Tutorial LEGAL REQUIREMENTS WITH UPLOADING [Deleted]

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zipperworks

Ruko's Ruffians
Defender of Defoko
I'm also wondering - which producers? What, exactly, did they say? I want to respect producers' wishes, but I also want to know what, exactly, those wishes are.

I am arguing against this only because we've all been covering songs and sharing USTs for years. Producers have known about us and even encouraged us for all that time. If this is actually true, it essentially says that everything we've done as a fandom for years is wrong, and I feel like if that were true, we'd have heard about it before now.

And it's like Jeremy said - there are SO MANY of us that there's no way every producer can give us all permission... I don't know.
 
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bodytemp

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They have been saying it for years yet people don't listen. This is a thing some producers STOP producing because of covers I'm not saying who but there have been producers who have left due to covers.
 

na4a4a

Outwardly Opinionated and Harshly Critical
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It should say on the page you download their off vocals from whether or not it can be used...generally.
There are situations where the community ignores it tho (even if it's clearly stated) and no one gives a damn...

Kinda needs to be fixed on both ends.
 

Leah

Ruko's Ruffians
Defender of Defoko
Well, let's settle for this - there are some producers perfectly fine with covers and translations and even encourage those, whilst there are some who are not fine with these things and absolutely hate them for one reason or another. This is why we should ask for permission to cover or translate their songs. That's clear.

So with this being the case, vagueness will not help; we would like to know information about those producers. Who has quit because of fans making covers? Who said 'I hate others making translyrics/translations of my songs'? Because then we can start respecting those producers' wishes, instead of just taking down all of the covers that exist, or emailing every producer about every single cover that has been made, since they would not be able to answer everything.
 

Ramus

Teto's Territory
I don't see how 15 random producers voice an entire class of people who have been giving off vocal for free for so long, if it was true the argument about "some people simply enjoying off vocals, and they are reaching for those." all of this producer's songs would be free too, and this is rarely the case.

Also the way we agree to use the off vocals in Piapro for example, is literally for no profit, which is contract, and as long as we respect it, there is not much to be done.

Don't wanna reprints? Make a Youtube account.
Don't wanna translations? Give up growing outside Japan.
Don't wanna covers? Don't give free off vocal via a single clause contract

But that might be just too hard, right?
 
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Enriku

Ruko's Ruffians
Defender of Defoko
Pretty sure Japanese Laws and Culture do not apply to us because none of us probably live in Japan sooo wouldn't it be more like International Copyright laws or something more on that like then just a single Country. (Idk I might be wrong but I'm just saying since most of us are from everywhere else but Japan)

Also these producers who have stopped producing originals because of covers have themselves to blame since they've made zero clarifications and some people don't really recognize on Piapro it says Reproduction is Prohibited (I for one never even saw that ever). Not like I'm saying they deserve to not be producing but you know you put 0 label on a package and how do you expect people to know what to do with the content. It's kind of like you need to say straight = Please don't do this, please don't do that, to expect people to actually NOT do it.

Also there's 0 proof this is a thing, it's more like preference they would like to be ask more like you're legally obligated to ask, but to be honest if you want to have your originals not reprinted, not translated, not covered your really just asking your western fans, your supportive fans and the fans who are fans to not be a part of your fan base.

Honestly this is such a simple issue being made into a big issue when producers should be more mindful that people don't know Japanese outside Japan. Also I agree with what Ramus said.

I have respect but they need to show some respect back that we're not all Japanese native speakers who know about asking before covering content posted to seem like they're asking for us to cover it with off vocal for downlaod. It's misleading and the fact this is all an issue now is just annoying because you can't just force a lot of people to just ask to cover a single song.
 
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shinami

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uwah many intense feels in this thread

I really do think it depends on the producer. When I made a UST and covered a song by whoo he happily tweeted about it and was clearly overjoyed that people enjoyed his works and wanted to cover them! Meanwhile I don't cover DECO*27 songs because years ago he went on the record saying he hated covers and even had Aimai Elegy be a song people couldn't cover for a long time. And when he did put a very clear "DO NOT COVER" label on the song though, the fandom did indeed listen! If a cover popped up people told them to take it down out of respect for DECO*27 and I think the only official cover was by Nano and Neko who asked him if they could I'm 100% sure of.

Do I agree with DECO*27's opinion of covers being the bane of his existance? No, but I (grudgingly, and I really don't think as highly of him as I used to) do listen to what he said.

Now this isn't to say we should be overcautious, I think being overcautious really restricts society as a whole. There are many producers like whoo who love to see covers and it might just make their day. So I think it's okay to take the chance, just make sure to be respectful and heed the creator's wishes and if they do go on record and say they hate covers then just walk away from what they do even if you heavily disagree.

I am grateful that bodytemp outlined how Japanese society views this issue, very interesting and valuable to know! Don't let the debating get you down or feel that people don't understand, everyone just has passionate feelings. ouo
 

zipperworks

Ruko's Ruffians
Defender of Defoko
I'm with Shinami - it's probably safe to take the chance (like we have been for years), until a producer outright says otherwise...

If I come across harshly, I'm just very afraid that saying that something like this is required is putting a very high barrier to entry on this fandom for people like me who are deeply shy and find it very hard to reach out, as well as scaring people into either giving up entirely or deleting old work. I've seen people talking about feeling like everything they've worked on is probably a waste now already...
 
