copyrighting music

Copyright: your number's up 
By FERGUS SHIEL 
Thursday 4 October 2001 

Listen up, they've got your number. Australian composers Nigel Helyer, aka
Dr Sonique, and Jon Drummond have copyrighted 100,000,000,000 telephone
tone sequences.

You might not know it but every time you dial a number, you play a short
melody.

With the aid of a computer, Helyer and Drummond have notated the tones of
every imaginable phone number combination and, in turn, claimed the
melodies as their own. Next time you make a phone call, therefore, chances
are you'll be in breach of international copyright law.

If business can claim ownership over the elemental building blocks of human
life, the composers say it's only fitting that artists lay claim to the
"DNA" of business and are paid for it.

"We're saying to (big business), 'Okay guys, the boot is on the other foot.
 If you really believe in copyright, you've got to pay'," Helyer says. 

"I think Mr Howard will be high on the list.  Universities.  Lots of
corporations.  We'll go for it."

The composers say their Magnus-Opus is a playful way of lampooning
copyright laws that protect big business rather than artists.

You can check your home, work, mobile, fax or modem number against their
compositional database by logging on to www.magnus-opus.com.

If your number is matched, the melody will be played, the notes scored and
a direction given to complete the licence agreement supplied online as soon
as possible.

Helyer and Drummond, who've only just launched the website, say they've had
one offer of payment already. "An American guy tired of direct sales people
calling him has told us he'd like to purchase the copyright for his number
so that he can stop them," Helyer says.

The website explains in greater detail how the composers went about their
creation by throwing 16 tone pairs into an algorithmic generation to
produce countless melodies.

"The whole telecommunications system is entirely musicalised," Helyer says.

* Magnus-Opuswill be installed at the Adelaide Festival of the Arts next
year. 

This story was found at:
http://www.theage.com.au/entertainment/2001/10/04/FFX0PGT0CSC.html 


--
Sean M. Burke  [email protected]  http://www.spinn.net/~sburke/