The decompilation of NSF will stop the NSF distribution as a music format. Although there will be a huge loss of data (instruments, envelopes, timing, etc), this can be the destruction of the NSF format itself.
I don't think that this will be a great add on. It is possible, it is usefull, but at the expense of what?.
Imagine thousands of users of the NSF format removing the files from their sites. Not everyone wants to show his techniques of composition, the originality is lost.
The decompilation of NSF will stop the NSF distribution as a music format.
wat
How about.. no? You speak as if FamiTracker was the only way to produce NSF files. There's still IT2NSF, MCK, ppMCK, Nerdtracker II, SuperNSF, Pornotracker and a bunch more. Just because one of these can "translate" NSF data into its native tracker format doesn't mean it'll kill the NSF format.
Besides even IF it were to kill the NSF format (which it isn't, trust me), what harm can it do? If anything it a) makes FamiTracker more popular, b) lets more people know about various composition techniques and c) doesn't impair NSF export OR intellectual property since artists can still export to NSF and/or make MP3s of their tunes if that's really a problem to them.
Besides, as it's been mentioned time and again in this very thread, MOD2PSG2 is capable of importing SMS VGM files, yet the VGM format is still very much alive and well indeed.
You speak as if FamiTracker was the only way to produce NSF files. There's still IT2NSF, MCK, ppMCK, Nerdtracker II, SuperNSF, Pornotracker and a bunch more. Just because one of these can "translate" NSF data into its native tracker format doesn't mean it'll kill the NSF format.
So?. As I said:
Delek wrote:
Not everyone wants to show his techniques of composition, the originality is lost.
Only one software to decompile a format is enough to let me say all of what I said above. I speak as if Famitracker could be the only way to truly decompile NSF files, not as if Famitracker was the only way to produce NSF files. This is about input, not output.
jrlepage wrote:
Besides even IF it were to kill the NSF format (which it isn't, trust me)
Why better you do not trust me?. :P
jrlepage wrote:
a) makes FamiTracker more popular
To makes Famitracker more popular you can add a lot of things, some of them are good ideas, others not. But all make it more popular.
There are, troyan programs that are very popular, exploits that are very popular. Popularity sometimes do not go hand in hand with the good. Hitler was popular. :P
jrlepage wrote:
b) lets more people know about various composition techniques
This is good or bad?, analyze Tim Follin's songs is awesome, but steal a bass-line and change some notes is something horrible that, trust me, will happen.
jrlepage wrote:
or make MP3s of their tunes if that's really a problem to them.
Yeah, MP3 will replace NSF as a NES Format, that's not right, friend..
jrlepage wrote:
MOD2PSG2 is capable of importing SMS VGM files, yet the VGM format is still very much alive and well indeed.
Are you comparing orange and apples.
Decompile SMS music is not the same as decompile NES music, or decompile SID music.
The NES subculture is, by several orders of magnitude, higher than SMS subculture.
Hovewer, maybe I'm wrong... or maybe you're wrong.
If this is implemented, only time will tell who was right. :P
Not everyone wants to show his techniques of composition, the originality is lost.
I should say, this one is a pretty funny argument. The only way to hide any 'techniques of composition', no matter if it is related to tracking techs or actual composition, is to hide your music from everyone, in any form. If it is available in MP3 or other audio format, all your tricks and techs will be learned by ear, as it was done by millions of people in the whole history of music. If it is available in NSF, there are a lot of ways to analyze the output and reconstruct the sound already. A lot of people doing this for years, actually - look at all these accurate FT covers of music from commerical NES games around. There are also nsf2midi etc tool, any possible FT import can't be radically better than these.
Yeah, the idea of security people are mentioning seems really strange to me.
People plagiarize data from MP3s all the damn time. Yeah you can't really "unmix" sound, but the thief will just steal the whole mix. A more talented thief can even transcribe it (e.g. see jrlepage's excellent Batroll).
NSFs aren't secure at all, only a little bit obfuscated. They're not even obfuscated that well; it's extremely easy to unmix an NSF by muting channels in your player.
People who want to steal your music probably aren't that interested in putting it back into an NSF anyway. The world at large doesn't listen to NSFs, and we've got a strong community to sort out authenticity for the people that do.
I mean, this would simply increase the chances of stealing a melody. If it is easier, then more people are going to do.
Or you think that it's easier do it by ear or to open a NSF in a tracker?.
Because it's easier in the way that $1.01 is worth more than $1.00, and the benefits for people who want to use it for a proper educational purpose are pretty strong.
No I mean the tools we already have for messing with NSFs, editing MP3s, etc. are the $1.00, and an NSF->FTM logger is an extra $0.01 of value to the thief's toolset.
Delek, if someone want just to steal a melody, he won't bother with ears, trackers, or anything. He simply take your song and put it on youtube or something under his name. This often happens in internet with any non-mainstream music, including chip music. You can see many threads about these cases on chip-related forums.
If someone actually going that far that he uses trackers, it is very probably he prefer to make his own music instead of stealing random pieces of other's music.
Also, why someone should want to steal a melody that is available in NSF only? You expect someone to follow easier way, but the easier way would be to just take one of countless FTMs.
Even if someone actually 'steal' a melody, it is not a big deal, because these guys always take something good, and good is always well known, so the lie is discovered very fast. It is even a weird sort of appreciation, if your song is stealed, it means you did something good.
Well, Delek, one thing's for sure; as much as we don't want people plagiarizing our work, I still remember the fact that the NES chiptune scene started off with nothing but NSF rips of copyrighted games (which is also plagiarism since the rippers aren't paying royalties to the music composers).
I, again, have nothing to fear from this (even if my music sounds like crap to others) because I know that there's no such thing as 100% secure coding under any environment. To every lock, there's always a key & to every binary, there's always a method of reversing it back to its original source code.
It's like Facebook users & their attitudes about the internet; if they don't want their friends/the public to know about something retarded they've done, they shouldn't post their retarded deeds on a medium that's easily accessible to anyone. They expect 100% security from an insecure medium.
On top of it, the NSF format, though it's designed to be a music format, it's still a ROM data format realistically, which is only part of the otherwise flawed iNES format that was made the de facto standard in the scene. If it were a more standard & widely recognized music format, there would be a codec under every OS & for every music player (even the XM, MOD & IT formats are more widely recognized than NSFs in this regard).
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Well, Delek, one thing's for sure; as much as we don't want people plagiarizing our work, I still remember the fact that the NES chiptune scene started off with nothing but NSF rips of copyrighted games (which is also plagiarism since the rippers aren't paying royalties to the music composers).
That's true.
TechEmporium wrote:
To every lock, there's always a key & to every binary, there's always a method of reversing it back to its original source code.
WHAT!, hey friend that's not true. There's information that never can be restored.
For example, from a NSF opened in FT you can never obtain the instruments or other tracker specific values.
For some programming languages, you can never re-create some structural data of the program, because the compile process transforms the original code.
You NEVER can get the complete full source code of, for example, a compiled C exe file.
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