Mobygratis – Free Moby music to empower your creative projects
mobygratis.com
mobygratis.com
He’s certainly free to license his music however he wants but he’s really overselling how permissive it is.
I genuinely hoped for a MIT/BSD-like license that would allow people to express themselves freely with his content. However, I am now less inclined to do so.
Update: All said, still grateful to him for doing something. That’s already way more than most artists to do give back.
If one or more artists create an initial Collaboration and they are granted a commercial license, their revenue share would be, in the sole discretion of mobygratis, at most, 49% (forty-nine percent) of the gross income earned, received or credited from the permitted use and exploitation of that Collaboration. If a Collaboration is subsequently used by another artist or artists to create a new (or sub-) Collaboration—the new collaborating artist(s) will receive their share of any revenue exclusively from the initial collaborator(s); the mobygratis revenue share of any collaboration, regardless of how many layers of collaboration have occurred, shall always be greater than 50% (fifty percent). However, the specifics are subject to change in the sole and absolute discretion of mobygratis and would be covered on a case-by-case in the commercial license.
If you add > * text * it's more clear what is happening:
> Commercial Use License If you wish to use a track from the mobygratis platform for commercial purposes, you must apply for a commercial license prior to such use. You may do so by sending an email to: mobygratis@moby.com and include your full name, the name of the Track, and your desired use of the Track, including all the commercial uses you anticipate, and the desired duration of the commercial license.
> If one or more artists create an initial Collaboration and they are granted a commercial license, their revenue share would be, in the sole discretion of mobygratis, at most, 49% (forty-nine percent) of the gross income earned, received or credited from the permitted use and exploitation of that Collaboration. If a Collaboration is subsequently used by another artist or artists to create a new (or sub-) Collaboration—the new collaborating artist(s) will receive their share of any revenue exclusively from the initial collaborator(s); the mobygratis revenue share of any collaboration, regardless of how many layers of collaboration have occurred, shall always be greater than 50% (fifty percent). However, the specifics are subject to change in the sole and absolute discretion of mobygratis and would be covered on a case-by-case in the commercial license.
The collection is great. It's like a much more polished and professional version of my ideas folder (I rarely get beyond the initial loop/riff stage). Will now download a random piece, pop it into my DAW and see if it can inspire me to create something new.
This is an attempt to grab a slice of the pie before AI-generated music kills the market for session musicians. His terms of use are odd, but that's his choice.
Personally, I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt and saying that his intentions are earnest here; he really does want to put free music in the hands of creators. Maybe if he'd launched a $MOBY memecoin alongside it I'd be skeptical, but my gut says this isn't a venture he expects to make real money from.
Clicking the play button doesn't do that, it brings up a somewhat eccentric 2-line license agreement.
Clicking the checkmark to agree then prompts for your email address and to create an account.
These are dark UI patterns, and it's a shame a website purporting to be about generously sharing free content uses them. A button should do what it advertises.
Here's a snippet from the full license text if anyone's curious:
Moby does not permit his Tracks to be used to advertise right-wing politics or causes, or to be used to promote meat, dairy, or other animal products. People may disagree about when these lines have been crossed—which is why Moby retains the right to terminate the license to any Track completely at his sole and absolute discretion, at any time.
Also note you're contracting with a corporation, and the agreement includes a clause about you indemnifying them.
That snippet implicitly acknowledges this and Moby the person gets to arbitrate between you and Moby Collaboration, Inc.
Also this:
"Mobygratis retains the right in its sole and absolute discretion to determine whether any use of a Track (or Collaboration or Master Recording derived therefrom) is commercial."
That's an understatement. Restricting content based on political activism I can sympathize, if not agree with. Restriction based on war and geopolitics, ok.
But based on promoting veganism? Come on dude, pick your battles. Any business that deals in any way with animal products (virtually every restaurant, grocery store, hospital, school, entertainment venue, etc) could get accused of promoting cruelty and violating the license; this is a nonstarter.
I'm very liberal, but this is bizarre. Apart of a society is doing business with people who don't 100% agree with you.
And Bob's Burritos can't run an ad with it because they aren't a vegan restaurant ?
I'm lumped in with the Republicans because I like burgers and pizza? Is that where the culture war is at?
And, I don't think that the agreement here is meant to equate eating meat with being right wing. Moby is famously against animal products, so he's decided he doesn't want the music used to support those products.
There's a vast chasm between "not 100%" agreeing with someone (Moby in this case), and being a Nazi. Bob's Burritos is a TV show so I don't think they'd be considered promoting meat, though the legalese is probably too questionable, as is restricting use for "right wing politics".
Moby is however of the opinion that animal abuse is unacceptable, regardless of whether people think it tastes good. I'm generally of the opinion that people should be free to establish hard boundaries for the use of their content.
If you take this to its logical conclusion it can't be used with any media that displays the consumption of food that's not 100% vegan.
Right wing cause is also a bucket of worms. Someone like Joe Rogan is now considered Right Wing though he supported Bernie Sanders in the past.
