Copyright Infringement on Ridley Scott's "Raised By Wolves" TV Programme

[erikborgo]

My original intention with my music composition hobby was to create a "One Hit Wonder".  It can't be that hard, can it?  Pop music creators all use the same basic set of chords and the biggest hits use a only very small handful.  For six months in 2008, I tried very hard, and I thought I had succeeded when the "First Post" newspaper featured one of my tunes on it's website.  The viewcount went crazy.

 

Not knowing where the sudden increase in views was coming from and suspecting some sort of nefarious activity, I disabled the embedding of my music - this led to the complete stop of views.  In 20/20 retrospect, I should have let it roll.

 

Advertisers spend massive sums of money on seemingly inconsequential little jingles.  A small series of attractive notes can be vaulable:  I have no idea what Brian Eno was paid for the Windows 95 "Startup" noise.  Therefore, after awhile I stopped posting my good material on Youtube, planning to do so only after registering at PRS.  It's a bit late now.  Quite honestly, I never expected anyone to steal the music I have posted.

 

If I had joined PRS, I could have attempted the ceasing of Royalty payouts to those musicians from PRS by opening a copyright dispute.

[erikborgo]

> The infringing copy has not been placed on YouTube. If that's right then there is no point in talking to YouTube

 

Youtube is positioning itself as a paid-for streaming service like Netflix and Amazon.  Perhaps it's simply a matter of time before "Raised By Wolves" appears, I could try to stop Episode 5 streaming then.

[erikborgo]

> Of course you have no proof, any music added to Youtube was the source of any music being used elsewhere.

 

They have greatly increased it's length from about 4 seconds to about 32 seconds, plus added obscuring (and beautifully applied) reverb and effects.  This makes make digital fingerprinting impossible.

[erikborgo]

> I'm no musician, so what does that mean? 

 

I mean that I'm not a trained musician and I have no musical qualifications.  After taking one guitar lesson as a teenager, I'm self taught.

 

> a unique (I presume) sequence of ten notes played over a period of four seconds.

 

It's a unique ten note sequence.  Aside from that, they've used a drect recording (digital copy/sample) - it's the same instrument, ie the unique instrument sound I created.  You can daisy-chain many instruments together in DAW software with different settings within each instrument or effect, to produce something unique.  It's best to create something unique to prevent copyright problems down the line.

> Can you definitely establish that you had distributed your composition to third parties prior to your posting of it on Youtube in June 2020?  Can you show how those third parties would have made your composition available to the "Raised by Wolves" composers to allow them to copy your work?  (Remember:  it isn't necessarily enough to show that the two peices of music are the same, my understanding is that you need to show that they actually copied your work, which means somebody must have made it available to them to copy.  Unless you can show how they would have heard it before writing the "Raised by Wolves" sequence, I think you'll find it difficult to prove any breach of copyright). Can you definitely establish that you had distributed your composition to third parties prior to your posting of it on Youtube in June 2020?  Can you show how those third parties would have made your composition available to the "Raised by Wolves" composers to allow them to copy your work?  (Remember:  it isn't necessarily enough to show that the two peices of music are the same, my understanding is that you need to show that they actually copied your work, which means somebody must have made it available to them to copy.  Unless you can show how they would have heard it before writing the "Raised by Wolves" sequence, I think you'll find it difficult to prove any breach of copyright).

 

Other than proof of the emails being sent, I can't prove anything.  Once it's been sent, it can end up anywhere.  At least one of the people I sent it to knows a Film Composer (his brother in law).  Another is a producer and publisher of electronic music, who has extensive contacts in the music industry and knows people who compose sountracks.

 

I have no idea when their soundtrack was produced.  With online streaming moving at such a fast development pace, Directors these days tend to be compelled to make last minute editing decisions.  It could be that they used my music as a filler and didn't have time to compose anything themseves and left it in.

 

Ridley Scott is well known for being thrifty - nearly all of his productions have been completed under-budget, this is very rare in the film industry.  I doubt if I will see any action without legal pressure. 

