NA&EU/JP Bards and non FF14 music.

Hello! Nice to meet you all!

To begin with, please let me explain the nature of this post.

I am Mana Hime from the Japanese server "Shinryu" in the ManaDC. I do translation for players events between JP and NA servers. That is to say that I help with organizing bard performance concerts. With performers from Japan and North America.

We are trying to connect both communities in our love for FF14 and music in general.
However there has been a point of contention between both communities, and I would like to ask about this from a purely official point of view.

In Japan it is very much a taboo to play non FF14 music as it is "technically against the rules." However there no such concern in NA and EU servers. We have been told many times that the GMs do not care about what songs are played. And I am wondering whether there has ever been a GM or administrator who stated this, or if it is simply assumed from bards not being banned after having played so much in big cities such as Limsa.

I do not wish to start a debate on this topic as I personally understand both opinion for or against this limitation. But I am curious is that has ever been an official response that reflected the general opinion of NA/EU players.

Thank you very much for your attention, I look forward to learning more about this topic.

Mana Hime

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Originally Posted by ManaEterna

Hello! Nice to meet you all!

To begin with, please let me explain the nature of this post.

I am Mana Hime from the Japanese server "Shinryu" in the ManaDC. I do translation for players events between JP and NA servers. That is to say that I help with organizing bard performance concerts. With performers from Japan and North America.

We are trying to connect both communities in our love for FF14 and music in general.
However there has been a point of contention between both communities, and I would like to ask about this from a purely official point of view.

In Japan it is very much a taboo to play non FF14 music as it is "technically against the rules." However there no such concern in NA and EU servers. We have been told many times that the GMs do not care about what songs are played. And I am wondering whether there has ever been a GM or administrator who stated this, or if it is simply assumed from bards not being banned after having played so much in big cities such as Limsa.

I do not wish to start a debate on this topic as I personally understand both opinion for or against this limitation. But I am curious is that has ever been an official response that reflected the general opinion of NA/EU players.

Thank you very much for your attention, I look forward to learning more about this topic.

Mana Hime

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It is any Music with a copyright on that is technically not permitted to play on the FFXIV platform, so if you want to play Bach or Mozart, Beethoven and others, then you should fele free to or own compositions, that has no copyrights or claims, feel free to.

I've seen the stance of "Don't post videos of you playing copyrighted music online and you won't get in trouble." thrown around too, from friends that regularly bard. Not sure where it originated from but that's the logic I've been hearing.

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Originally Posted by LianaThorne

I've seen the stance of "Don't post videos of you playing copyrighted music online and you won't get in trouble." thrown around too, from friends that regularly bard. Not sure where it originated from but that's the logic I've been hearing.

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It's quite fascinating to me. I've heard people throw claims like that, or "it's fine GMs don't care."
But I can't seem to find anything official on this. Even though one would expect that many questions were asked about this topic.
Or maybe it is just that no one really bothered with this in NA/EU to begin with?

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Originally Posted by Themarvin

It is any Music with a copyright on that is technically not permitted to play on the FFXIV platform, so if you want to play Bach or Mozart, Beethoven and others, then you should fele free to or own compositions, that has no copyrights or claims, feel free to.

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I'm quite curious about this point too.
I've seen people say that public domain is OK. But the text that you agree too when you unlock the bard performance system says:

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When using the performance actions, you are strictly prohibited from performing the music of any third parties. You may record and upload your performance and hereby agree to license such recordings to us for use by Square Enix or others in accodance with the terms of the 'FINAL FANTASY XIV Material Usage License".

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Does this mean that public domain is not concidered third party?

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Does this mean that public domain is not concidered third party?

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My understanding is that if a piece of music has fallen out of copyright and is now public domain, performances of that music as still subject to copyright - so if you play Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star SE would own the copyright to any recordings of that performance.

From my EU perspective, I like it to port into any big city and get Rick rolled, hearing any Anime opening or all other kind of music.
I often wait there and listen to it a bit until i figure out what song they are playing.

About the "against the rules" part I think they mostly think about it like about the 3rd party tools.
Dont talk about it and you should be fine.

No one is reporting them for playing copyright music because no one really cares and many people in the EU dont like the copyright system and how music lables abuse/uses it.


