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Discussion from Village pump (proposals)

What with featured articles and featured pictures, I think it may be approaching time to establish a process for featured sounds. This would be for recorded music as well as for "sound portrait"-type illustrations of articles: birdsong, the shouts of a crowded marketplace, a running steam engine. I think Spoken Wikipedia articles, though, as they are basically text-based, wouldn't be appropriate for this (though of course they would be improved by the inclusion of these sounds). I realize that there aren't many sounds on Wikipedia as of yet, but I think that establishing a featuring process will encourage more exceptional recordings to be collected by Wikipedians. What do you all think?--Pharos 23:16, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

I think this is an excellent idea. There a quite a few good sound recordings already, perhaps more than most of us realise. I think that by allowing sounds to be elevated to featured status more contributors migt be encouraged to supply them. However, I think ther will have to be strict guidelines from the outset about what might constitute a featured sound: after all, a featured article requires a lot of work. --Gareth Hughes 10:12, 1 August 2005 (UTC)
I think a very good idea over-all. I think the requirements should be much like the Featured Pictures: that is, be both highly informative within the context of the article, and be aesthetically and technically pleasing. — Asbestos | Talk 16:03, 1 August 2005 (UTC)

Format

I've adapted this mostly from Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates. Any comments/suggestions?--Pharos 04:01, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

Just like with FPC's, the sound files must be used in an article in order to pass/nominated for FSC (which, reminds me, we should lock up WP:FSC as our shortcut.) Zscout370 (Sound Off) 04:03, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

Not yet

This is a good idea, but I think it might be a bit too early. The number of sound files on wikipedia, excluding spoken wikipedia things, is very, very small. You're talking about *maybe* 300 songs (225 would be a more realistic estimate), and maybe another 300 non-song sound files. So you're selecting from a tiny, tiny pool (I say this as the person who uploaded most of them). I think it might be a bit premature to start featuring things. →Raul654 05:01, August 11, 2005 (UTC)

Well, if that is the case, then we could just have one nomination for x time, then start on another one. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 05:03, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
I recognize that the standards will certainly evolve over time and, like other featuring processes, some of the early selections will probably be defeatured later as we achieve higher standards. I do think that this project may be an important incentive to actually build up a quality sound library here. Anyway, we certainly don't have to put this on the Main Page anytime soon.--Pharos 05:13, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
Ok, but have any of you develped a way of marking FS's, like a template or something? Zscout370 (Sound Off) 05:16, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
Well, that's the easy part; it can be simply adapted from the templates used for other featured content. The tough part is establishing the standards, which is why I put up this page first.--Pharos 05:22, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
Mainly, I just wanted to add that the sound file has to be used in an article. Other than that, I do not know what else I could think of. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 05:27, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
I don't think the idea is premature, but it is true that, if the pool is small, we'll be including a lot of noticably sub-standard sound files to keep to a one-a-day pace. We could either, then, use Zscout370's idea and replace a FS at some indeterminate time, or make it Sound Of The Week, at least for the time being. — Asbestos | Talk (RFC) 14:17, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
No need for a one-a-day pace -- over at featured list candidates, we're getting 2-3 a week most of the time, and that's fine for now. At this point, there's very little chance of featured lists ever getting turned into a "Featured list of the day" type template, so we don't need to move too quickly. A "Featured sound of the day" might be interesting, but it's not necessary at the beginning. Start slow (1-2 a week is fine!) and see what happens as time progresses. --Spangineer (háblame) 18:43, August 16, 2005 (UTC)
Mayeb what we can do is show not only how sounds can be used to enchance an article, but also what quality sound files Wikipedia offers to the world. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 19:09, 16 August 2005 (UTC)

I strongly feel that this isn't premature. We've got some good recordings, and nothing requires the process to be highly active. More importantly, we have very little guidance on what featured audio should be. License clairty? Noise freeness? Legnth? A featuring process is one way we can start figuring out guidelines on what people should be creating. --Gmaxwell 01:38, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

Nominations

Everything about the nominations procedure and suitability of the sounds seems fine to me for now. Minor question: 

===[[Wikipedia:{{subst:PAGENAME}}| ExampleName ]]===

[[Media:Example.ogg|Example.ogg]] [[:image:Example.ogg|*]]

Add your reasons for nominating it here; 
say what article it appears in, and who created the recording.

