@source61 , that's not what Fair Use is. I'm not a lawyer, but I wrote FAQ 61 to delve deeper into this topic. Ask your lawyer your legal questions. He or she can help you determine your risks. And if you really want to explore Fair Use in particular, just google it.

@rogerdv Hi, Roger, as a music producer and ASCAP member I can tell you that it's illegal to do that. Melodies are copyrighted. The thing you can do is to make a sounda-like song or melody.

@Tom Sloper

I'm not either, just questioning your strict conclusion (without citation or explanation) out of general curiosity for the subject.

As for “that's not what fair use is”, I only spent a couple minutes earlier skimming through the wikipedia article on Fair Use when I read this:

To prevent the private ownership of work that rightfully belongs in the public domain, facts and ideas are not protected by copyright—only their particular expression or fixation merits such protection.

Doesn't seem that much of a stretch to me to say there's become an “idea” of the song “We Are The Champions" as that of being Victorious or of Victory in general.

Pure speculation of course, just curious if you had any particular objections to the idea since you came out so hard on OP I figured you must be an authority on the subject.

source61 said:
I figured you must be an authority on the subject.

No. No more so than you. Rogerdv said: “I would like to be sure that no legal risks are involved” so I said, “Then don't use somebody else's music in your game without permission.”

Want no risk? Don't do something risky. Don't mind risk? Go ahead and do as you please. In regards to the original question, it all comes down to how much risk you're comfortable with.

source61 said:
As for “that's not what fair use is”, I only spent a couple minutes earlier skimming through the wikipedia article on Fair Use when I read this: To prevent the private ownership of work that rightfully belongs in the public domain, facts and ideas are not protected by copyright—only their particular expression or fixation merits such protection. Doesn't seem that much of a stretch to me to say there's become an “idea” of the song “We Are The Champions

I'm no lawyer, but if so i would argue that a musical composition is more than just an idea. It is result of actual work, and thus an an ‘expression', i guess. If somebody publicates this song of somebody else, it refers to both the initial idea behind the composition, but also the work of doing the arrangement, recording it, publishing it. Changing the arrangement to 8bit sounds does not weaken this reference.

However, the point is that it is just logical taking somebody elses music and publishing it without agreement can never be fair. Assuming differently is just disrespect against the creators. It is like saying: ‘Hey, writing that song probably was easy and required no effort or talent. So it’s ok to take it, and put it into my game, or my gameplay video on YT.'

That's not ok. It is stealing somebody elses work.

It totally is ok (but can be still a legal risk) to take that song, change melody, harmony and rhythm, make it something different but being inspired from it. The original composer will likely have no problem, because the ‘idea’ - the real value which lacks legal protection and definition - gets lost in this process of modification. If it does not get lost, the changes are not big enough and a lawsuit can still follow.

It is my impression music business did a good job to protect itself by laws which are indeed fair. They also did good work on distribution of royalties, e.g. they got money for each sold blank tape cassette (or even CD-Roms / USB Sticks AFAIK) from the manufacturer, and composers, lyrics authors, arrangers, interprets get their estimated part of that.
So, Brian May can lean back and relax, knowing his grand kids will still get good money from the work he did.

But it also means there are a lot of ‘lawyers’ which make all their money from seeking for misuse, then enforcing take down and payment to settle. So, if the game is a success, chances are high they spot it.

The answer is no, it's not legal.

Call Disney if you want the rights to play 10 seconds of a melody from Queen. They will sell you a license.

@Tom Sloper

Got it.

JoeJ said:

source61 said:
As for “that's not what fair use is”, I only spent a couple minutes earlier skimming through the wikipedia article on Fair Use when I read this: To prevent the private ownership of work that rightfully belongs in the public domain, facts and ideas are not protected by copyright—only their particular expression or fixation merits such protection. Doesn't seem that much of a stretch to me to say there's become an “idea” of the song “We Are The Champions

I'm no lawyer, but if so i would argue that a musical composition is more than just an idea. It is result of actual work, and thus an an ‘expression', i guess. If somebody publicates this song of somebody else, it refers to both the initial idea behind the composition, but also the work of doing the arrangement, recording it, publishing it. Changing the arrangement to 8bit sounds does not weaken this reference.

I get your point, but I think likewise certain icon sounds or tunes are so strongly associated with a certain idea or symbol, for instance the “Eye Of The Tiger" for the idea of “preparing for a match”, that the music is no longer just a piece of music, it's become a symbol of an idea.
Does that mean anyone can freely rip the song off, of course not, I'm just suggesting there might be a purely common sense argument, whether it would translate into law or not, for Fair Use of a song or melody (which is basically the song stripped of all its details and exactness) that clearly represents a pop-culture idea if used contextually and appropriately as a symbol rather than as a song.