The part I personally dont like about the performences is that a lot of musicians using 3rd party tools to let them play the music without a mistake.
But they dont gain anything from doing it so I dont mind it.

Under the terms that Square posted in their article from February 2019, they posted a link to the 'unacceptable behaviors' that a player can be banned for in the game. That said, here is the link: https://support.na.square-enix.com/f...6&id=5382&la=1

It says nothing about non-FFXIV music being played by Bards as a 'bannable offense'.

However, they also seem to take action against players outside of the game, as we saw last year with regards to Twitch streaming. I don't believe that their 'long arm of the law' should extend that far and even have Twitch/Amazon support it, but that's another conversation.

So really, it just seems that Square is going to take action how they see fit and do whatever they want to do. They've even protected that action with a specific paragraph in the link I provided:

"The following list identifies some of the activities that are prohibited in, or in connection with Final Fantasy XIV and other Square Enix services. This list provides general guidelines and is not exhaustive. When in doubt, Square Enix urges its players to err on the side of caution and to treat other players with civility and respect. Square Enix reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to (i) determine which activities are prohibited or violate Square Enix’s policies or terms of use, (ii) enforce such policies and terms of use, and (iii) revise this list."

So as far as playing a song - yeah, you can but keep in mind you can be penalized for it, whether you play it in game, and/or post the video of you doing it online. Either way, they can take action against your account, or choose not to take action. They appear to have given GMs the ability to be objective, as the article also stated that, in this place: https://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodes...216f5aef769c60 and its given them free reign to enforce or not.

Their rules are basically 'clear as mud' because they can do whatever they want and get away with it as the game owner. Once they are approached by an interested third party, such as someone who may own rights to a song, then to protect that company from litigation, they have to act upon it.

On NA servers at least, you are more likely to be suspended because you sit and spam some obnoxious emote for an hour straight, filling up the chat box. Yeah, it's annoying, turn that crap off. :P

You are allowed to perform your own compositions or compositions in the public domain. On top of that, the material usage license explicitly allows you to perform ff14 music (with exceptions to Answers, Dragonsong, Revolutions and their rearrangements).

Now, you are really unlikely to get in trouble for performing copyrighted songs, unless you subsequently upload it to a video hosting platform or stream it, but the possibility is there.

This is a long blog post but explains the copyrights surrounding this really well.
https://geeklawjournal.wordpress.com...forming-music/

To my knowledge no one has been banned for playing copyrighted songs on any NA/EU server. It is possible that someone was punished for playing them and simply decided to quietly accept it. But given how vocal the NA portion of the community tends to be, I find that very unlikely to be the norm. The community would have been made aware in some fashion and would have raised a stink about it almost immediately. Likewise, I struggle to imagine very many in the NA community even know the developers have a rule against 3rd party music. So in that sense it's unlikely that anyone is reporting them to begin with.

I would imagine that a performance in game using the in game bard instruments would be fine because you aren't playing an exact copy of the music. It would be more like a tribute band or a cover.

I think their official stance is that it's against the rules, but it's just that it's unlikely you'd get in trouble for it. People use the same excuse for things like parsers, and think it's fine as long as you don't say you're doing it in game. GMs mostly seem to use chat logs to take action, so unless they were there live for the performance or there was a video it might be hard for them to confirm something actionable happened.

Also, GMs don't know every song or how close it has to sound to be illegal, so unless a copyright holder took legal action against SE to stop their songs from being played in the game they probably wouldn't have a good idea of what they need to be looking for. Like, I could probably play a little bit of "Axel F" but it's not going to be a perfect rendition and definitely not the whole song, so how many notes would I have to play for it to be something they needed to ban me for? It's not really worth the GMs time to try and figure that out unless SE is being sued.

Just keep in mind, that it is certainly not the players that make the rules.. though it is not exactly a grey area, they should do something about the botting bands for an instance.

The rule about copyrighted music is just SE covering their behind so that if a music label complains SE can say "well we're not permitting it" to avoid a messy legal situation.

Sure you could get reported for playing copyrighted music but I doubt most players would even think of reporting it given it doesn't actually cause them any problems. You can turn performance audio off if you don't like it. I am also inclined it might be difficult for GMs to see if the music is copyrighted unless they see it live and recognise or are told what the song is. Unless their logs can easily play back music that has already been played, it might be too much work for them to investigate.