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Purin

Momo's Minion
Wouldn't it just be much easier to make a master-list of producers who don't want specific works (or their works in general) being published so that every UTAU user doesn't have to jump through hoops learning Japanese to make a cover of a song tho? I’m sure a producer has better things to do then to go through tens of emails everyday saying “UM, can I cover this plz?” in rough Japanese having to say yes/no over and over again.
 

Lystrialle

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Vocaloid and UTAU culture thrives on something that I've called the Unspoken Doujinshi Agreement. Applied to fanworks of things like anime, it's a sort of tacit agreement that many anime/game/whatever companies have with doujin artists in Japan that they will turn a blind eye to the technical copyright infringement as long as the artists continue to support and promote the original work. The difference in this case is that we're dealing with indie producers, not with corporations.

So what do you do in this situation? Honestly speaking, if you had to ask every single producer for permission to cover or do anything based off their work, this community would be a lot smaller - a lot of people, Japanese or otherwise, probably would feel a little intimidated having to ask every time they wanted to cover something (and I'm sure ryo of supercell would have tons of emails in his inbox a day). It's something that the community understands is unintuitive and impractical. Even on the legal end, if you wanted to boil down to it, technically every cover of any song by DECO*27/sasakure.UK/any producer under U/M/A/A or other label would be illegal as well. They allow it because they understand that this is one of the base requirements for the culture to subsist on, and many of the producers in question like it anyway.

See, the thing is, when producers in this community release off vocals, they're not blind. They know people are going to take that as a tacit invitation to cover their song, on the internet or not, unless they post up a corresponding note "do not publicly post covers on the Internet". And although perhaps it's getting into analytical psychology, I know for sure that if I, as a producer, really didn't want people to publicly post the song, I would absolutely attach a ToS or statement with it. Besides, the idea that off vocals are included for people to listen to the BGM is a little silly because...honestly, most songs are made to have the vocals with them, so (although some producers may disagree with me) releasing an off vocal for people to listen to for fun is basically like releasing an incomplete product. It's like releasing a video game with all the sprites removed so people can appreciate the backgrounds.

In the case of Aimai Elegy, do note that DECO*27 intended that song to be an album special song, sung by marina, and that he never released an official off vocal for it. It stands to reason that he wouldn't want covers of that song, and generally speaking most people understand that when they see a Vocaloid producer make an album-exclusive song, you don't just make a fanmade off vocal and cover it. (The issue of whether it's okay to cover songs if DECO*27 personally just dislikes covers - and mind you, this is the first time I have ever heard this claim, although I'm not necessarily doubting it - is something that I think each person should personally decide for themselves, and not concern themselves with trying to analyze people's psychology. Has anyone ever bothered asking DECO*27 about this personally anytime recently?)

Knowing the climate in the community, on Nico Nico Douga or on YouTube, I think you should feel free to cover if you see an off vocal released. Of course, you shouldn't try to make money, and you shouldn't be publicly distributing off vocals that come only on albums, and if you really feel nervous about it there's no harm in dropping an email to a producer like ____さんの曲「_____」のカバーを作ってもいいですか? or something. But I don't think there's some kind of cultural taboo in doing this (no, seriously, I dare you to claim to me that all or even most of the UTAU, Vocaloid, or utaite covers on Nico Nico Douga were all made after individual emails to the producer to ask for permission). Considering that Vocaloid culture's been around since 2008, if people covering things without permission were really that much of an issue, you'd think there'd be some action taken against it by now. Of course, if an individual producer says that they want people to stop covering songs, then by all means you should stop and respect that. I think the community has been very good about that so far.
 
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shinami

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Quite honestly memory might be playing tricks with me on DECO*27 - I remember there was a discussion and I feel like there was a tweet, it was around the Aimai Elegy incident and if there was such a tweet it might have been him being upset about the covers at the time. I remember a lot of Japanese people being upset. Again, could just be the years passing playing with my mind. I honestly don't care if people cover his stuff, I don't really do much with UTAU anyways so it's not hard for me to do. XD

Doujin work is such a great way to term the cover culture! :o I need to remember that for the future, fantastic way to explain it.
 
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bodytemp

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Quite honestly memory might be playing tricks with me on DECO*27 - I remember there was a discussion and I feel like there was a tweet, it was around the Aimai Elegy incident and if there was such a tweet it might have been him being upset about the covers at the time. I remember a lot of Japanese people being upset. Again, could just be the years passing playing with my mind. I honestly don't care if people cover his stuff, I don't really do much with UTAU anyways so it's not hard for me to do. XD

Doujin work is such a great way to term the cover culture! :o I need to remember that for the future, fantastic way to explain it.

Yeah a lot of people got upset. He left because of that issue and has only come back recently. He's told the overseas community to stop many a time.
 

Info-Chan

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I feel like either way, people are going to cover songs. You can't stop it, even if the producer says they don't want covers done, people will find a way.
 

Leah

Ruko's Ruffians
Defender of Defoko
I definitely agree with the fact that, if a producer doesn't want covers to be make without permission, he should only give them out with permission. Some producers even release their off-vocals in different keys. They wouldn't do that if not for covers. I agree it's a good thing to ask for permission, however, for some of the bigger producers, it'd become tiresome for them to answer every single question.

On a side note, another point came to my mind today. A lot of people were introduced to Vocaloid through subbed videos translated into their native language being it/or English. Even if some producers don't like translations, ironically it is thanks to them that they may have a large Western fanbase.
 
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bodytemp

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This resource has been removed and is no longer available for download.
 
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