@@ of Bigtopians wit Attitude, who you can tell is treating this seriously because the normally coarse and sloven musician is restrained and got well-groomed to meet you. "But we gave up when they made unrealistic demands. To sample the chorus of the unknown Muddywater Revivals tune 'Crescent Moon Arises' they wanted seventy percent of our song's royalties. Then they separately demanded seventy-five percent to use five seconds of Emperor Crimson's '23rd Millennium Bipolar Dude' on the same song. That's mathematically *BLEEP*ing impossible! We were also a small act at the time, so the cost of clearing either would've easily bankrupted us. I beg you, please make sampling covered by fair use. By sparing us of this payment headache, you'll save the future of @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ music and cause the creativity of a thousand acts to bloom."
Result: this summer's hottest singles sounds almost the same as last year's

Option 3: "Yo my name is Minister @@RANDOMNAME1@@ and I'm here to say, that I have a sweet idea that involves equitable pay!" freestyles your Minister of Compromises who moonlights as an amateur DJ. After seeing that @@HIS@@ verse was met with dead silence, an embarrassed @@LASTNAME1@@ clears @@HIS@@ throat and continues. "Sorry, don't know what came over me. Knew it wasn't the right time. Anyway I suggest that the government set a flat fee that must be paid for all samples, regardless of their popularity or the sample's length. That way the labels can get paid while it won't bankrupt over half of @@NATION@@'s emerging acts, and the government can also get a cut from it. Sure the labels will feel that they are not being properly compensated while some artists will chafe at paying at all, but you know what they say about a good compromise."
Result: the budget option for getting the latest album is buying the rights to the artist's entire discography

Option 4: "I have a proposition for you boss," says multimillionaire artist and entrepreneur Dr. Me, who just wrapped up an 18-hour concert with the @@CAPITAL@@ Symphonic Orchestra. "Me and my boys at the studio have been recording some instrumentals to be used for our talent. If you're willing to pay us to create a free music catalogue for all of @@NATION@@'s up-and-coming artists, we can get right on it. Our beats will surpass that of copyrighted music and you'll be directly creating jobs for the @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ music community. What's not to love? I'll throw in some of my 'Tempos for Me' earbuds for your staff to sweeten the deal."
Result: creators of stock elevator music are making it rain with taxpayer @@CURRENCYPLURAL@@

Fixing the results (again)

ISSUE: (You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (to Sample!)

VALIDITY: Capitalist nations with copyright laws, freedom of speech, and a judicial system

Sampling, taking snippets of existing music and audio to be used or remixed in other songs, has become the latest trend among the nation's newest and hottest musical acts. After it was discovered that several highly popular albums forwent payment on some samples to avoid their exorbitant fees, a related and not-coincidental trend among record companies emerged of lawsuits demanding compensation.

[Option 1 - Valid for countries with internet]: "Our acts form the backbone for today's most popular songs," snaps high-powered blue-haired lawyer @@RANDOMNAME@@ of the recording giant World Music Group, "and not once have we been properly compensated. Take the albums in question, Bigtopians wit Attitude's 'Straight outta @@CAPITAL@@', Life Slaps's 'The Currency Boutique', and MC MEEN's 'Supervilliany'. The main instrumentals and choruses on half of the songs on these albums were sampled from WMG's catalogue. How many times were these albums streamed on Stripeify? Over 800 million combined. How many @@CURRENCYPLURAL@@ were we paid? Exactly zero. This is completely absurd. The government must make it clear that all samples have to be cleared by the original recording label, no matter how obscure or costly they are!"
Result: originality among wealthy @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ musicians is deader than disco

