Musicat - Am I imagining things or did you at some point do an AMA (“ask me anything”) type of thread about your musical transcription career? I tried searching for it, but couldn’t find the right search terms. Or perhaps it was only mentioned in another thread as a possible spin-off thread but just never got spun out.
It was a great album, I bought both the Eagles greatest hits albums in the 1990s and listened to them many times. They are almost 100% good songs. Those albums are still on the SDcard in my car media library, on my computer, and on my phone.
Copyrights and trademarks are indeed granted overnight. Faster, even. For copyrights, at least at the time of this album, you just put “Copyright (c) this year” on a book or whatever, and presto! It’s copyrighted. My assumption is that the lead sheet mentioned is a handy or even essential place to put that magic phrase and record that it was done.
Trademarks are kinda just as easy. Put “tm” on your logo art – boom, it’s trademarked. For additional protection you can register the trademark with the feds (I don’t know the procedure), and if that’s granted you get to use the “(r)” mark. Trademarks are a little weird though – you can have regional trademarks, for example, that only protect the trademarks in some areas. You can also lose your trademark if you’re not using it or fail to defend it from infringement.
Patents, on the other hand, are much more formal, and require a long process involving a proper description of the patentable thing, reasons why it is unique and not prior art, and so forth. Then you get to spar with the Patent Office to prove your claim, and eventually get your patent if you do so. The date on applying for a patent is crucial, but a fairly informal proof of priority may be adequate, e.g. mail yourself a letter with a description of the invention. The person who establishes the claim first can patent the invention, which becomes unpatentable prior art for the next guy.
The law referencing copyright claims has been changed drastically over the last few decades. In the early 1970’s, a notice was required, and a claim form had to be filed with the US Copyright office. The copyright wasn’t officially granted until you received the form back with their stamp, because the claim might be denied. I know of two cases where this happened; one was a song that said “Words & music by X.” The Copyright Office noted that the only words were a repeated phrase, “Feelin’ the spirit,” and they said that you couldn’t claim writer credit for that, no matter how many times it was repeated.
The other case was one where the disc (this was a sound recording claim, not copyright) had “for demonstrations purposes only.” The office said that didn’t look like a serious recording, and denied the claim.
The first case was solved by resubmitting and omitting the “words by…” line. The second was solved by some clever and insistent wording by me, and they OK’d the copyright.
What you are describing is the current state, not the 1970 state of copyright.
pulykamell, I never started a thread exactly like that, although it has been suggested (maybe by you?). I guess after threads like this one, I feel I have told everything I know and used up all my stories! Still think I should?
Ah, my bad. I remember the requirements had changed, but thought they may have become more formalized, not less formalized. I think even under the old regime you had a valid copyright until it was denied under review. Now you have a valid copyright upon publication - if the correct notice were made on the work - until challenged and the copyright thrown out or upheld.
do they still exist?
Greatest hits albums in the vinyl/cassette era were often not chronological, tracks were arranged primarily to align the playing time on each side, and suffered when there were wild stylistic or production swings from one track to the other. The Eagles Greatest Hits I all sounds like it fits together and makes up a cohesive album. It doesn’t sound patched together.
Since around 2000, with the Beatles “1” and similar CD and digital compilations, Greatest Hits collections tend to be more comprehensive and almost always chronological - a real history of the group.
There were some albums that were promoted hard by those record clubs, Meat Loaf’s “Bat Out of Hell” was featured for an eternity.
The catch was after you got the first eight records for a penny, you’d be charged $15 for a dud by Huey Lewis and the News that you couldn’t return on time.
That exact thing happened to my friend and that is is the story of how I got a free copy of Huey Lewis and the News’s greatest hits.
Okay, my story might not be as cool as Musicat’s.
Yes in a technical sense. Read all about it on Wikipedia. Bought out a couple times, bankrupt in 2015, gave up music CD mail order a long time ago but kept the video disc business alive for a while longer.
Sony owns the brand name but it licenses it to the current “owner”. Has promised to bring back vinyl record mail order sales with a consumer choice model.
Yeah, right. Won’t believe it until I see the ads in my TV Guide. Wait a second there …