• Contact

  • Newsletter

  • About us

  • Delivery options

  • Prospero Book Market Podcast

  • Democracy of Sound: Music Piracy and the Remaking of American Copyright in the Twentieth Century

    Democracy of Sound by Cummings, Alex Sayf;

    Music Piracy and the Remaking of American Copyright in the Twentieth Century

      • GET 10% OFF

      • The discount is only available for 'Alert of Favourite Topics' newsletter recipients.
      • Publisher's listprice GBP 33.99
      • The price is estimated because at the time of ordering we do not know what conversion rates will apply to HUF / product currency when the book arrives. In case HUF is weaker, the price increases slightly, in case HUF is stronger, the price goes lower slightly.

        16 238 Ft (15 465 Ft + 5% VAT)
      • Discount 10% (cc. 1 624 Ft off)
      • Discounted price 14 614 Ft (13 919 Ft + 5% VAT)

    16 238 Ft

    db

    Availability

    printed on demand

    Why don't you give exact delivery time?

    Delivery time is estimated on our previous experiences. We give estimations only, because we order from outside Hungary, and the delivery time mainly depends on how quickly the publisher supplies the book. Faster or slower deliveries both happen, but we do our best to supply as quickly as possible.

    Product details:

    • Publisher OUP USA
    • Date of Publication 30 March 2017

    • ISBN 9780190675110
    • Binding Paperback
    • No. of pages274 pages
    • Size 234x155x20 mm
    • Weight 399 g
    • Language English
    • Illustrations 20 illus.
    • 0

    Categories

    Short description:

    Democracy of Sound tells the story of the pirates, radicals, jazzbos, Deadheads, and DJs who challenged the record industry for control of recorded sound throughout the twentieth century. A political and cultural history, it shows how the primacy of "intellectual property" gradually eclipsed an American political tradition that was suspicious of monopolies and favored free competition.

    More

    Long description:

    It was a time when music fans copied and traded recordings without permission. An outraged music industry pushed Congress to pass anti-piracy legislation. Yes, that time is now; it was also the era of Napster in the 1990s, of cassette tapes in the 1970s, of reel-to-reel tapes in the 1950s, even the phonograph epoch of the 1930s. Piracy, it turns out, is as old as recorded music itself.

    In Democracy of Sound, Alex Sayf Cummings uncovers the little-known history of music piracy and its sweeping effects on the definition of copyright in the United States. When copyright emerged, only visual material such as books and maps were thought to deserve protection; even musical compositions were not included until 1831. Once a performance could be captured on a wax cylinder or vinyl disc, profound questions arose over the meaning of intellectual property. Is only a written composition defined as a piece of art? If a singer performs a different interpretation of a song, is it a new and distinct work? Such questions have only grown more pressing with the rise of sampling and other forms of musical pastiche. Indeed, music has become the prime battleground between piracy and copyright. It is compact, making it easy to copy. And it is highly social, shared or traded through social networks--often networks that arise around music itself. But such networks also pose a counter-argument: as channels for copying and sharing sounds, they were instrumental in nourishing hip-hop and other new forms of music central to American culture today. Piracy is not always a bad thing.

    An insightful and often entertaining look at the history of music piracy, Democracy of Sound offers invaluable background to one of the hot-button issues involving creativity and the law.

    This book is for music lovers and those of a certain age who remember artists from the Jazz and Rock days of the 1960s when tape recorders and vinyl were in place and bootlegged recordings of Bob Dylan and Janis Joplin were the in-thing to have. You can see how [Cummings] has enjoyed researching the detailed background of music piracy which makes this book a jolly good read providing the history of music piracy from the late 19th century onwards.

    More

    Table of Contents:

    Introduction
    Part One: The Birth and Growth of Piracy, 1877-1955
    1. Music, Machines, and Monopoly
    2. Collectors, Con Men, and the Struggle for Property Rights
    3. Piracy and the Rise of New Media
    Part Two: The Legal Backlash, 1945-1998
    4. Counterculture, Popular Music, and the Bootleg Boom
    5. The Criminalization of Piracy
    6. Deadheads, Hip Hop, and the Possibility of Compromise
    7. The Global War on Piracy
    Conclusion: Piracy as Social Media
    Notes
    Index

    More
    0