[Option 1 - Valid for countries without internet]: "Our acts form the backbone for today's most popular songs," snaps high-powered blue-haired lawyer @@RANDOMNAME@@, of the recording giant World Music Group, "and not once have we been properly compensated. Take the albums in question, Bigtopians wit Attitude's 'Straight outta @@CAPITAL@@', Mr. Drips and the Boys's 'Former SpecOps', and The M/O/P's '1984 (What the Heck is Happening?)'. The main instrumentals and choruses on half of the songs on these albums were sampled from WMG's catalogue. How many sales did these three albums have? Close to 30 million combined. How many @@CURRENCYPLURAL@@ were we paid? Exactly zero. This is completely absurd. The government must make it clear that all samples have to be cleared by the original recording label, no matter how obscure or costly they are!"
Result: originality among wealthy @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ musicians is deader than disco

Option 2: "We did try to pay them for the samples," interjects "Ol' Dirty @@ANIMAL@@" @@RANDOMNAME@@ of Bigtopians wit Attitude, who you can tell is treating this seriously because the normally coarse and sloven musician is restrained and got well-groomed to meet you. "But we gave up when they made unrealistic demands. To sample the chorus of the unknown Muddywater Revivals tune 'Crescent Moon Arises' they wanted seventy percent of our song's royalties. Then they separately demanded seventy-five percent to use five seconds of Emperor Crimson's '23rd Millennium Bipolar Dude' on the same song. That's mathematically *BLEEP*ing impossible! We were also a small act at the time, so the cost of clearing either would've easily bankrupted us. I beg you, please make sampling covered by fair use. By sparing us of this payment headache, you'll save the future of @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ music and cause the creativity of a thousand acts to bloom."
Result: this summer's hottest singles are almost exact duplicates of existing songs

Option 3: "Yo my name is Minister @@RANDOMNAME1@@ and I'm here to say, that I have a sweet idea that involves equitable pay!" freestyles your Minister of Compromises who moonlights as an amateur DJ. After seeing that @@HIS@@ verse was met with dead silence, an embarrassed @@LASTNAME1@@ clears @@HIS@@ throat and continues. "Sorry, don't know what came over me. Knew it wasn't the right time. Anyway I suggest that the government set a flat fee that must be paid for all samples, regardless of their popularity or the sample's length. That way the labels can get paid while it won't bankrupt over half of @@NATION@@'s emerging acts, and the government can also get a cut from it. Sure the labels will feel that they are not being properly compensated while some artists will chafe at paying at all, but you know what they say about a good compromise."
Result: @@DEMONYMPLURAL@@ purchasing a Beat-Alls CD can accidentally end up buying the rights to their entire discography

Option 4: "I have a proposition for you boss," says multimillionaire artist and entrepreneur Dr. Me, who just wrapped up an 18-hour concert with the @@CAPITAL@@ Symphonic Orchestra. "Me and my boys at the studio have been recording some instrumentals to be used for our talent. If you're willing to pay us to create a free music catalogue for all of @@NATION@@'s up-and-coming artists, we can get right on it. Our beats will surpass that of copyrighted music and you'll be directly creating jobs for the @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ music community. What's not to love? I'll throw in some of my 'Tempos for Me' earbuds for your staff to sweeten the deal."
Result: creators of stock elevator music are making it rain with taxpayer @@CURRENCYPLURAL@@

Punching up the "results", fixing the compromise option, and making the debate over costs more central to the debate

ISSUE: (You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (to Sample!)

VALIDITY: Capitalist nations with copyright laws, freedom of speech, and a judicial system

Sampling, taking snippets of existing music and audio to be used or remixed in other songs, has become the latest trend among the nation's newest and hottest musical acts. As almost all of these samples are being taken without payment to avoid their exorbitant fees, a related and not-coincidental trend among record companies are lawsuits demanding compensation.

