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Hacked
How to Brute Force Music
Sep 15, 2023
Damien Riehl, technology enthusiast involved in the project of putting every musical melody in the public domain, discusses the complexities of proving subconscious infringement of melodies and the ethical and legal questions surrounding computer-generated music. The podcast also explores the mathematical aspects of music and compares the concept of the Library of Babel to chat GPT, discussing the intersection of creativity, technology, and copyright law in the music industry.
34:59
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Quick takeaways
- There are a finite number of melodies that can be created within the Western 12-tone system, challenging the notion of melodies as unique and owned by individual creators.
- The project 'All the Music' argues that unoriginal and common melodies should not be subject to copyright protection, raising questions about the need to reevaluate copyright laws surrounding melodies.
Deep dives
Melodies as Sequences of Numbers
Melodies can be seen as sequences of numbers, with each note represented by a number. This realization led Damien Reel and Noah Reuben to explore the idea of generating and analyzing melodies using computer algorithms. They developed a program that could brute force melodies by exhaustively generating every possible combination of notes. The program generated an astonishing 471 billion melodies, ultimately demonstrating that there are a finite number of melodies that can be created within the Western 12-tone system. This challenges the common notion that melodies are unique and owned by individual creators.
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