It is only "wrong" if you sample and redistribute the original samples without permission. You might consider that a serious software company will properly license any foreign content - that's not for free, usually, but possible.midinut wrote:If by definition you are saying that is wrong, then that makes Spectrasonics, Native Instruments, IK Multimedia, etc. ALL guilty of copyright violations. How can you hold end-users accountable for not copying other peoples samples when software companies do it all the time? I still don't understand the logic behind "it's okay to sample a vintage keyboard but not a Motif."
Regarding the mellotron, I am not really sure about it. There might be license conditions which allow to sample it, the ancillary copyright might also be expired in the meantime - in Europe I think it lasts "only" 50 years.
And after all, the companies who sold the mellotrons are all void now. In the special case of ancillary copyright, which is not necessarily a personal right, but can also belong to a company, this might result in "orphaned" rights - a difficult topic.
After all, the Mellotron is a bad example to conclude from...