[Option 1 - Valid for countries with internet]: "Our acts form the backbone for today's most popular songs," snaps high-powered blue-haired lawyer @@RANDOMNAME@@ of the recording giant World Music Group, "and not once have we been properly compensated. Take Bigtopians wit Attitude's 'Straight outta @@CAPITALCITY@@', Life Slaps's 'The Currency Boutique', and MC MEEN's 'Supervilliany' for example. The main instrumentals and choruses on all but one song on these albums were sampled from WMG's catalogue. How many times were these albums streamed on Stripeify? Over 800 million combined. How many @@CURRENCYPLURAL@@ were we paid? Exactly zero. This is completely absurd. The government must make it clear that all samples have to be cleared by the original recording label, no matter how obscure or costly they are!"
Result: originality among @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ musicians plummets the moment they can feed themselves

[Option 1 - Valid for countries without internet]: "Our acts form the backbone for today's most popular songs," snaps high-powered blue-haired lawyer @@RANDOMNAME@@, of the recording giant World Music Group, "and not once have we been properly compensated. Take Bigtopians wit Attitude's 'Straight outta @@CAPITALCITY@@', Mr. Drips and the Boys's 'Former SpecOps', and The M/O/P's '1984 (What the Heck is Happening?)' for example. The main instrumentals and choruses on all but one song on these albums were sampled from WMG's catalogue. How many sales did these three albums have? Close to 30 million combined. How many @@CURRENCYPLURAL@@ were we paid? Exactly zero. This is completely absurd. The government must make it clear that all samples have to be cleared by the original recording label, no matter how obscure or costly they are!"
Result: originality among @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ musicians plummets the moment they can feed themselves

Option 2: "Don't listen to the record labels," pleads "Ol' Dirty @@ANIMAL@@" @@RANDOMNAME@@ of the hip-hop group Beastly Enemy, who you can tell is treating this seriously because the normally foul-mouthed and sloven musician is soft-spoken and got well-groomed to meet you. "Sampling has become the cornerstone for many of @@NATION@@'s emerging acts, including mine. The cost of clearing a sample of just one song can easily bankrupt over half of us. If you force us to pay the labels' sampling fees, you will be destroying many acts overnight and the future of @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ music. I beg you, please make sampling covered by fair use. You will cause the creativity of a thousand acts to bloom."
Result: this summer's hottest singles are almost exact duplicates of existing songs

Option 3: "YOU ARE BOTH WRONG!" bellows the elusive singer of the experimental band The Locals, somehow popping out of your office's closet in their iconic eyeball mask and cape. "These samples come from our hard work, so we deserve a say on whether it shall be used. And these money-grubbing labels take the sampling fees for themselves, and leave us with but a pittance! What you, O great @@LEADER@@, should do is leave the fate of sampling fees to us original creators. If we want to give it to them for free, we shall. If we ask for a pound of their flesh as payment, we shall. If we ask they crawl to the top of the tallest summit in @@REGION@@ while carrying a bowl of green candies on their heads to get our blessings, WE SHALL! And tough on them if we die before we decide."
Result: former diplomats are deployed to negotiate sampling rights from cantankerous artists

Option 4: "I have a proposition for you boss," says multimillionaire artist and entrepreneur Dr. Me, who just wrapped up an 18-hour concert with the @@CAPITALCITY@@ Symphonic Orchestra. "Me and my boys at the studio have been recording some stock instrumentals to be used for our talent. If the government is willing to pay artists like us to create a free music catalogue for all of @@NATION@@'s up-and-coming artists, we can get right on it. The quality will match that of copyrighted music and you will be directly creating jobs for the @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ music community. What's not to love? I'll throw in some of my 'Tempos for Me' earbuds for your staff to sweeten the deal."
Result: recent purchasers of gold chains and lavish mansions are artists that make stock elevator music

Cutting down the options and diversifying the remaining

ISSUE: (You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (to Sample!)

VALIDITY: Capitalist nations with copyright laws, freedom of speech, and a judicial system

Sampling, taking snippets of existing music and audio to be used or remixed in other songs, has become the latest trend among the nation's newest and hottest musical acts. As almost all of these samples are being taken without payment to avoid their exorbitant fees, a related and not-coincidental trend among record companies are lawsuits demanding compensation.

