Talk:Sita Sings the Blues

Animation
"'Modern silhouette puppetry was also employed in a similar fashion, on plain backgrounds, in the recent animation Princes et princesses by Michel Ocelot.'"

Firstly, this is only recent if you consider late 1980s to be recent. Secondly, while the visual appearance may be similar, Princes et princesses used actual cut-out card (and other materials) on an actual lightbox, whereas in Sita the animation of the shadow puppets appears to be all done on computer, or least is front-lit rather than back-lit (and so is not silhouette animation in its pure sense). Turtleheart (talk) 10:50, 14 October 2008 (UTC)

Copyright issues
Something really, really needs to be written here about the copyright issues that this film is having. Here's what I remember hearing at the WFAC (some details may not be correct): Nina Paley, despite having worked on this film for 6 years, does not have the right to sell it (except in France, which is the only country in the world where those laws are different). This is because of the Annette Hanshaw songs used in the film; although they are all in the public domain, Nina Paley does not own the sync rights which would allow her to insert the songs into a larger work as she has done here (so apparently, there are limits to what you can do with something in the public domain). Buying those sync rights would cost $1 million, money that she does not have and that no-one is willing to give to her. So the film cannot be sold anywhere, cannot be released commercially in theatres or on DVD. Even though audiences love it and it has won some important awards (not to mention it has made quite a bit of publicity for Annette Hanshaw's legacy), it has made Nina Paley broke, and she is strongly considering giving it away for free online since there currently seems no way out. The Free Software Foundation has refused to fight her case because they don't see it as important enough.

It is actually legal to screen the film with two separate soundtracks; one with the Hanshaw songs removed and another soundtrack which would play the Hanshaw songs at the appropriate time. However, it is illegal to screen it with the Hanshaw songs combined with the rest of sounds in a single soundtrack.

That's what I recollect from what I heard. Good sources would of course be needed. I'm just writing this down here before I forget. Esn (talk) 03:45, 17 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Right... this link seems to have some information. Esn (talk) 13:41, 17 November 2008 (UTC)


 * TechDirt also has a post on the subject. I think that that has come to the point that it should be mentioned here. —Preceding unsigned comment added by NeoNorm (talk • contribs) 08:02, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

This trailer here seems to be CC-BY-SA licensed: So, presumably we don't need fair use images here? Haukur (talk) 13:05, 7 January 2009 (UTC)


 * The links above are sources for (tendentious) arguments, not information--or, in any case, the little information they have is carefully selected to bolster the arguments. The first link, in fact, goes merely to Nina Paley's own web site. Paley seems to be fundamentally confused about copyright law (to say nothing of intellectual property ethics). She assumes, for example, that it is the record company (in contradistinction to the lyricist, composer, or publisher) that renews a song's copyright and further assumes that song copyrights were routinely not renewed. In fact, song copyright and the recording copyright are distinctly different things, and song copyrights as a rule were renewed--routinely. (The Henshaw recordings, of course, involve a fair number of different songs originally copyrighted at different times and many different writers.) TheScotch (talk) 11:54, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

copyright section added
I did my best to summarize the infringement of copyright issue that this film is having. Bluerasberry (talk) 18:17, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

Images are CC, are they not?
Considering that the full film has been uploaded to archive.org under a CC license, do we really need "non-free use rationales" for the images in the article? Esn (talk) 23:25, 12 March 2009 (UTC)
 * I've gone ahead and removed the copyright rationales. Esn (talk) 07:25, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Reverted some crap
A user, one User:Num1rockchick, has made some questionable edits to the "controversy" section. Rather, she (I assume) has replaced the entire section with what is pretty clearly a non-neutral and entirely reference-free opinion piece from a conservative Hindu perspective. The user's sole other contribution to Wikipedia as a whole, at the time of this writing, was to add an "f" to the word "art" in the Nina Paley article's introduction. On the subject of sexuality, I recommend to any Hindu who is offended that one looks at the history of sex in India.

You opinion is valued and you are entitled to it, but Wikipedia is an encyclopedia and therefore not the place for it. Please sign up for a blog (you can get one free of charge at a number of places (finding them is left as an exercise for the reader)) if you'd like to share opinions. I have my own opinions on this topic but I will not discuss them further here. :) Eris Discord | Talk 04:32, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

Stub status
Is this article really a stub anymore? It's not really missing any major information. The cast list is complete, plot is complete, controversy/style/copyright are all in... 71.205.206.31 (talk) 02:10, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Controversy Section
This section seems a little biased. It doesn't take into account the way some people in Hindu communities felt as a whole about this piece. It labels Hindu's who have a problem with this piece of art as "Conservative" and takes a quote from a small group (possibly a single person trying to incite hatred against this piece) and uses it order to stereotype a whole. It doesn't take any opinions from any notable Hindus about the way their Religion is represented through this piece and it clearly gives a quote from the author delivering her own opinion about critisisms regarding her work. Something else it ignores is the debate that went on in India around this time over how culturally important epics such as the Mahabharat and the Ramayana are portrayed in western media. Speaking as a Hindu myself, I greatly respect Wikipedia's impartial way of portrying information, and I understand that it is no place for one's personal opinions, but surely this piece can be written in a much better way as to represent an unbiased, worldwide view on the critisisms of the piece without belittling either side...? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.37.28.139 (talk) 23:42, 28 August 2010 (UTC)

I've re-edited what I've left before. If someone has a problem then please discuss here after changing back so we can agree on a fair resolution.

An international note. My Hindu friends love it and so does everyone I know. Unfortunately under rules of the Australian copyright council, artist rights are automatic on creation and expires seventy years later, regardless any attempt to prolong it. Creative commons license is recognised as a waiver of copyright, but recording artist Annette Hanshaw died in 1985 which means it is not suitable for distribution in countries where that ruling holds (eg. Britain) until 2055, even though her rights are long extinct in her home country.Tradimus (talk) 16:20, 30 August 2012 (UTC) Correction, copyright.org.au states it is seventy years after publication for the recording only, but it would still be seventy years after the death of the writer of each individual song.Tradimus (talk) 23:27, 30 August 2012 (UTC) So for example "Am I blue" was written by Harry Akst et al and Harry died 1963, seventy years would be 2033 when rights to the song expires in Australia. I note that screenings may be partly silent.Tradimus (talk) 23:33, 30 August 2012 (UTC)


 * This section was still biased when I came upon (a bit ago). I've tried to make it more neutral, but I'm unable to address the quotation imbalance: Two persons involved in making the video are quoted at some length labeling those who object to it insane, imbalanced, illiberal, violent, and politically extreme, whereas the the other side is quoted much more briefly (calling the video "derogatory"). I'm far from a Hindu myself and have no religious or political objection to the video (I do have some aesthetic reservations, I admit), but it seems to me obvious that a cartoon (and very cartoon-ish), silly, distorted, and polemical depiction of a significant religious epic couldn't possibly sit well with everyone. TheScotch (talk) 13:47, 13 December 2013 (UTC)

no bumpers policy?
can someone insert a brief explanation of what that means? I have no idea. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.85.82.17 (talk) 18:24, 22 November 2011 (UTC)


 * The term is as quoted on her blog, which doesn't help much. However, Bumper (broadcasting) seems to be the relevant term - a short message at the start or end of a broadcast. Shimgray | talk | 18:52, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

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