Licensing

Can I share the music on this site?

Yes, yes, yes! I’m interested in getting my music out to as many people as possible, so please feel free to share these songs in any of the following ways:

• make torrents out of them
• upload them to Limewire, eDonkey, or your favorite other P2P network
• IM them to your friends
• burn them onto mix CDs to give to people
• write out the sheet music and drop leaflets over your city from a helicopter
• anything else I might have missed

One request: Please don’t do anything to the ID3 tags on the files* – they contain info that will help random strangers who come across these songs and like them find this website.

(* If you have no idea what this means – don’t stress – you’re fine. )

Hey, is it okay if I use your music for my podcast?

Definitely! All of the songs here on the Radio Nowhere site are “podsafe.” This means that the whole catalog qualifies as royalty free music that you can spin on your podcast or internet radio show – as long as you observe the conditions of the Creative Commons by-sa 3.0 license. If you do play one of my songs, please let me know so I can add your podcast to the list of worthies here on this page.

Um, what is Creative Commons and what does this by-sa license let me do?

Creative Commons is a legal framework created by some very smart people to help facilitate cultural cross-pollination – and allow independent artists to customize the rules that balance protection of their creations with incentives for other creative types to spread them around.

Here’s a summary of the license rules:

• Provide attribution – this basically means that if you use my song, you’ll provide a link back to this website and an explicit mention that I wrote the song.

• Share alike – if you remix a song, or mash it up with something else, the resulting work has to be released under the same CC license.

Check out the web page for this license, and the rest of the CC website, for details and a fuller explanation.

I’m making a movie for my film class/youtube channel/slideshow for my mom’s birthday – is it okay if I use your music?

You should know the answer by now…yes! As long as you adhere to the CC conditions I was talking about above, you’re just as free to use the music in a film as you would be in a podcast or radio show.

If some Hollywood studio picks your soundtrack up for distribution and wants to talk about licensing music for movies, though:

a) Congratulations in advance!

b) Please get in touch with me and we’ll work out a commercial license.

Speaking of commercial licensing…

Don’t worry – I’m interested. If you want to use one of my songs in a commercial work just email me. I’m the sole owner of all the rights to my music, and I can green light a use of any song immediately, so licensing music for movies, TV, advertisements, etc. is quick and easy.

This is all very nice, but what I really want to read is some stultifying lawyer sh*t!

Great! This paragraph is for you, then…

This license does not provide a warranty of any kind. Make sure you read the license thoroughly before you do anything with the royalty free music on this site.

Furthermore, this license only applies to songs I’ve written and/or own the copyright to. It does not cover audio files at other websites that are linked to on this site.

Finally, if you’d like to use any of my songs in connection with a social or political campaign, please get in touch first.