Web Sites and Songs

Hey everyone, got a question...

Does anyone know what the rules are about putting covers of songs you've done with your own band on a web page? I'm guessing there a whole 'copyright' thing involved....so is it legal?

Whilst on the subject how can you prevent people from stealing your own songs and recordings once they're on your website?

Thanx, ^Chacron^.

Do you mean stealing the mp3's or
stealing the song-idea?
If its just the mp3's then you can
use javascripts or something like that
to prevent visitors to rightclick on your
mp3 page.
check out
http://javascript.internet.com/page-details/disable-images-click.html
or
http://www.dynamicdrive.com/dynamicindex9/noright3.htm
to see what I mean.
If you mean the song-idea, I think you have the copyright
once you've recorded it or written it.
Of course people can still steal your music and
say they came up with it, but they cant make money
from it.

[Edited by mc9mm on 05-22-2002 at 07:22 AM]

He has to mean stealing the song idea,otherwise if you don't want people to get hold of your mp3,why give it to them then?
Go to this site:
http://www.guitarnoise.com/songwriting
It's a series of articles about songwriting,and if a guy who knows what he's doing writes about songwriting,he'll talk about getting copyrights for the songs you write and all that.This one seems to.Plus he recommends a couple of other sites and resources dealing with these issues.
If you'd like to see these other sites without reading this guy's articles,here they are:
http://www.socan.com
http://www.cla.co.uk/
http://www.lib.virginia.edu/copyright/copylaw.html
http://strategis.ic.gc.ca/sc_mrksv/cipo/cp/cp_main-e.html?icservices=e_cop
http://www.copyright.com.au/
He doesn't vouch for any of them.Neither do I.But they're good for a starting point.
And by the way Chacron,if you search,these sort of things are there on the net.
But it's good to ask.Coz somebody here might have the exact details you want,without you having to go to all the trouble.

This is a thread that we started a while back, good things came out of it, some members did a lot of research.

It could probably help.

http://guitartricks.com/forum/showthread.php?threadid=2422

Okay thanx, i'll bear that stuff in mind. I like the idea of not putting all your stuff on and getting people to contact you for more, that way you can choose who you trust. I take it from that you would have to have permission to put your version of someone elses song on your site, am i right?

For me it's really important. On my website I only put original stuff that I made or public domain music. I would ask permission first.

I did take off stuff I had recorded cause people told me it sounded like this or that song. I did the research and sometimes they were right, so I took them off.

I know that people could take my songs away in a heartbeat but I think it does help and motivate more. I do this to help people so I'll take the risk. In the end, more good will rise from this.

That's my school of thoughts.


On another subject, I don't see posting tricks of a song a bad thing. As long as the whole song is not posted and that the person doesn't take credit for it.

It does bring up the problem of tabs, are they legal or not? I think they are an important part of learning guitar and should be legal. On the other hand, I understand musician who see tabs as a ripp off since they could make money out of tab books. Personnaly, I always post the tabs of my songs and tricks on my site, but not the whole song.