*Nominate and '''support'''. - ~~~~ 
*

<!-- additional votes go above this line -->
<br style="clear:both;" />

What is the point of the [[:image:Example.ogg|*]] link? It just adds a little asterix, linking to the speaker image (if "Example" is kept") or a non-existant image if "Example" is replaced with the sound's name. — Asbestos | Talk (RFC) 11:48, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. Zscout370 (Sound Off) 14:28, 14 August 2005 (UTC)
Wait. Huh? What sounds good? — Asbestos | Talk (RFC) 18:50, 14 August 2005 (UTC)
The purpose of the asterisk is to link to the image page, wherein copyright information (as well as a description of the file) is kept. →Raul654 18:54, August 14, 2005 (UTC)
Ah wait, I guess it does work. I was confused because putting 'Image:some_sound.ogg' in the search box doesn't get anything, but it does indeed work from a link. My mistake. — Asbestos | Talk (RFC) 23:40, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

WikiProject Sound

I've started a new WikiProject to help organise the sounds we have and encourage more people to contribute new ones. I think it will be beneficial to have a central forum for discussing sound files, as a lot of the information is spread across projects and namespaces. the wub "?/!" 14:03, 18 August 2005 (UTC)

I don't think sounds are widespread or prominent enough to have a "Featured Sound" project, but I'd like to float around the idea of Featured Maps/Diagrams/Graphs. Currently, these things are accepted at FPC, but many people are more hesitant about supporting their promotion, and some simply oppose all diagrams outright. If we have Featured Lists apart from Featured Articles, it doesn't seem too far out there to have Featured Diagrams. Coffee 18:50, 30 August 2005 (UTC)

The problem with diagrams/maps on FPC is with the people, not with the project. Starting a new project to avoid the culture on FPC is a sub-optimal solution. →Raul654 19:01, August 30, 2005 (UTC)

Commons or not

The main page seems to imply that sound files that don't "add significantly" to an article either don't belong at Commons or simply don't exist over there. Who made this distinction of what should or shouldn't be uploaded to Commmons or is it just unintentional? While I tend to concentrate mainly on pronunciation illustrations of article titles, I've also made very illustrative files used in, for example, Swedish phonology and Russian language. Another good examples is the recording of hymns made by Garzo that are used in Aramaic language. All of these are files that are found at Commons.

Is the intention here really that we shouldn't nominate Commons files?

Peter Isotalo 16:18, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

If you're referring to the line that states "Sounds that are striking but do not illustrate an article may in future become featured on the Wikimedia Commons,", I don't believe your interpretation the intended meaning. I think, very much like Wikipedia:Featured pictures, the sounds featured here need to be ones which are encyclopedic. They may be hosted either here on or the commons. If a sound is really striking, but happens not to be encyclopedic in the current context (say, it hasn't been added to any article), it could be nominated for an as-yet-non-existant 'Commons:Featured sounds'. — Asbestos | Talk (RFC) 22:04, 18 September 2005 (UTC)

Potential candidates

To get this page moving, I suggest we start examining sounds and see if we can come up with a list of twenty-or-so sounds which we think could be featured. I haven't yet found a in-wiki way of displaying a list of all sounds, but the dedicated Google searches [1] and [2] probably find the bulk of all sound files. I'll start looking through them, but anyone who wants to post their own list of potentials should do so. — Asbestos | Talk (RFC) 09:11, 21 September 2005 (UTC)

A few potential sounds found in a cursory search of hosted media:
Kennedy berliner.ogg *
Wtk1-fugue2.mid *
Toque-de-angola.ogg *
Violin pizzicato.ogg *
Bassoon-technical-mouthbend.ogg *
Rock beat ride cymbal.ogg *
Harmonics 110x16.ogg *
2step pattern1.oggg *
Killer whale residents broadband.ogg *
These are quite varied, and obviously there are many more sounds that come from each category. I personally don't think we need to worry that we might not be getting the best-of-the-best of all possible sounds: I feel that the main point of this project should be to inspire the uploading of more sounds to Wikipedia, and this can be achieved as much by just getting this project out from underground as by only having A* quality sounds from the get-go. — Asbestos | Talk (RFC) 10:15, 21 September 2005 (UTC)
If we were going to look at featuring the technical basooon samples, I'd suggest we concatenate them. They are seperated to facilitate use inline in the article, and so they could be free of a description voice which would need to be translated for use in other wikipedias. --Gmaxwell 01:52, 23 October 2005 (UTC)
I must admit I'd never heard of the feasibility of Featured Sounds until I searched for it after hearing (see Shepard Tone) - it'd certainly be my first nomination. I'd love to see FS get going, if it was an active project then it'd inspire people to create more recordings, what are we waiting for? --PopUpPirate 23:46, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
The DescenteInfinie.ogg would be much improved if it didnt fade in/out, so that it could be played looped, thus giving a clearer demonstration of its seemingly infinite fall. --Quiddity 21:02, 18 April 2006 (UTC)