I think it has to do with different country's laws pertaining to copyrighted music.

From what little I know, Japan has rather strict laws regarding it. I cannot say for the EU, but in NA, it is a common practice, with 'cover bands' and the like. As long as the artist is credited if you are making a profit off of it and pay the artist or composer a royalty, it is fine. If there is no profit made US law states: Music compositions do not require permission in order to use them.

However, if you decide to use somebody else’s work for commercial purposes, you must credit them and pay them for it. To pay to use somebody’s composition requires a mechanical license, which requires that you pay 9.1 cents per copy sold, paid to the owner of the copyright to the composition. (monetization on youtube. etc. counts for this.)

I would just be aware of the composer of each song you play and be ready to credit them as it being their work.

As no bard is getting paid IRL money to play (if they are I am not aware of it, they would then owe such to the composer as stated above.

Japanese law states: The author or composer of a work in question is provided
with the exclusive right (referred to as a “performance right”)
to perform or release the work in question to the public.

The concept of “fair use” of art is rather limited in Japan, where copyright is viewed as a rule and not a standard in which some wiggle room exists for society or the courts to interpret whether
such a performance of a musical piece constitutes a public performance requiring payment of royalties to the author or composer of the work in question.

That was all I could find in a timely fashion on the subject regarding Japanese Copyright laws for music. I have been in a cover band before and in the US at least things are pretty lax unless you really screw up somewhere.

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Originally Posted by Themarvin

Just keep in mind, that it is certainly not the players that make the rules.. though it is not exactly a grey area, they should do something about the botting bands for an instance.

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It is my understanding that the Japanese ToS is written in a way that using third party software for the purpose of playing music is a little less explicitly prohibited as opposed to the English one.
Though I have no checked both ToS to verify this information. The Japanese ToS seems to mention specifically tools used to break the game's balance (implying gil farmers, and spammers, and dps parsers and such) whereas the English ToS basically just says "third party software is not permitted"
Maybe I should take a look more specifically.

Edit: Guy below me explained the policy. It is stupid.

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Originally Posted by Puremallace

ALSO if it was against the terms of service they would literally tell you in game when you unlock it to legally protect themselves.

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But they do tell you.
https://i.redd.it/ucja16m43bzz.png

Here's what the Material Usage License tells you

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In relation to any functions within the game which allow you to perform virtual musical instruments (“performance actions”), you are strictly prohibited from performing the music of any third parties. You hereby warrant that your performance using the performance actions will not infringe the rights of any third parties and you shall indemnify us in respect of any breach of such warranty. You may record and share your performance of the FINAL FANTASY XIV original score excluding the songs entitled “Answers”, “Dragonsong” and “Revolutions” or original songs and/or melodies using the performance actions in accordance with this Agreement. Furthermore, by using the performance actions, you acknowledge and consent to any third party recording and sharing of your performance online. You also hereby agree that we may block or otherwise restrict your access to FFXIV if you do not comply with the terms of the licence contained herein.

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Now, SE can choose to not really enforce it at this time, but they could choose to do so at any time.

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Originally Posted by Sove92

But they do tell you.
https://i.redd.it/ucja16m43bzz.png

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That is incredibly silly because why not just put some generic music templates in the game and limit what you are allowed to do. This seriously seems like an ACT policy where literally almost everyone breaks it but if you get caught by someone who cares then they can claim legal immunity.

After seeing this it just killed any urge I had to ever try bard and now I understand why it is such a under played class in FF14 with such silly restrictions.

Most countries that have laws about copyright infringement also tend to put heavy penalties on the infringing parties. Because the game operates in many countries with many different laws SE just makes a blanket prohibition on anything not owned by them to cover themselves in case someone brings a lawsuit. If you were to play some popular song and post it on youtube then you are creating a creative link between the original work and SE which can be used to give SE legal liability in a lawsuit. Works that you own you aren't going to sue over and SE isn't going to sue themselves over their own work and work that is in the public domain doesn't belong to anyone to bring a suit; all other works are considered third party (not owned by you or SE), and thus are considered a legal risk.

While SE is going to try and cover all their legal liability they don't have an interest in punishing their customers and as long as they don't get sued, they won't care. SE also won't post any official response or clarify this in any meaningful way because to do so only weakens their legal defense. But the reality is, few people would care if you did post a performance on youtube and those who did would ask youtube to take it down and the repercussions stop with you and youtube.