[Option 1 - Valid for countries with internet]: "Our acts form the backbone for today's most popular songs," snaps high-powered blue-haired lawyer @@RANDOMNAME@@ of the recording giant World Music Group, "and not once have we been properly compensated. Take Bigtopians wit Attitude's 'Straight outta @@CAPITALCITY@@', Life Slaps's 'The Currency Boutique', and MC MEEN's 'Supervilliany' for example. The main instrumentals and choruses on all but one song on these albums were sampled from WMG's catalogue. How many times were these albums streamed on Stripeify? Over 800 million combined. How many @@CURRENCYPLURAL@@ were we paid? Exactly zero. This is completely absurd. The government must make it clear that all samples have to be cleared by the original recording label, no matter how obscure or costly they are!"
Result: originality among @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ musicians plummets the moment they can feed themselves

[Option 1 - Valid for countries without internet]: "Our acts form the backbone for today's most popular songs," snaps high-powered blue-haired lawyer @@RANDOMNAME@@, of the recording giant World Music Group, "and not once have we been properly compensated. Take Bigtopians wit Attitude's 'Straight outta @@CAPITALCITY@@', Mr. Drips and the Boys's 'Former SpecOps', and The M/O/P's '1984 (What the Heck is Happening?)' for example. The main instrumentals and choruses on all but one song on these albums were sampled from WMG's catalogue. How many sales did these three albums have? Close to 30 million combined. How many @@CURRENCYPLURAL@@ were we paid? Exactly zero. This is completely absurd. The government must make it clear that all samples have to be cleared by the original recording label, no matter how obscure or costly they are!"
Result: originality among @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ musicians plummets the moment they can feed themselves

Option 2: "Don't listen to the record labels," pleads "Ol' Dirty @@ANIMAL@@" @@RANDOMNAME@@ of the hip-hop group Beastly Enemy, who you can tell is treating this seriously because the normally foul-mouthed and sloven musician is soft-spoken and got well-groomed to meet you. "Sampling has become the cornerstone for many of @@NATION@@'s emerging acts, including mine. The cost of clearing a sample of just one song can easily bankrupt over half of us. If you force us to pay the labels' sampling fees, you will be destroying many acts overnight and the future of @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ music. I beg you, please make sampling covered by fair use. You will cause the creativity of a thousand acts to bloom."
Result: blatantly plagiarizing songs is okay as long as you claim fair use

Option 3: "Hey now, there's no reason we can't compromise!" yells beloved music satirist and concertina player "Crazy Pal" Wankovitch, who somehow popped out of your desk. "I had no problems getting cheap music samples quickly, by just directly asking the artists. There are some that will happily let you sample their music for free, and there are others that don't want to be sampled even if their labels are paid a lot. Be a pal and allow samplers to just need explicit permission from the original artists, with the fees haggled later if needed! If the artist refuses or can't be traced, well then that's just tough noodles. Now who wants to hear my polka rendition of the @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ national anthem?!"
Result: former diplomats are deployed to negotiate sampling rights from cantankerous artists

Option 4: "We don't need no other's sample," sings the elusive founder of the music collective PC98 Audio in autotune, who is currently covering their face with a palm tree. "My collective's music never relied on the work of outsiders. Whenever we craved the need to sample, we would recycle our old tunes and remix it into something new and daring with no permissions or fees required. What you should, nay what you must do, is ban the sampling of other's works, and make artists sample their own works if they ever need to scratch that itch. That will truly make the creativity of artists bloom, and the beat will forever go on and on and on and on."
Result: having the same tempo as another artist is grounds for government prosecution

