License that allows only me to sell my music?

[decomp]

Hi!

So I have a band and we are making cd's. I don't think the standard copyright is working for musicians so I don't want to use that.

I'm thinking of a license that makes it okay for people to copy and distribute the music and artwork, but not to sell it - except for us, or people with our permission to sell it.

Does something like this exist?

[iiiears]

http://creativecommons.org/choose/

another place to look.

I hope you sell out stadiums.

Best wishes.

[Frogs Hair]

This may be worth checking out . http://www.jamendo.com/en/

[decomp]

Hmm yes I am familiar with creative commons but theres nothing about ME being able to sell it.

Jamendo looks cool I suppose but still uses standard CC licenses.

I found the "free music public license" but it appears to be dead.

http://www.fmpl.org/

Any other ideas anyone?

[szymon_g]

Hi!

So I have a band and we are making cd's. I don't think the standard copyright is working for musicians so I don't want to use that.

actually- the "standard copyright" works fine- if you wanna earn money.

[donkyhotay]

Since you own the copyright to the music you automatically have full rights to something no matter what. If you use creative commons where you restrict commercial uses then that does not affect your own ability or rights to sell the music yourself.

[Copper Bezel]

Yeah, the tangle that most musicians get into is a situation where they're not the exclusive copyright holders. If you're putting up the cash to do the recording and production, most of the usual problems go away.

[HermanAB]

By default in most states, you are the only one allowed to sell your music. Read your state's copyright act.

[Mr. Picklesworth]

Hmm yes I am familiar with creative commons but theres nothing about ME being able to sell it.

There is. That's what the non-commercial license is about :)

[aysiu]

This one looks good:
Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported (CC BY-NC-SA 3.0) (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/)

It has this clause, too:
Waiver — Any of the above conditions can be waived if you get permission from the copyright holder. Since your band is the copyright holder, you can waive it for yourself, of course.

[satanselbow]

Expanding on what
aysiu has just said,

The point that you seem to be missing throughout the thread is that regardless of licence type, be it GPL / CC etc you, as the licence holder, can pretty much do as you please (ie exclusively profit from the sale of your work) - the licence is there to restrict how and what others may do with it; especially with regards to sale/profit and reworking. ;)

Problems generally arise when (from experience) when record labels / agents get involved and their contracts involve claims of transfer of copyright to themselves - usually tied into the separate and equally suspect quagmire of "publishing rights" ... a slippery slope indeed... just look to the estates of any random dead rock-star for scary examples :(

[undecim]

CC-BY-NC-SA is exactly what you're describing.

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/

[decomp]

Wow thanks for all that information everyone!

I'm much better informed now!