Obviously this isn't legal advice though, just an argument.

However, the point is that it is just logical taking somebody elses music and publishing it without agreement can never be fair. Assuming differently is just disrespect against the creators. It is like saying: ‘Hey, writing that song probably was easy and required no effort or talent. So it’s ok to take it, and put it into my game, or my gameplay video on YT.'

That's not ok. It is stealing somebody elses work.

Personally I think it depends on how it's done. There can be a thin line between ripping someone off and admiring, being inspired, or copying the idea of something for the sake of making a point (e.g. satire), and I think it's all a matter of how you thread that line.

It is my impression music business did a good job to protect itself by laws which are indeed fair. They also did good work on distribution of royalties, e.g. they got money for each sold blank tape cassette (or even CD-Roms / USB Sticks AFAIK) from the manufacturer, and composers, lyrics authors, arrangers, interprets get their estimated part of that.
So, Brian May can lean back and relax, knowing his grand kids will still get good money from the work he did.

But it also means there are a lot of ‘lawyers’ which make all their money from seeking for misuse, then enforcing take down and payment to settle. So, if the game is a success, chances are high they spot it.

One of the biggest ironies of copyright imo is that only major artists can afford to enforce it.
For instance it's become a big thing within the past months of livestreaming that you're no longer allowed to play copyrighted music on stream due to legal complaints being sent to the livestreaming services.
So has streamers now stopped “ripping off” artists due to “the success” of copyright? Not at all, now they're all just “ripping off” all the artists that can't afford to enforce their copyright, and there's no reason that trend will ever end.
Seems fair?

source61 said:
I get your point, but I think likewise certain icon sounds or tunes are so strongly associated with a certain idea or symbol, for instance the “Eye Of The Tiger

I hear you, but basically you say ‘Some music is strongly associated to a certain symbol, it should be treated as public domain if the use associates the same symbol’, and that's not fair. You propose to penalize artists for being good, while bad artists get away without a loss. My reasoning here is this: Writing a song like Champions / Tiger is probably the highest achievement possible in musical art. Those songs are brilliant work, and only this is why the become ‘iconic’ at all.

I say this because i assume, you - probably not a musician - simply don't know how hard it is to write such a song. So, let's try this:
You come up with a new unique game idea, like Tetris. You work 3 years on it, release it, and everybody loves it. Everybody plays and knows it.
Because your game is iconic there exist thousands of clones, for free, with some advertising. And you don't see a single cent from all the money that is made.
In the meantime i also released a game. Nothing special, just a clone of some game similar to Tetris. Made some good money with that crap.

Same situation, not fair. That's why i say music industry did a got job to protect itself, contrary to us.

source61 said:
One of the biggest ironies of copyright imo is that only major artists can afford to enforce it. For instance it's become a big thing within the past months of livestreaming that you're no longer allowed to play copyrighted music on stream due to legal complaints being sent to the livestreaming services. So has streamers now stopped “ripping off” artists due to “the success” of copyright? Not at all, now they're all just “ripping off” all the artists that can't afford to enforce their copyright, and there's no reason that trend will ever end. Seems fair?

Unfortunately, true fairness remains an illusion in practice. :D

source61 said:
So has streamers now stopped “ripping off” artists due to “the success” of copyright? Not at all, now they're all just “ripping off” all the artists that can't afford to enforce their copyright, and there's no reason that trend will ever end. Seems fair?

To respond more seriously, i see another irony here too: The artists which can not afford, usually also have not much value to protect. Because if they had written just one good song, they could afford. For those artists it may be even an advantage to be heard at all. It may help them to build up.

Probably for the same reason the game industry mostly tolerates streaming of gameplay. It's not clear to me if it hurts or helps business on the long run.

Just saying… personally i don't think gameplay streamers do anything useful. But i don't know how much they have to share to the producers of the media they use.

JoeJ said:

source61 said:
I get your point, but I think likewise certain icon sounds or tunes are so strongly associated with a certain idea or symbol, for instance the “Eye Of The Tiger

I hear you, but basically you say ‘Some music is strongly associated to a certain symbol, it should be treated as public domain if the use associates the same symbol’, and that's not fair.

Definitely not, I'm saying there should be exceptions to copyright when appropriate, and there is, it's called Fair Use. If we can't agree on that we really don't have anything to talk about, you clearly support copyright unconditionally and I don't, moving on.