Guitar Hero World Tour Wont Allow Covers
By Tyler Ryan on Sep 30, 2008 in News
Why Does Activision Hate Midgets?
If you’re going to be purchasing Guitar Hero World Tour to take advantage of the in game music studio and create ‘cover’ versions of your favorite song… well that’s cool by us.
But if you plan on distributing the song online you might face some difficulties as Activision has said that they will take down any songs that are copyrighted.
According to Activision’s Brian Bright;
“We’ll be actively monitoring the site. And, obviously, if the copyright holder complains, Activision will pull it down immediately. We can’t condone people putting up covers of music. It’s really there for original content.”
They must be getting complaints from record studios already, with threats that their artist’s music libraries wont be available for the game in the future, if they’re putting out a statement like that.
I’m not that familiar with copyright law, so maybe one of our readers could explain whether or not distributing cover versions of songs would be an infringement.
Just for fun, we’re going to list the songs that were cover versions on the first Guitar Hero game after the break;
Here they are…
That would be all 30 songs in the main setlist.
Just to quote Activision’s Brian Bright again;
“We can’t condone people putting up covers of music.”
Thank you again for reminding us why we hate suits.
I don’t think i’ll be playing any Zeppelin songs on GH anytime soon.
Plus, I think that Activision likes midgets not just these midgets, they are pretty creepy.
ZED | Sep 30, 2008 | Reply
By me, i like covers, but not in a music-based game. That’s why i don’t really have fun with the Harmonix guitar hero’s (i didn’t play rock band yet). So i don’t think it’s an excuse to say that “beacouse they have covers in other games this game must have covers of songs they didn’t have autorized… and if someone found a non-autorized cover there they’ll maybe lose a big bunch of cash…
I think they’re doing fine.
Slap | Sep 30, 2008 | Reply
I doubt they will be actively taking down songs made by the music studio. They just don’t want to be held liable by music companies.
ryan | Sep 30, 2008 | Reply
I think that they will only be actively taking downs covers of bands that have not been in the game like Zeppelin. If someone makes a Sabbath song then that will probably stay up.
ZED | Sep 30, 2008 | Reply
Well I can see it as a major problem, not necessary for Harmonix but for the studios. i.e someone uploads a cover, 1,000 people download it before it gets removed. Then 1,000 people can use this song as they please anytime, even edit the track rename then upload again. A never ending spread of copyright songs like a virus on their networks becoming a costly full time task just to review the thousands of new song uploads daily. Anyone else thoughts on this?
Dean | Oct 29, 2008 | Reply
Love Festivals Tonight! Sing This Song! -
how to copyright a song | Dec 1, 2008 | Reply
save to my Bookmarks
Maxstepper | Dec 3, 2008 | Reply