Licensing concerns

In some ways the copyright issues related to audio recordings, or at least music, can be even more complex than for other media. For a musical work to be free, the composition itself must be free (the standard for 'copying' doesn't in music doesn't just apply to translations and transcriptions), the lyrics must be free, the transcription used by the performer(s) must be free, and the recording itself must be free.

Of these requirements the transcription is the most difficult. Since new editions of transcriptions are often published, it can be difficult to find free sheet music for a work that is hundreds of years old. Without a copy of an original score it is impossible to tell if a recording was made from the original or from a copyrighted transcription.

There is no equivalent of the 2D artwork Corel case in the world of music, as courts have upheld the copyright of transcriptions in a great many cases.

These conditions are not widely understood by our community. As a result, any recording of music from outside of the project must be regarded with suspicion.--Gmaxwell 02:02, 23 October 2005 (UTC)

FP name change

I didn't know that this project was under construction. A few people at FPC were thinking of renaming it to "featured media candidates" and including sound and video files. See Wikipedia_talk:Featured_picture_candidates#Page_rename for discussion. Broken S 20:55, 17 November 2005 (UTC)

Going live

Any chance of this going live anytime soon? It seems like a great project, but seems to have stalled in the mud. Staxringold 23:01, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

I don't know that we have a critical mass of media yet. --Gmaxwell 00:16, 9 March 2006 (UTC)
Featured Sound would be great at encouraging it tho! --PopUpPirate 00:59, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Sound Format

I feel that since .ogg format compresses the sounds a lot, we should be open to uncompressed sounds also if we are serious about featuring excellent sounds. -Ambuj Saxena (talk) 08:05, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

It's all my fault

You know, this was my idea initially, but I really didn't pursue it seriously enough, mainly because of my very slow internet connection and lack of sound recording equipment. And, as I feel this great responsibility weighing on me, and it's been like a year now, we should really get things started. Let's start with some sort of informal voting procedure for "good sounds" (ala WP:GA) if we don't feel we can pursue "featured sounds" just yet. Seriously, someone just nominate something so we can get started working the issues out.--Pharos 02:01, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, I think Wikipedia:Sound of the day is enough for this category. AQu01rius (User | Talk | Websites)  05:25, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Okay...

I did some layout changes and other tweaks and added an FSC notice at the Community portal. Let's hope we get some nominations. :) --KFP (talk | contribs) 17:38, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Where's the criteria‽

There's no criteria as far as I can see. The problem with featured sounds is that there are so many good ones. Too many good ones. Who's to say which song or sound byte is good or not? I think that a key criteria is that the sound has to have some sort of social significance. Now, this can be left to be interpreted by the voter, but in general, the sound should mean something to the general public, not just being a song they heard on the radio a week ago or the sound of a bird chirping (unless, of course, these two have social significance). └Jared┘┌talk┐  18:09, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

I agree that the criteria aren't very well defined at present. However, I disagree that social significance should be the defining factor; if a sound has historical significance (e.g. the current A Chantar nom) or provides an illustrative aspect to an article which significantly improves its usefulness, then those should be equally good reasons to support. We're unlikely to get nominations for things 'heard on the radio' because they won't be freely licensed; but I see no reason why a high-quality recording of a birdsong (particularly an unusual one, like for example the Lyre bird) shouldn't meet the requirements. --YFB ¿ 18:34, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
As criteria are formalized I might suggest including both 'pure sound files' and 'videos with sound'. The latter could theoretically go into 'featured pictures', but have not been housed there to date. Quality of the recording/sound file should certainly be a factor and then some form of 'significance'. --CBD 21:43, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
I think it would be premature at this point to nominate video files, especially as part of a sound project. Even videos with sound are still dominantly a visual medium. I'm sure we'll find a place for them eventually though, either in FP or in a future spin-off.--Pharos 00:41, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
Yeah, I think when I said social significance, I was a little too specific. I think just significance in general should be taken into account heavily. Of course quality is very important as well. I'm sure there are others. └Jared┘┌talk┐  22:17, 28 January 2007 (UTC)
I'm still not sure what you mean by social significance. I think encyclopedic significance; i.e. adding to the content of the article in more ways than just being a pleasant recording, should be of prime importance.--Pharos 00:41, 29 January 2007 (UTC)
I also snuck in some backdoor criteria in the first two paragraphs of the front side of this page, back when I first created it in 2005.--Pharos 00:41, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Featured spoken article