[Option 5 - Valid for nations with internet]: "Music shouldn't even be copyrighted," demands LemonWire creator @@RANDOMNAME@@, who appears to be hiding in a cave in @@HIS@@ video call to you. "Music represents the cultural heritage of all people. Copyrighting it deprives people unfettered access to what makes life worth living. You must abolish copyright for all music, whether it's an original creation or a remix! While you're at it, you must also shield me from prosecution by the record companies. I'll give you access to my 100,000-file song collection if you do."
Result: veteran and novice artists are teaming up to put on street performances while begging for money

[Option 5 - Valid for nations without internet]: "Music shouldn't even be copyrighted," demands trenchcoat-wearing @@RANDOMNAME@@, who just got done selling bootlegs tapes to your young intern and Wankovitch. "Music represents the cultural heritage of all people. Copyrighting it deprives people unfettered access to what makes life worth living. You must abolish copyright for all music, whether it's an original creation or a remix! While you're at it, can I interest you in a rare Happily Deceased concert tape? It's from Cherry Garcia's last tour with them."
Result: veteran and novice artists are teaming up to put on street performances while begging for money

Option 6: "I have an idea," says @@NATION@@ National Library's lead audio archivist @@RANDOMNAME@@, whose been recording the entire debate with a conspicuous boom mic. "The National Library has millions of recordings that are just sitting in the archives. We should open it up for artists to sample! With music, sound effects, archived speeches, nature sounds, and so on they will have plenty of public domain music and audio to choose from. That will allow labels to charge fees for their samples however they want while providing a free catalogue for those who need it and can't get permission. Some of these sources may not be as 'hip' or 'with it' or 'coral' as the kids these days say as contemporary recordings, but that's what creativity is for!"
Result: the Wilhelm scream has replaced the Amen break as the @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ sample of choice

Clarifying what sampling is and adding more options

ISSUE: (You Gotta) Fight for Your Right (to Sample!)

VALIDITY: Capitalist nations with copyright laws, freedom of speech, and a judicial system

The latest trend among @@NATION@@'s newest and hottest musical acts is to sample music and audio recordings. As almost all of these samples are being taken without payment to avoid their exorbitant fees, a related and not-coincidental trend among recording companies are lawsuits demanding compensation.

[Option 1 - Valid for countries with internet]: "Our acts form the backbone for today's most popular songs," grills high-powered blue-haired lawyer @@RANDOMNAME@@ of the recording giant World Music Group, "and not once have we been properly compensated. Take Bigtopians wit Attitude's 'Straight outta @@CAPITALCITY@@', Life Slaps's 'The Currency Boutique', and MC MEEN's 'Supervilliany' for example. The main instrumentals and choruses for exactly all but one song were sampled from WMG's catalogue. How many times were these albums streamed on Stripeify? Over 800 million combined. How many @@CURRENCYPLURAL@@ were we paid? Exactly zero. This is completely absurd. The government must make it clear that all samples have to be cleared by and paid to the original recording label, no matter how obscure or costly they are!"
Result: cash-strapped musicians are being forced to issue sample-free albums that contain over an hour of silence

[Option 1 - Valid for countries without internet]: "Our acts form the backbone for today's most popular songs," grills high-powered blue-haired lawyer @@RANDOMNAME@@, of the recording giant World Music Group, "and not once have we been properly compensated. Take Bigtopians wit Attitude's 'Straight outta @@CAPITALCITY@@', Mr. Drips and the Boys's 'Former SpecOps', and The M/O/P's '1984 (What the Heck is Happening?)' for example. The main instrumentals and choruses for exactly all but one of their songs were sampled from WMG's catalogue. How many sales did these three albums have? Close to 30 million combined. How many @@CURRENCYPLURAL@@ were we paid? Exactly zero. This is completely absurd. The government must make it clear that all samples have to be cleared by and paid to the original recording label, no matter how obscure or costly they are!"
Result: cash-strapped musicians are being forced to issue sample-free albums that contain over an hour of silence