If a liberal podcast host uses this as their theme music, then has a right wing guest on violate this?
If I mention I start my day with some yogurt, did I violate it ?
Feels like a "I'll sue you if I want" clause.
But no, I don't think it makes it unusable for media which shows people eating meat. If I make my music available for anyone to use in projects which aren't promoting homophobia, I'm not going to have a problem with someone using it in a TV show where a character is homophobic. The salient thing is whether the show itself is promoting homophobia (and if I wanted to sue someone for such a use, I'd need a pretty strong case that the TV show was actually promoting homophobia)
> Right wing cause is also a bucket of worms. Someone like Joe Rogan is now considered Right Wing though he supported Bernie Sanders in the past.
Yes, I agree with this 100%, it's pretty much meaningless. I'm not sure if this makes it unusable or usable for anything. My suspicion is that the wording of the license would make it very difficult for Moby to sue you for use for anything but a clear violation, but he can revoke your license (which he would gain nothing from, and would erode faith in his mobygratis project). So I think it would be best avoided by people who aren't reasonably using his music for projects that he wouldn't approve of. Obviously "right-wing" is subjective, but if you're using it to promote Trump's campaign, trans-denialism, or the new Arby's chicken burger, obviously you can expect the license to be revoked.
If you're a "liberal" talk show host I think the license would be best avoided; liberal in the U.S. is considered right-of-center by many
If you're a socialist (or even social democratic) talk show host who occasionally brings on centrist or right-wing personalities, I think you'd be fine.
Again, I’m liberal, I check the box for the Dems in every election. Just straight blue.
But if Moby wakes up tomorrow and says the Dems are right wing and I say most people should just vote for Dems he can sue me.
Personally I don’t like the idea of releasing content with a “use it if I like you “ clause. He’s free to keep it for his own personal use.
I know I release my code MIT. I don’t release it along with a list of my personal beliefs.
And he's free to release it under whatever license he wants also. I don't like it as much as a free license either, but it's not my music, and IMO it's better than not granting use; there are of course many cases where people will feel comfortable using it (and in fact it has been used by many people already who have applied common sense to their usage of his work, and I don't believe he has sued anyone or revoked the license in the 18 years he's made it available under similar terms).
I also release my code MIT or GPL even though I find it tempting to use less permissive licenses like the "Don't be evil" license of JSON[1] or JSLint[2]
I would feel comfortable using Moby's music for lots of purposes personally.
I feel like you are overthinking this, I don't think it's about what you believe in, it's about what you think Moby would approve of. If you wanted to release a video promoting veganism, you could obviously use his music (even if you're a democrat). If you wanted to release a video promoting the Democratic party, there's some chance he'd revoke the license (but almost no chance he could successfully sue you). Even if you were a far-right activist using his music for a video supporting an abortion ban, he wouldn't be able to sue you (because banning abortion isn't exclusively a right-wing position), but I expect he would revoke your license if he became aware of the use and didn't believe in banning abortion.
I say that using it for Democratic party propaganda would be unwise because Moby himself is a socialist, or something in that direction. If you were AOC or Bernie and wanted to use his music for your own platform, you could probably get away with it; Whatever Moby's views on social democrats (or democratic socialists depending on who you ask), I think it's incredibly unlikely he'd revoke the license.
So you don't need to worry about "getting sued" unless you're using his music for clear violations of the license (e.g. "significant" commercial usage , or literal republican party promotional materials). If you're not clearly, unambiguously violating the license which itself contains much ambiguity, you don't need to worry about anything other than the license being revoked. And for determining if it might be revoked, consider why Moby made his music available for causes he cares about in the first place.
For many uses of the music, it can be replaced with something else fairly easily anyway
[1]: https://www.json.org/license.html
[2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-C-JoyNuQJs&t=2480s "I give permission to IBM, it's customers, partners, and minions to use JSLint for evil"
Here’s a controversial view point I hold. It’s not a good idea to have loser friends ( unemployed, unable to support themselves), even if it’s not strictly their fault.
These people have a tendency to pull you down and will laugh about it .
Is that a right wing viewpoint? Left wing ?
No body knows.
Even if you bag groceries at Vons you have my respect and we can be friends.
If you don't work and expect others to provide for you, I don't want to be around you.
He's not supplying it as a stock sounds library.
Eh. Some of his music I like, some, not so much. I'll give it a listen.
I don't listen to music while I code. The only time I listen to music, is my daily exercise in the morning. This may be good for that.
Might use it as background music for some presentations. I don't vlog; which seems to be where a lot of stock music is used.
It seems that I can't use it to promote Slavic content, because Slavic as a tradition can be right-wing in Moby's world.
If you're a content creator, I don't think going into this rabbit hole is worth it.
Of course this will induce demand as well, so it’s nonlinear. But the point is, it’s not a right wing idea.
In so far as the established ruling order is so-called free market capitalism, as is the case in the US, I have to agree that your political interests are right-wing aligned.
That said, Americans have somehow redefined and reduced all political vocabulary to absolute nonsense, so I can see why you wouldn't understand this.
-- literally every generation