Can we nominate spoken articles for to be featured under this project? Or should that have its own list? Remember 20:52, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

No, Spoken Wikipedia is totally text-derived, so it wouldn't make sense to feature it alongside musical performances or field recordings. See Wikipedia:Featured sound criteria. Perhaps there should be some way to recognize quality Spoken Wikipedia recordings, but I think that would fall outside of the context of the featured content system (or who knows? in future, the inclusion of a quality Spoken Wikipedia recording may be a standard part of the FAC process). On a related topic, I think many Spoken Wikipedia articles may benefit from the splicing in of featured sounds or other quality recordings. And in future, as the sophistication of our recordings improve, Spoken Wikipedia folks may be able to help us if there's a move toward including "audio captions".--Pharos 04:44, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

More noms please

Now that Featured articles is live, we need to start populating it. I feel personally incompetent to nominate classical music (which constitutes the majority of our recorded pieces), and so I've tried for something in a different direction. I'm sure everyone has there favorite pieces; now is the time to figure out how we will judge different manners of recordings. Don't be shy! We're hardly overwhelmed at the moment.--Pharos 06:43, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Media_of_the_day -- Jeandré, 2007-02-14t09:50z

Change to 7 day nom period

This page's format was originally taken from WP:FPC in 2005, which at that time had moved to a 14 day nom period, doubling its traditional 7 day period. This proved a temporary fad, and WP:FPC is now back at 7 days. I suggest we follow suit.--Pharos 19:29, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

  • I agree. The seven day period works at FPC and I think it would work here as well. --KFP (talk | contribs) 20:15, 16 February 2007 (UTC)
    • That's assuming the number of votes will be sufficient after 7 days. 14 days would be fine if nominations weren't getting enough votes, in my opinion. --Tewy 00:52, 17 February 2007 (UTC)
      • Well, considering (1) that the current format is a historical accident derived from when I created the test page in 2005, and (2) that so far, the noms have been getting sufficient response, I think I'm going to move to a 7 day nom period in the interest of letting the project progress. If participation declines in future, we can always go back to a longer nom period.--Pharos 17:43, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

So I don't know where this "should" go, so I'm putting it here

Does any one have a record of 4′33″? It is composer's John Cage's musical masterpeice where he doesn't play anything for 4 minutes and 33 seconds. A good recording should have the backsounds audible, the rolling and twisting of musical programs, the polite coughs, the snickering of the audience etc. etc. as the peice focuses on the audience's addition to music. A little avant garde yes, but could be a fine FSC. Zidel333 02:45, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure such a recording could be under a free license, since it was first performed in 1952. Featured sounds must be under a free license. Mak (talk) 02:51, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
That would be the issue, albiet humorous, of getting this recording. Could be a sound bite/musical sample of sorts, like what is put on musician's articles. Zidel333 03:00, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
Ugh. How I detest avant garde. bibliomaniac15 03:01, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
Apparently there have been successful lawsuits on this issue. You cannot have a recording of 4'33" without it being a derivative work. You could make a fair use sampling of a recording, but there would be no difference legally between a clip of Frank Zappa's recording or a Wikipedians, and neither could be a featured sound. Cheers, Mak (talk) 03:03, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
Wow, I have to say I'm shocked that anything like this could be enforced in any way (even if it was an out-of-court settlement). If a silent musical piece can be copyrighted, I'm starting to wonder if anything really can fall under Template:PD-ineligible, at least within the current enforcement system. Can I have dibs on the odorless perfume? It's just called "Eau".--Pharos 03:25, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Process is broken

Hey. I let this go for a couple of days to see if it would be caught. The file is fair use and has been tagged that way since before the FSC. You can't feature fair use audio. It looks like makwik eventually caught it, but the process needs to work better. FPC would not have let this happen. Should we merge this process back into FPC so the works can get the attention of a broader audience? --Gmaxwell 02:47, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