Option 2: "Don't listen to the record labels," pleads "Ol' Dirty @@ANIMAL@@" @@RANDOMNAME@@ of the hip-hop group Beastly Enemy, who you can tell is treating this seriously because the normally foul-mouthed and sloven musician is soft-spoken and got well-groomed to meet you. "Sampling has become the cornerstone for many of @@NATION@@'s emerging acts, including mine. The cost of clearing a sample of just one song can easily bankrupt over half of us. If you force us to pay the labels' sampling fees, you will be destroying many acts overnight and the future of @@DENOMYMADJECTIVE@@ music. I beg you, please make sampling covered by fair use. While the labels will take a hit, you will cause the creativity of a thousand acts to bloom."
Result: samplers are raking in millions while the original artists are forced to live in cardboard boxes

Option 3: "Hey now, there's no reason we can't compromise!" yells beloved music satirist and concertina player "Crazy Pal" Wankovitch, who somehow popped out of your desk. "I had no problems getting cheap music samples quickly, by just directly asking the artists. There are some that will happily let you sample their music for free, and there are others that don't want to be sampled even if their labels are paid a lot. Be a pal and allow samplers to just need explicit permission from the original artists, with the fees haggled later if needed! If the artist refuses or can't be traced, well then that's just tough noodles. Now who wants to hear my polka rendition of the @@DENOMYNADJECTIVE@@ national anthem?!"
Result: former diplomats are deployed to negotiate sampling rights from cantankerous artists

[Option 4 - Valid for nations with internet]: "Music shouldn't even be coprighted," demands LemonWire creator @@RANDOMNAME@@, who appears to be hiding in a cave in his video call to you. "Music represents the cultural heritage of all people. Copyrighting it deprives people unfettered access to what makes life worth living. You must abolish copyright for all music, whether it's an original creation or a remix! While you're at it, you must also shield me from prosecution by the record companies. I'll give you access to my 100,000-file song collection if you do."
Result: former samplers and artists are teaming up to put on street performances while begging for money

[Option 4 - Valid for nations without internet]: "We shouldn't even have copyright for music," demands trenchcoat-wearing @@RANDOMNAME@@, who just got done selling bootlegs tapes to your young intern and Wankovitch. "Music represents the cultural heritage of all people. Copyrighting it deprives people unfettered access to what makes life worth living. You must abolish copyright for all music, whether it's an original creation or a remix! While you're at it, can I interest you in a rare Happily Deceased concert tape? It's from Cherry Garcia's last tour with them."
Result: former samplers and artists are teaming up to put on street performances while begging for money

Option 5: "I have an idea," says @@NATION@@ National Library's lead audio archivist @@RANDOMNAME@@, whose been recording the entire debate with a conspicuous boom mic. "The National Library has millions of recordings that are just sitting in the archives. We should open it up for artists to sample! With music, sound effects, archived speeches, nature sounds, and so on they will have plenty of public domain music and audio to choose from. That will allow labels to charge fees for their samples however they want while providing a free catalogue for those who need it and can't get permission. Some of these sources may not be as 'hip' or 'with it' or 'coral' as the kids these days say as contemporary recordings, but that's what creativity is for!"
Result: the Wilhelm scream has replaced the Amen break as the @@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ sample of choice

The Original

[Trotterdam]

What exactly does "sample" mean in this context? Why do people want to do it?

[Southland]

Sampling is taking snippets of an existing song or audio clip to be used in another song. This has long been a staple of hip-hop, rap, and electronic communities, who would remix it to be used as instrumental and choruses in their music. This practice that has long attracted the ire of record companies since they used to be done without their authorization due to their expensive, time-consuming approval process. This video, which shows how samples were used in Paul's Boutique, long considered to be the seminal hip-hop album to extensively use sampling, does a good job at illustrating how it's done, while this Wikipedia article delves more into the practice and its various legal issues.

[Australian rePublic]

Next option- take a page from Elton John and encourage artists to sample from their own songs

[Southland]

Bump. Like to hear some more suggestions before implementing Australia's idea.