At the end of the day, play what you want. If SE doesn't like it you'll get a GM warning and you know to stop; until then, rock on.

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Originally Posted by Raltar

I would imagine that a performance in game using the in game bard instruments would be fine because you aren't playing an exact copy of the music. It would be more like a tribute band or a cover.

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Covers pay royalties

that said, I'm not going to report someone playing bonetrousle; Square can deal with that themselves

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Originally Posted by Penthea

The rule about copyrighted music is just SE covering their behind so that if a music label complains SE can say "well we're not permitting it" to avoid a messy legal situation.

Sure you could get reported for playing copyrighted music but I doubt most players would even think of reporting it given it doesn't actually cause them any problems. You can turn performance audio off if you don't like it. I am also inclined it might be difficult for GMs to see if the music is copyrighted unless they see it live and recognise or are told what the song is. Unless their logs can easily play back music that has already been played, it might be too much work for them to investigate.

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The GMs, though, don't have to check if every song being played is owned by copyright. They stated in the ToS that you can ONLY play FFXIV music, so if you're playing a song that's not a track from this game, it doesn't matter if it's public domain or even your own creation. Under the strictest reading of the rules, it's not allowed.

That being said, though, I do think you're right in that stating that anything that's not a track from this game being banned is a way of deflecting responsibility for copyright infringement over to the person playing the song rather than themselves, and gives them standing to ban a person from the game for playing copywritten music if at some point a lawsuit over it comes up.

Think of it as a legal duty to absolve themselves of any unintended video's, branding, and association with their game and their name.

No one is that stupid to create a musical instrument capability in a game and think that the majority of it's potential users who would highly unlikely be musicians in real life, would do anything but mimic what they know or like.

Most are not songwriters, let alone original.

In fairness, depending on who you ask, there is also a perception that GMs don't give non-JP worlds quite as much thought/attention, and it can be just a bit more lawless out here. For all we know, maybe it'd turn out to be true that JP GMs would be more strict in enforcing the stated restrictions.

It could also be considered that non-JP players simply tend to be a bit more reckless with the rules, as well.

But, these observations come from having no exposure outside of NA worlds, so maybe I'm way off.

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Originally Posted by ManaEterna

Hello! Nice to meet you all!

To begin with, please let me explain the nature of this post.

I am Mana Hime from the Japanese server "Shinryu" in the ManaDC. I do translation for players events between JP and NA servers. That is to say that I help with organizing bard performance concerts. With performers from Japan and North America.

We are trying to connect both communities in our love for FF14 and music in general.
However there has been a point of contention between both communities, and I would like to ask about this from a purely official point of view.

In Japan it is very much a taboo to play non FF14 music as it is "technically against the rules." However there no such concern in NA and EU servers. We have been told many times that the GMs do not care about what songs are played. And I am wondering whether there has ever been a GM or administrator who stated this, or if it is simply assumed from bards not being banned after having played so much in big cities such as Limsa.

I do not wish to start a debate on this topic as I personally understand both opinion for or against this limitation. But I am curious is that has ever been an official response that reflected the general opinion of NA/EU players.

Thank you very much for your attention, I look forward to learning more about this topic.

Mana Hime

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The rule was probably created as a blanket way to protect Square Enix from copyright infringement liability, and gives them the flexibility to enforce if/when necessary.

That said, in Japan I think the majority of the population respects authority and rules. That is why officials can simply request that restaurants close early and people avoid going out unnecessarily (with no legal teeth behind it), and most of the population will comply.

If it is a point of contention between the performers, I wouldn't try to "solve" it because you are basically dealing with a cultural issue and there is no right or wrong answer. It may be best to just leave it to individual performers to decide if they want to participate depending on the songs to be played.

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Originally Posted by wereotter

The GMs, though, don't have to check if every song being played is owned by copyright. They stated in the ToS that you can ONLY play FFXIV music, so if you're playing a song that's not a track from this game, it doesn't matter if it's public domain or even your own creation. Under the strictest reading of the rules, it's not allowed.

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It says you can't play third party music. This could mean that a player could play their own composition given they're not a third party. Assuming the performance of said composition does not breach a contract with a label, if the player has a contract with one.

