When I worked on a “Copyrights and Wrongs” project with my 7th grade general music students several years ago, one of the various issues we focused on was how they would choose to treat their own music in terms of rights management. We discussed various positions and potential pros and cons of copyrighting or applying creative commons licenses to their music. Ultimately they had to make their own final decisions of what they might do to their own music. The concepts and decisions, however, were fairly abstract in relation to their own lives and experiences.
If we were having the same discussion today, I wonder how they might react to the contest being hosted by the record label Asthmatic Kitty in which contestants choose to trade the rights of their own original composition for the rights of a song being created by Sufjan Stevens.
The contract for the contest states:
We will choose one winner for the Contest based on the creativity and originality of the submitted works. We will announce the winner on or around December 15, 2007. If you win this Contest, you agree to transfer to Sponsor all rights in your submitted recording and composition. In exchange, we will transfer to you all rights in an original Sufjan Stevens recording and composition. This prize may not be transferred, substituted or redeemed for cash, except that, at our sole discretion, we may substitute a prize of comparable or greater value. (emphasis added)
It is also interesting to note the last sentence in this quoted excerpt, which makes it seem that the person receiving the rights of Sufjan Stevens’ song may not make a profit from it while the Asthmatic Kitty label could very well make a profit from the contestants’ song ,which according to the contract actually wouldn’t be the contestant’s song once it was submitted. The contract does state that you transfer your rights “if you win this contest” so presumably a person who does not win the contest would retain the rights to her or his song.
The contest and decisions that must be made to enter, raise serious issues about copyright and ownership (just to name two) that could lead to some very interesting discussions with students. Of course one must be 18 or older to legally enter the contest but it still might be interesting to ask your students what they might do.