[Southland]

Bump.

[Southland]

Bump. In light of the news, I would be interested in submitting this for the contest.

[Democratic Poopland]

Awesome! I'd let it in the game!

[Kaschovia]

The latest trend among @@NATION@@'s newest and hottest musical acts is to sample music and audio recordings. As almost all of these samples are being taken without payment to avoid their exorbitant fees, a related and not-coincidental trend among recording companies are lawsuits demanding compensation.

I like this description, but I would remove @@NATION@@ as it can lead to some silly sounding results once in the game. "The latest trend among the nation's newest and hottest..." works just fine.

However, simplifying even further I would say: "Recording companies have lobbied you to take action as the nation's newest and hottest artists, who've been sampling copyrighted audio clips for almost every popular song, are being hit with lawsuits like never before."

[Verdant Haven]

- I'm not sure if this is what Trott was getting at with the very first feedback comment in this thread, but it would be worth defining sampling (in just a couple words) within the description itself. Not everybody is familiar with the terminology of music production.

- Option 1: "Grills" typically means that they are asking questions in an intense manner, synonymous or near-it with "interrogates." This option switches back and forth between talking about songs and talking about albums. If those three names are meant to be album titles, you probably want to refer to popular albums in the first sentence, or else say "all but one song on these albums" in order to make it clearer. It is possible to clear a sample without demanding payment, so I would also suggest that the final argument be adjusted to say "cleared by the original recording label...," as the potential pay/cost element is mentioned in the closing part of that sentence.

- For effect line 1, this seems to suggest that there are no artists capable of writing or performing their own music. There are many albums out there with few or no samples at all, so I think it might be more interesting to reference the idea that musical talent is now more necessary than ever to be a musician, or something along those lines.

- Because of the fact that people don't necessarily know what sampling means, and the fact that it is a fairly niche part of only a certain few genres, the use of that term over and over in the effect lines is not particularly strong. I would look for ways to replace it in as many of the effect lines as possible so that they feel a bit more broadly applicable without the specialist knowledge.

[Southland]

Thanks for all the suggestions! I finally implemented Australian rePublic's suggestion (though it may not exactly be what he had in mind), did Verdant Haven's suggestion (they actually responded when I just getting Draft 2 up), and did some of the wording suggestions by Kaschovia. I'm holding off doing the complete simplification he suggested because it somewhat obscures the main sticking point by the record labels, but if I can get it to work I will implement it.

[Electrum]

This issue is way too long, you need to pare it back. Really consider what options need to be there as well as the text of each option. If it doesn't help provide an argument or add humour, get rid of it. As you go down the list the options are a bit remote from the original premise. (Side note.... for the option variants, do you mean computer/no computer rather than internet/no internet?)

For example here's a summary of the options

1a/1b. Samples must be cleared by the label
2. Sampling should fall under fair use
3. Samples must be cleared by the original artist - pretty similar to option 3, it's not really a compelling issue because this option is clearly the best one
4. You can only sample your own work - this seems to be a weird thing to mandate
5a/5b. Music shouldn't be copyrighted - not really related to sampling
6. Use public domain, allow labels to charge fees - pretty similar to option 1, does not really add much to the issue

Option 1 - there's a lot of complaining but no mention that samplers are profiting off the hard work of others. It's implied but not explicitly drawn out in the option.

[Southland]

I cut it down to four options, tried to make Option 3 sound less enticing, and replaced the last option to offer something new to the issue by having the government directly help artists (which was always the intention with the last option). I'm confused about the criticism of Option 1; I though it and the body text was explicit about how the original artists were not being properly compensated.

Also, for Option 1 I always meant for the "internet/no internet" options to be there since most album purchases and listening is done through the internet nowadays.