  • I disagree that the process is "broken". It has not featured anything fair use and it has never come at all close to doing so; folks who were opposed to that nom (everyone but the nominator), probably just didn't bother looking too carefully into something they opposed anyway. A flaw, true, but not a tragic flaw. I'm sorry I didn't get a chance to look at that nom myself, but noone's perfect. Also, this project cannot be "merged back" into FPC because it was never part of FPC.--Pharos 03:08, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
    • "this project cannot be "merged back" into FPC because it was never part of FPC" Oh come on. In any case, my point is that the nomination wouldn't have last more than an hour on FPC, we're suffering with too narrow an audience here. That needs to improve. Suggestions? --Gmaxwell 03:30, 1 March 2007 (UTC)
      • I would disagree with the process being broken, its just there isn't enough of people who are aware of FSCs, and its potential. Can we contact Wikipedia Signpost to make an upcoming article as a way to get FSC's name out? Lastly, when I was listening to the pieces, I was simply judging their musicality, and the recording of it; to be brutally honest the issue of Fair Use never entered my mind, and I think this is similar to other voters. Perhaps we should make a Please Read First list of rules, and suggestions to keep in mind over voting, and suspiciously advertise it on the top of the page to ensure that all pertinent rules are followed. Zidel333 06:38, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Promotions

The Four Seasons should have been promoted a couple of days ago; I would do it myself but as the nominator I'm not sure if that would be kosher. I'll probably be doing a fair bit of nominating here, though not of recordings I've created myself. Would it be OK to promote recordings I've nominated if there's very clear consensus, or should I just wait for others to do it?--Pharos 16:07, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Movies?

Is there a reason why this is restricted to sound? ~ trialsanderrors 20:55, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

The Entertainer

Just noticed the promotion of the recording of "The Entertainer (rag)" on The Signpost. I find the rendition to be very unencyclopedic. It is very far from the score of the piece, and many liberties were taken with the performance. None of this was discussed in the nomination, yet even the performer of the file admits the alterations and had concerns about its suitability as an audio document. If we are going to promote music recordings, there should be some standards involved in how they are performed. First, I would say that if a recording is for an article about a scored work, the performance should follow the score, and only add things that are commonly added as part of an established tradition for the genre. Second, the performing style should be documented and cited. This implies that there should be scholarship that justifies and explains how the score was interpreted. So using Beethoven's fifth symphony as an example, there might be a performance on original instruments using performance practices from the early 19th century, and one on modern instruments using current performance practices. Someone unfamiliar with "The Entertainer" is not going to be aware of the liberties that were taken (tempos variations, added syncopation, added improvisation, altered harmonizations, etc...) This might be perfectly acceptable as a performance, but not as part of an encyclopedia article. It is analogous to digitally retouching a photograph to change the appearance of a portrait that accompanies a biography, adding wrinkles, changing the hair color and straightening crooked teeth. I'm nominating it for removal of featured status, but I hope there can also be discussion of the broader issue of setting some encyclopedic standards for music files. --Samuel Wantman 09:47, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Here's the original nomination. I can speak on behalf of those who aren't familiar enough with the piece to identify any differences. [As such, I agree that there should be a requirement to explicitly state how the recording differs from the original score, original style, etc. We should not prevent a promotion because the piece isn't in the original form (unless it's to the extreme of modification, like a picture edit that adds wrinkles), but we should prevent promotion if there is no explanation as to how it was performed and how it may differ from the original. --Tewy 17:37, 28 March 2007 (UTC)
If this were a commercial release of the Entertainer, it would say "Arranged by IE". Any piece that would say "Arranged by" should not be in an encyclopedia. By not following the score. It violates the principles of "No Original Research", and "Neutral Point of View". So the criteria that is essential is that the performance should follow the score if there is a score. For postings that perform unscored music, like some jazz compositions, it would be appropriate to call it a "Jazz performance of X performed by Y". Even in that case, it should be in an established and easily recognizable jazz style, (Dixieland, Bebop, Big Band, etc...) -- Samuel Wantman 19:01, 28 March 2007 (UTC)
If this were a recording of a recently arranged version, I think that it might require a license to publish and thus would be un-free. Better to stay with a pre-1923 score. --Iamunknown 05:19, 31 March 2007 (UTC)


Here's how the recording differs from the original score:

  • The playing style is based on stride piano.
  • It's given a kind of swing feel, where the time signature is sort of changed from 4/4 to 12/4 (or 2/4 to 6/4) (more details of the technique here)
  • The tempo is fast. The score says "Not fast".
  • The tempo varies throughout the song
  • In the 2nd strand (part "B"), some of the notes are played an octave lower
  • There are added improvisations and embellishments throughout.
  • It's similar to how John Roache arranged his performance of Maple Leaf Rag (see here) --IE 17:58, 2 April 2007 (UTC)