 

> I think you really need legal advice on this.  I think that if you try to go it alone you will, as uncle bulgaria suggests, simply be ignored.

 

This is the conclusion I am coming to, but they will likely respond to a letter from a Law firm.  There seem to be a lot of No-Win-No-Fee Lawyers for Copyright issues advertised widely.  Should I leave it until it has been distributed more widely to increase their exposure or strike now? 

 

Edited September 13, 2020 by erikborgo

[erikborgo]

I'll try and find a way to view all the different streaming versions.  If they remove my music in Episode 5 in any of the versions, that would be a possible admission of a copyright breach.

 

Can I use the Small Claims Court? The limit is £10,000.

Edited September 13, 2020 by erikborgo

[erikborgo]

One of the other people I emailed is a Director of a  large and famous advertising firm with offices all over the world.  I was touting for work of course.

[erikborgo]

> a unique (I presume) sequence of ten notes played over a period of four seconds.

 

One of the benefits of using Youtube is their use of algorithms designed to detect breaches of copyright.  A sequence of notes within published music similar to the ones I uploaded is automatically regarded as being legitimate and mine would be automatically deleted.  It happens quite often. 

 

A friend of mine tried to upload his documentary to Youtube about the many similarities between a popular spy novel and a recent TV spy drama, by using extracts from two TV dramatisations.  It was immediately flagged as in breach of copyright automatically, and deleted.  The music gave it away.

 

There are ways to beat the algorithm: Reverb and time stretching works, as in this case.  Lots of music is distributed illegally on Youtube at half speed by using this method - to be downloaded and speeded up later.  Until a publisher flags it up manually.

Edited September 13, 2020 by erikborgo

[erikborgo]

 

Under Part 27 of the Civil Procedure Rules that govern civil disputes:

 

https://www.justice.gov.uk/courts/procedure-rules/civil/rules/part27

 

The court will rarely make an order for the losing party to pay sums in respect of the winning party's 'costs, fees and expenses', e.g. legal fees.

 

There are exceptions which allow the court discretion to make an award for the fixed costs attributable to issuing the claim, court fees paid by the issuing party, travel and accommodation expenses which a witness reasonably incurs in attending a hearing, fees incurred in the instruction of an expert to attend the hearing  - limited to £200.

 

Therefore my costs (if I lose)  will be limited to about £800, at Small Claims Court.  Should I open a case in Small Claims Court?

[erikborgo]

I would love to upload a copy of their version and mine but to do so would breach their (invalid) copyright.  I have a recording with a version of theirs which I have sped up, followed by mine which I have slowed down and they have exactly 11 notes (missed one earlier) - exactly the same notes that are in mine, and in the same order!  One note is doubled in exactly the same place.  This is deeply irritating.  I must have satisfaction.  Just a credit would do.

Edited September 13, 2020 by erikborgo

[erikborgo]

It's absolutely insane that they deleted their website hosting - doing so has the effect of deleting their received emails, because their mail server is deleted too. 

 

The mail server is part of any hosting package - I sell hosting packages myself and know that when you receive a bounced email after the hosting has been removed, it's because the mail server was operating within that hosting package (it can be separate, it wasn't in this case) and has been deleted.

 

I also know that web forwarding has to be set manually.  They have done this on purpose, straight after receiving my ranty email threatening legal action.  But it could of course be a coincidence.  Why didn't they just change their email addresses?

Edited September 13, 2020 by erikborgo

[erikborgo]

Ridley Scott is making a film called "The Last Duel":

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_Duel_(2021_film)

 

Can I legally challenge him to one?  I must have satisfaction.

 

 

 

Edited September 13, 2020 by erikborgo

[erikborgo]

Is the penalty for challenging someone to a Duel still six months in prison? 

 

https://www.british-history.ac.uk/no-series/acts-ordinances-interregnum/pp937-939

 

 

[erikborgo]

> Does it make it more difficult to prove copying?

 

Why do you keep asking if I'm serious?  I do wish it was legal to post both their recording and mine played at roughly the same speed, so that you could hear it.  I don't want to be accused of copyright infringement myself, which is why I haven't done so. 

