[calibas]

So if an algorithm you wrote produces a melody identical to a copyrighted work, you can claim copyright of the melody too?

I don't believe there's an objective right and wrong answer here, we're still figuring out how our legal system should adapt to modern technologies.

[tebruno99]

Part of the law is that the infringer has to have had access to the work that he/she is accused of "stealing"

An Algorithm has no access and could have never heard the work in question..

[mooman219]

The individual writing the algorithm certainly can have access. If I copy a song, I can't say that the tool I used didn't have access as a defense because that makes no sense.

[dwild]

> The individual writing the algorithm certainly can have access.

Sure he can have access, but looking at the algorithm you can prove without a doubt that the algorithm couldn't have access to it.

> If I copy a song, I can't say that the tool I used didn't have access as a defense because that makes no sense.

You could have given access to the song to the tools that you used though.

[k__]

I think there is a difference in creating an algo that generates all possible solutions vs one that generates one specific solution.

[unnouinceput]

No, it's not. One that generated a specific solution is given specific parameters. And those parameters can be, in their turn, just plugged in by a loop, hence generating everything.

Usually songs are between 2 and 5 minutes long. Therefore I can, theoretically speaking, write an algorithm, that can use linear interpolation, to generate all sounds, for all octaves, using 44KHz as sampling (the most usual track these days), and you can bet your rear latest pop or rock or whatever song will be generated as well - leaving me with only showing to court "here Your Honor, after looping through, my algorithm at mark xxx gazzilion generated this awesome piece of melody that you know from Youtube as <Lana Del Rey - Blue Jeans>"

[mygo]

So the Library of Babel for music?

https://libraryofbabel.info/bookmark.cgi?eofpgjcg.ggyvpzpti,...

^ search that bookmarked page in the Library of Babel for “jeans” ;)

On another note, since melodies can be encoded into a text format, the Library of Babel has actually done this too.

Heck, there’s a page in the Library of Babel that reads “Your honor, Lady Gaga will one day steal this melody from the library of babel, encoded here in text format: {melody for ‘Shallow’}”

which may look something like this (search “lady gaga” https://libraryofbabel.info/bookmark.cgi?vakuygoqaattmqm315 )

[dr_dshiv]

And discussed in 1692, by Bernoulli, Mersenne and Kircher

http://articles.adsabs.harvard.edu//full/1979HisSc..17..258K...

[unnouinceput]

Sounds awesome. I agree with this 100% (both your sarcastic statement AND libraryofbabel)

[bathtub365]

Sounds a bit like parallel construction...