Non-Admins

Can non-admin established contributers close these discussions? Thanks! Greeves (talk • contribs • reviews) 20:01, 21 April 2007 (UTC)

Yes, certainly. --KFP (talk | contribs) 20:07, 21 April 2007 (UTC)

It doesn't appear to lead to the reasons it was demoted for (some of which may be above here. Tony 11:34, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

I've proposed a new version of the existing criteria for implementation after a week or so to form consensus. Comments by reviewers from this room would be welcome. Tony 02:28, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Possible candidate

I thought this might make a good candidate. Remember 17:48, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

backlog

There's one at the moment. Who normally clears the queue? Tony 00:03, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

Can somebody please clear up the promotions? I'd do it myself, but almost all the nominations now on this page are either mine, or for files that I've contributed to, so I don't think it's fair for me to promote. Borisblue 18:38, 15 August 2007 (UTC)
True; that would be a conflict of interest, as you imply. We don't want to repeat the CoI that Raul goes in for at FAC by nominating articles himself, and making judgemental comments on nomination pages. Later: that was a little ungenerous of me.
I wonder whether one or two people would like to volunteer to do this task. It's hardly onerous. Volunteers would have to be very cirumspect in their reviews, or not review at all. Perhaps I should raise this at FAC ... Tony 01:07, 16 August 2007 (UTC)
I generally have my hands full with FPC, though I may pop in on a monthly basis. The only way to feasibly attract closers is to have a significantly greater volume. MER-C 11:13, 16 August 2007 (UTC)

Copyrights of nature recordings

I'm not sure where this question should go, so I'm putting it here.)

It seems to me that a recording of nature sounds (birdsongs, crickets chirping, a thunderstorm) would not be eligible for copyright. After all, birds and crickets can't hold copyrights for their creations, and the recording person is not producing creative content -- he's just recording sounds he did not create. I know that "sweat of the brow" does not make a work copyrightable, so the fact that it took work and patience and expensive equipment to record a rare birdsong shouldn't matter. Couldn't be consider most nature recordings to be ineligible for copyright, unless there's some indication that a person had a hand in creating the sounds in some way? – Quadell (talk) (random) 17:55, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

IANAL, but it would be my guess that it would be eligible for copyright, for similar reasons as a photograph of a PD sculpture can be copyrighted to the photographer. The photographer has to make decisions about camera placement, lighting, etc. The person creating the audio recording has to make decisions about microphone selection and placement, and choosing an appropriate time to make the recording. They may also do post-processing, which may add more of a copyright claim. I'm just making a guess, though, so I welcome being corrected. As a sound engineer, I would be interested to know the answer. kmccoy (talk) 02:56, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
Maybe WP:MCQ is the best place to pose this question. Borisblue 15:33, 25 August 2007 (UTC)

New recordings

Just so everyone knows, last week, I convinced a music professor to release about 100 professional recordings of classical music. I think a number of them should be featured sounds. See the recent additions at the bottom of Wikipedia:sound/list Raul654 01:54, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

But is a recording of someone else's performance up to the recorder to release? Secretlondon 06:17, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

Signpost Dispatch article on FSC

Suddenly a gap needs urgent filling in the weekly Signpost Dispatch section. I've volunteered to write an article on Featured Sounds, and it will have to be done within a day. I'll post a link here to the draft when it's done, so contributors can give prompt feedback.

Does anyone have a speech or animal sound worth nominating? There are two musical performances at the moment, and it would be nice to have a greater range for the large number of visitors that will result from the article. Tony (talk) 06:19, 27 May 2008 (UTC)

OK, the draft is complete. Please offer feedback soon, since publication is due in about a day's time. Tony (talk) 04:45, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Hey hold on a minute

When Johnny came marching home. It was here for a week, and now supposedly promoted by Milk's Favourite Cookie. No way. That's far too quick; I didn't even get a chance to review it. BRING IT BACK, PLEASE. This task is helped by the fact that MFC has goofed technically in the promotion. Tony (talk) 01:12, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