[West Barack and East Obama]

The premise is interesting, but I don't really see the approach to this topic as realistic. Albums with hundreds of millions of streams where all the songs are unauthorised samples? Is the cost of clearing a sample (which in most cases can't be that costly otherwise no one would do it) really so exorbitant that even the most popular rappers can't get one? And even so, why do they prefer to proceed with unauthorised sampling when a lawsuit is guaranteed to cost them much more than paying for the sample? It doesn't really make much sense.

I think the whole thing needs to be dialed down a little and seen from a different angle, because a widespread industry issue of unauthorised sampling just doesn't seem realistic to me. Perhaps one specific instance of a band suing a rapper for an unauthorised samples sparking a debate on fair use and music copyright would be better?

[Southland]

Should have fixed the issue with realism, by having it involve a select few albums and scaling back the number of copyright infringements on them. I really want to thank you for the suggestion, because I felt that Option 3 was not properly focused (and I felt that the rewrite didn't fully satisfy Electrum's criticisms), but now it is. And I finally got to sneak in a Jojo reference!

[Southland]

Soft bump. I would like to see comments on the new changea

[Electrum]

I think it's in a good shape. I just think the effect lines need sharpening.

For example instead of 'this summer's hottest singles are almost exact duplicates of existing songs' you might say 'this summer's hottest singles sound nearly the same as last year's hottest singles'. I also don't really understand effect line 3.

[Southland]

Fixed both of the effect lines. Let me know what you think!

I also don't really understand effect line 3.

What I was trying to get at was that the flat fee policy caused the sampling fees to become so severely distorted that the rights to the not!Beatles's entire discography, in real life worth over a billion dollars, now costs the same as a CD. Hopefully the rewrite makes this more clear.

[Southland]

Bump. I plan to submit this for the contest on June 25 at the earliest, so I would like some last minute feedback.

[Verdant Haven]

It feels to me like you've really cleaned up the draft well, and now have a clear dilemma, clear suggestions, and a solid through-line. There are some stylistic things I would tweak here and there, but that's to be expected (and some other editor might make totally different tweaks).

My only remaining feedback of note is that these options are long - every one of them. The shortest is 108, while the others range from 120 to 150+. When something is that long, I like to see the length be specifically relevant to the option, and for it to stand out in part because of its length. When they're all that long, it just turns into an essay. If you're able to chop 10-20% off the lengths of most of these, that will go a long way towards improving usability. To be concise can be difficult, but it's important to the issue. The more options there are the shorter each one typically needs to be!

[Southland]

A bit old, but I cut down the descriptions like you told me to. Let me know what you all think!

[Verdant Haven]

Keeps getting a bit better.

A final couple of thoughts from one last read:

- For effect line 1, I'm not quite sure I see how this follows from the option. Locking down the use of sampling ought to lead to more original music, not less, even amongst the already wealthy.

- How does the govm't get a cut in Option 3? Is the govm't going to take over the clearing process itself?

Probably pretty close to ready.

[Southland]

The idea for Option 1 was that only the rich could afford to use samples (the Washington Post even wrote that using samples has become the newest form of conspicuous consumption among rich musicians for this reason), and for Option 3 it was supposed to imply that a small tax would be wormed into the flat fee. I made the latter more explicit about this while for now I'm on the fence about changing Option 1.

Here's some off-the-cuff idea to replace it: "@@DEMONYMADJECTIVE@@ musicians flaunt their wealth by remixing existing songs"; "musicians forfeit their royalties if they have the same tempo as someone else"; "dance remixes is deader than disco". What do you think?

[Southland]

I really hate to bump this so soon, but my personal deadline is approaching and I would like for Verdant's opinion on Option 1 and change to Option 3.

[Verdant Haven]

The tweak to option 3 works for me.

For option 1, that's fascinating that it actually has become a status symbol – thank you for the link. I would definitely make that relationship clear if that's the desired meaning of the effect line. Something like "five second audio samples are the latest status symbol" or another line that makes it clear that the actual act of sampling is, itself, done merely to flaunt wealth.