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Originally Posted by wereotter

That being said, though, I do think you're right in that stating that anything that's not a track from this game being banned is a way of deflecting responsibility for copyright infringement over to the person playing the song rather than themselves, and gives them standing to ban a person from the game for playing copywritten music if at some point a lawsuit over it comes up.

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SE aren't stupid, they knew people would play music from tv shows, well known bands, other games, etc. Players already name their characters after copyrighted characters from other media. The ToS is there to protect SE, and that's exactly what the entry relating to performance does. It puts the responsibility on the player to not perform copyrighted music, not on SE.

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Originally Posted by Catwho

My understanding is that if a piece of music has fallen out of copyright and is now public domain, performances of that music as still subject to copyright - so if you play Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star SE would own the copyright to any recordings of that performance.

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IIRC from my university days*, it's 70 years it has to be free and then it's public domain (at least in the UK). For venues to play music (radio, other recordings) they need a licence. For live band/musician music, another additional licence is needed. This is supposed to ensure the original composers - or their estates - get their dues. SE doesn't pay the licence fees, and probably doesn't want to get sued by Metallica or similar.

However, it's going to be pretty hard for the gms to catch people in the act of playing music, I suspect. It's going to be more of a problem if someone uploads a video of it onto a site like YouTube, however. That's where I can see it could get a bit dicey and a much greater problem if you're playing any composition not in public domain**.


*I have a degree in Pop Music & Recording, did a module on music business, but it was a little over 20 years ago and I've not kept up per se

**and even then, the old spidey sense tells me it's tricksy. Can't put my finger on it exactly at this time of night, but I suspect it's down to performer interpretation? Meh, I wouldn't touch this with a barge pole if I were the performer, anyway.

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Originally Posted by ManaEterna

In Japan it is very much a taboo to play non FF14 music as it is "technically against the rules." However there no such concern in NA and EU servers. We have been told many times that the GMs do not care about what songs are played. And I am wondering whether there has ever been a GM or administrator who stated this, or if it is simply assumed from bards not being banned after having played so much in big cities such as Limsa.

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Okay, so the confusion here might stem from cultural differences resulting in different interpretations of the phrase 'technically against the rules'.

In my experience, the attitude towards this from English-speaking players is that the rule exists to protect Square Enix in the very unusual case that someone were to play a cover of a song in-game, and the original creator were to somehow find out and decide it would be worth their while to attempt to sue Square Enix for it. For the creator to do that would be pretty ridiculous, on the same level as suing someone for playing your song in their own house, really, but just in case, SE would have the legal shield of explicitly stating it was not allowed. What this also means is that they have no reason to actually punish or stop anyone unless they're given a compelling reason to; therefore, as long as you're not streaming or posting videos of people playing music SE doesn't own publically, you're safe, and someone who would choose to report you instead of minding their own business is the bad guy.

Long story short; unless it's being used to bully other players or has an effect on how the game functions, no one cares what you're doing.

On the other hand, I've heard scary things about the Japanese-speaking side of the community bullying people to extreme levels if it came to light they were breaking the rules about things like this; is there any truth to that?

As far as I can tell, the rule about playing non-FF music is pretty much just a formality. The powers in the game that be don't really seem to mind. I've seen multiple bard groups doing covers of all kinds of songs to big crowds in Limsa, and I don't think any ill has befallen them in terms of in-game sanctions.

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Originally Posted by KayRadley

As far as I can tell, the rule about playing non-FF music is pretty much just a formality. The powers in the game that be don't really seem to mind. I've seen multiple bard groups doing covers of all kinds of songs to big crowds in Limsa, and I don't think any ill has befallen them in terms of in-game sanctions.

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I saw someone performing "Kiss From A Rose" by Seal in Limsa a few weeks back. I chuckled and moved on with my day. I couldn't laugh too much though because I actually like that song. lol Like you said, it's probably just a formality. SE wants to cover all their bases from potential liability.

Even if there was an official statement against it I have a strong feeling that NA / EU would not listen lol . . Just my thought on that.

If anything an official statement might just cause more drama / eyes on the matter, might be better to be like Blizzard with all their copyright infringement in the map systems they have xD (lots and lots).

As for the event it sounds wonderful and was a bit heartwarming to read, so I wish your mission a success :).