The promotion will HAVE to be undone. The rule about at least FOUR votes was not met; there were three. This incident shows that the instructions are sorely in need of updating if people are suddenly going to use them to absolutely minimise the time available for reviewing. It's far shorter than for featured lists, and FAs, in a busy room with prompt reviews, take much longer. Until now, nominations have been here for longer than a month.
I propose that the minimum be two weeks, given the paucity of reviewers, and that nominators' votes not be counted: that's silly, because two conominators can come in and form half the votes necessary. Wrong. Unless there are cogent objections, I'm make the change in a few days' time. Tony (talk) 01:45, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
Proposal might be that there be at least three supports, not counting nominator(s) supports, and general consensus. Any disagreement on that? Tony (talk) 02:39, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
Um, I was kind of surprised by the promotion when it came, but even more surprised to see these vehement objections posted without a heads-up. DurovaCharge! 03:52, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
What does "heads up" mean? :-) Tony (talk) 04:31, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
A heads up would have been the courtesy of informing me you had objections, rather than contacting other people and then altering the nomination itself. Featured sounds are an undermanned area; I've made efforts to bring more life into it by creating the steeplechase award, conominating with a couple of people, and posting a request for reviewers to the community bulletin board. Although I don't recall any previous conflict between the two of us, it was necessary to reply to your vote and necessary to correct a few factual mistakes: for instance, the mistaken assertion that the recording was not used in any articles when it was actually used in three articles. If your concerns had been phrased as questions rather than as objections then I could have addressed them without the appearance of a confrontation, which is what some visitors are likely to take away from the exchange. I don't like the double bind: by claiming information was not linked that actually was linked (etc.) that compels me to respond, point by point, that it was. Yet what I'd really rather have than one successful candidacy is to create a positive environment here. FSC is music: it's supposed to be fun. I'd like to see this corner of Wikipedia develop a nice harmonious group of regulars so that one candidacy doesn't have to remain open for a month to get the minimum responses. That's a lot less likely to happen when it looks like we're locking horns. I'm a bit surprised (and tired), so how about this? Let's mutually revert both of our posts since the FSC reopened and start fresh. DurovaCharge! 05:09, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
Tony, I hope you're planning to work your magic on the instructions here? Should MFC have closed the nomination when he supported it? I don't believe that happens in other processes. SandyGeorgia (Talk) 15:14, 27 June 2008 (UTC)
  • I don't regard my posting as being discourteous. I did inform you I had objections, right on the page: how else? Whom else did I contact? If you're referring to this section, it concerns a breach of the rules. It was the info page at the Commons] where I saw the bit about no links. That was my mistake. I don't usually word my objections as questions. You're the one constructing this as conflict, and it's your problem if you think responding to reviewers' objections is "a confrontation". Revert my post? Not likely. Tony (talk) 06:12, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
    • Well it certainly is odd. As you can probably imagine, I treated the closure as a pleasant surprise and wasn't aware you were posting objections to the closure. I've run about a hundred featured content candidacies of various sorts, and the only one before this where editors objected to an early closure led not to an automatic delisting and reopened candidacy but to a delisting nomination, which (if memory serves) I received a courtesy invitation to join. Of course every featured content type runs its own nominations a little differently. What I'm suggesting is that it doesn't look particularly good for either of us or for FSC to progress in this way. I'll be going to bed very soon (it's late in my part of the world). Do suggest you give my reply a careful look: your oppose rationale appears to have been written in some haste, without a complete review of linked nomination elements, and a good portion of the objection is addressed by technological limitations: flat disc records had only just come into existence in a market that was dominated by wax cylinders, and steady 72RPM hadn't been developed yet. DurovaCharge! 06:39, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
    • I wish you'd read my subsequent posting there. Can we move on from the no-link issue, which I've explained arose because I looked at the Commons info page by mistake. The musical performance (and the technical quality of the recording) are so bad that I'm suggesting that only a very strong historical-importance argument would overbalance them in the decision. Tony (talk) 07:08, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

(outdent) Yes, we've moved on from that issue. My most recent post referred to other links that your comments demonstrated you had also missed. Those are outlined in my responses at the nomination page. To summarize:

  1. You state that lyrics ideally should be in article space, and say you were unable to find them. Lyrics are already in article space in the article about the song, which has a section header specifically for lyrics.
  2. You express a doubt that Emile Berliner invented the flat disc phonograph and assert that the claim is unlinked. Actually his biography, which is linked, states that fact quite prominently. He obtained the patent in 1897 and his right to the invention is uncontested.
  3. You ask where certain recording data comes from, which comes from the source site that is linked from the image file page.