 

I don't know what state of the art forensic music copy detection technology can do, but here's what I believe they did to cover their tracks and re-engineer my musical piece:

 

1.  They slowed down my sample to fit a longer time period.

 

2.  They then chopped up their recording of my 12 notes and rearragned them to fit 32 seconds they needed to fill.

 

3.  They added reverb.  (This had the effect of blending two very short notes of my 12, which are played very close together, hence 11 notes)

 

4.  They then played my slowed down music and changed the timing of the notes.

 

5. They then played my slowed down music through a guitar cabinet and re-recorded it using a microphone into a computer.  You can hear the untidy noisy sound of the guitar cabinet in the episode fade in shortly before the first note of my music plays.  It's a very hissy sound (and very odd to hear in an otherwise well funded and squeaky clean audio presentation) , because guitar cabinets are analogue devices and music producers tend to use very old models to add atmosphere to recordings.

 

This process also makes detection of copying harder because guitar cabinets are not high quality audio reproduction devices, especially the old, unusual and badly built classics from the 60s and 70s which producers like to use.  They add character to guitar, which is what they were designed to do. 

 

This technique is often used to create the "Wall of sound" effect used by Phil Spektor, and many other producers since, by playing music through guitar cabinets in large rooms with hard walls and floors (a "Live Room") which add reverb (echo) to mix back into the original recording.  I know that this process sounds overly laborious, but it's just one of the sonic activities producers get up to.

 

6. They added more layers of digital effects to some layers (expensive pre-echo and impulse shaping of reverb to rebuild the attack of my notes - they had to do this because they had stretched it so much, which reduces the attack) to produce a smooth sonic experience, but they used the same samples of my music to make those layers, to make sure that they are the same pitch.

 

My 32 seconds of stretched out music has been streamed many millions of times.  Apparently, in North America, an artist is paid $0.091 per play in streaming format.  32 seconds is a big chunk of an hour long soundtrack.  Therefore could I ask the Small Claims Court to award me £10,000 for the first million views from the UK?   The maximum award at Small Claims Court is £10,000.  If that works, could I keep going back for the next million etc?

 

 

Edited September 14, 2020 by erikborgo

[erikborgo]

2 hours ago, Manxman in exile said:

 

Have you ever considered that perhaps you should not be doing this?

Youtube would take it down if it was a problem.  I believe it's entirely legal to call my music anything I like, so long as it isn't actually a forgery of "The Matrix 4 Trailer". 

 

Despite the very extensive and expensive number they ran on my music, I recognised it from the very first note.  I know my sound.  The next 31 seconds saw me becoming more and more incredulous as more and more of the notes of my music played out at me.  I couldn't breate by the time the final note played, they had obscured it most with layers of synth, but it was the pitch of my final note. I couldn't enjoy the rest of that episode.

Edited September 14, 2020 by erikborgo

[erikborgo]

21 hours ago, honeybee13 said:

Hi.

 

To answer your questions about emailing people, please wait for BF to see your latest findings before you rush into anything.

 

HB

 

 

I have no intention of doing anything at all until I have some guidance from the esteemed members of this website.

[erikborgo]

HBO Max alone have at least 36.3 Million Subscribers:

 

https://variety.com/2020/digital/news/hbo-max-subscribers-subscribers-q2-att-1234714316/

 

"Raised By Wolves" is a hit programme.  My music has been played millions of times.  I have no idea where I can get accurate streaming statistics for "Raised By Wolves".

Edited September 14, 2020 by erikborgo

[erikborgo]

 

"Raised By Wolves" is being streamed by Youtube TV!  Maybe I could lodge a complaint with Youtube after all.  On the other hand, Youtube TV might be a wholly different commercial entity.  It's also being streamed on AT&T, Charter, Verizon, Cox Communications, Comcast, Apple and Hulu:

 

https://www.androidcentral.com/how-watch-raised-wolves

 

It's likely been viewed many tens of millions of times.