Allow me to also point out that your objections have also misrepresented or misinterpreted several FSC standards. Here you assert that the nomination had been open only one or two days when it had actually been open for eight (which was sufficient for closure) and at the same time you proposed that nominator votes shouldn't count toward the closing tally, although nominator votes actually specifically do count. Your oppose rationale omitted the where they are recoverable clause of criterion 5iii.

Additionally, a substantial portion of your original objection was based upon an assumption that the variances in pitch and tempo were performance flaws, although it had already been explained in the nomination how these were the natural outcomes of 1898 technological limitations. When these elements were re-explained you shifted to other esthetic complaints.

With this many basic factual errors all tending in the same direction and all pursued aggressively, it does give the appearance of an attempt to prejudice the candidacy. That may not be your intention but that is what it looks like. Your objections have contained a total of ten factual errors: three missed article appearances, three separate complaints that claimed information was not linked although it was, three misread FSC standards, and a series of misunderstandings based upon the recording speed. Surely, in fairness, you must concede that the result is off-putting to other volunteers. DurovaCharge! 19:41, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

  • Oh deary me: you're misreading a lot of my comments. Where, exactly, do I assert a "doubt that Emile Berliner invented the flat disc phonograph"? And no, I said the nomination had been moved to the "over seven days" section and remained there for only a day or two. Please read my text properly. You assert these 10 factual errors, but I suggest you calm down and look at the facts clearly. Thank you for a few of your explanations above: that is all that was required. But the fact remains that the musical performance is execrable. My comments about pitch and tempo were not reliant on changes in the speed of the disc. I sustain my oppose. Tony (talk) 09:45, 27 June 2008 (UTC)
I've left an olive branch on Durova's talk. Tony (talk) 15:57, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

instructions

Thanks, Sandy—yes, I was bold and made the changes discussed above, since there were ?two supports and no objections. Seven to 14 days, and three Supports not counting the nominator's. I think the closer should not add a declaration: potential conflict of interest! That may need to be spelt out, if people agree.

Does anyone disagree with the changes thus far? Tony (talk) 16:00, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

PS See above the discussion; we now don't have enough reviewers—certainly not enough prompt ones—to sustain the seven-day nom period. Tony (talk) 16:03, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

We do not have enough people to exclude a reviewer from promoting, just use common sense. Zginder 2008-07-10T20:51Z (UTC)

Change a criterion?

I added a request to change a criterion here, please make all comments there. Zginder 2008-07-13T01:16Z (UTC)

Priming the pump

To try and kick-start this project a bit more, I'm going to nominate a new FS every couple days. Please join in - it's going to look odd if all of them end up being my noms =) Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 09:54, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Slow down a little bit we can not handle the noms quick enough. Zginder 2008-08-24T03:22Z (UTC)

Timescale

While I'd like to keep letting things run past the limit if it's not been opposed, I don't think the 14 days is necessary any more. What does everyone think of 10 days? Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 13:53, 25 August 2008 (UTC)

Pronunications

Gerard Meijssen makes an interesting point about correct pronunciation and its encyclopedic value at his blog.[3] The reasons are worth consideration at featured sound candidacies. DurovaCharge! 09:37, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

War of the Worlds

Is this in the PD? [4] It is after 1923, but was it ever copyrighted? Is it covered under state laws? Zginder 2008-08-27T21:45Z (UTC)

I wouldn't trust hosting at IA as any assurance that copyright has lapsed. Quite a few of their files seem to me that they're likely under copyright, and the site admins haven't caught up with backlog. DurovaCharge! 21:56, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

10 days.

I asked about this before, but no-one commented. I think it would be expedient, now that we have more voters, to reduce the minimum time from 14 days to 10. We are a new project, so let's keep it as a "minimum" for now, so that things can set a bit if there isn't yet a quorum, but there aren't opposes.

At some point we should also increase the number of votes to four, but I'd rather wait until this has been running with good through-put a couple months.

Basically, we are a very immature project, and, while we should definitely have reasonable standards, now is not the time for too many bureaucratic obstacles. We want to keep things friendly and inviting. =) Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 14:37, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Media Restoration

Announcing a new wikiproject for image, video, and audio restoration. FSC contributors and voters who are interested in learning audio restoration are welcome to come join us. Expertise not required--just a good attitude and a willingness to learn. Best regards, DurovaCharge! 06:19, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

It's not a vote, but an exercise in consensus. Tony (talk) 04:11, 30 September 2008 (UTC)
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