IF TUNECORE IS SO GREAT, EXPLAIN THIS THEN!.....Tunecore is a Scam!
AUTHOR: anonymous - (United States of America)
SUBMITTED: Sunday, April 25, 2010
Victim#1
TuneCore is a scam - they owe me $28,000 in royalties and have not paid one penny. Arrogant enough to reply 'If you want to file a lawsuit.. go ahead' because they know i will have to travel from CA to NY multiple times to appear in court, etc. For more details check the tunecore forums, I am posting the entire discussion there. Just to notify everyone that TuneCore has performed a breach of contract. I am owed $28,000 in royalties - and they have not paid a single cent. It is more than 17 days since the issue was supposed to be 'fixed'. Their response - "If you want to file a lawsuit, go ahead, we cannot stop you" Of course, TuneCore is out to waste my time and money by having to file a lawsuit against them in NY, but I have to do this and spread the message. If anyone is serious about their music, do not do business with TuneCore. If you are an indie artist making $20 a month, they will pay you on time, but the minute you get higher sales (because of marketing, promotion, etc) their system has 'glitches'.
TuneCore is a scam - they owe me $28,000 in royalties and have not paid one penny. Arrogant enough to reply 'If you want to file a lawsuit.. go ahead' because they know i will have to travel from CA to NY multiple times to appear in court, etc. For more details check the tunecore forums, I am posting the entire discussion there. Just to notify everyone that TuneCore has performed a breach of contract. I am owed $28,000 in royalties - and they have not paid a single cent. It is more than 17 days since the issue was supposed to be 'fixed'. Their response - "If you want to file a lawsuit, go ahead, we cannot stop you" Of course, TuneCore is out to waste my time and money by having to file a lawsuit against them in NY, but I have to do this and spread the message. If anyone is serious about their music, do not do business with TuneCore. If you are an indie artist making $20 a month, they will pay you on time, but the minute you get higher sales (because of marketing, promotion, etc) their system has 'glitches'.
Victime#2
They guy above is exactly right. They are scammers and once they see someone start to do well they will just quit talking to you, or worse yet the CEO himself hung up on me because he was ask to point out things in the disclosure. He froze up because he knew he was wrong so just hung up. I will be spreading the word. I signed up to Tunecore last year and because I'm a newbie in music, totally independent and with very little marketing budget I was naive enough to think that I would be able to increase my unexistent audience via Tunecore.
Wrong. Not a problem because my music isn't necessarily very good either but when I tried to remove my songs and my name from Tunecore after realising that I had made a mistake, they cancelled my account but didn't remove my tracks, in fact, they distributed my tracks to a number of other pay sites. My music is available for free from my website and I think it is presumptuous to think that I should be charging money for tracks that are unreleased, unmastered and full of frequency soups and if I ever thought the opposite when I signed up to Tunecore, then I was totally wrong and take it all back. So I've contacted them again to remove my tracks from their site although this time I'm asking for their head office address as I need to do this in writing. In short: it wasn't good for me either. I am fortunate enough to realise this mistake early in my career...
Victim#3
I signed up to Tunecore last year and because I'm a newbie in music, totally independent and with very little marketing budget I was naive enough to think that I would be able to increase my unexistent audience via Tunecore. Wrong. Not a problem because my music isn't necessarily very good either but when I tried to remove my songs and my name from Tunecore after realising that I had made a mistake, they cancelled my account but didn't remove my tracks, in fact, they distributed my tracks to a number of other pay sites.
My music is available for free from my website and I think it is presumptuous to think that I should be charging money for tracks that are unreleased, unmastered and full of frequency soups and if I ever thought the opposite when I signed up to Tunecore, then I was totally wrong and take it all back. So I've contacted them again to remove my tracks from their site although this time I'm asking for their head office address as I need to do this in writing. In short: it wasn't good for me either. I am fortunate enough to realise this mistake early in my career...
Victim#4 tunecore is a f**king scam they will secretly take money out of your payments, the hidden percentage is what i called it the facts will come out soon.
Victim#5 The Part of the Tunecore Business Model that Jeff, doesn't tell you about. While it is true that Tunecore offers a good service, I read that the FBI is going to start monitoring Tunecores accounting processes. Why? Isn't Tunecore a great service? True on all accounts but why does a musician need to use tunecore to put their music on iTunes anyway.
Tunecore doesn't pay a fee to iTunes...or do they. Tunecore pays a fee to iTunes, and other online stores to keep the littleman out. Therefore they can charge a fee. This seems innocent right. I'ts only a mere 9.00 per single and 35 to 50.00 per album. That's where the 7 million in financing went. After doing the math and subtracting all the paypal transfer fees, I am wondering how Tunecore stays in the black. Aahh! The truth is revealed...Now... This is how they do it..aside from there state of the art automated processes . First you sign up.. they don't care what type of music you put on and they don't even check to see if the said music is copyrighted. They do let you check the box saying you agree that selling music that you don't have permission for is illegal. All goes well and believe it or not in less than 3 weeks all your music is in the stores...Wow!... You then every 5 minutes, check all the online stores to see if you moved in chart position or sales rank.
Then 45 days latter you receive your first 30 dollar royalty check. Wow you are really siked and pumped. Another 45 days goes by and now you receive a 300 dollar royalty check. Wow.. This keeps happening for the next few months till finally you are about to hit the $1000 dollar mark and you do.. You log into your account to initiate the paypal transfer. You type in your email..and wait for the next 24 hours to see your cash...but....2 days go by..6 days go by then 2 weeks go by and no money. You are pissed so you email support and no one answers you. There is no phone number but after calling and the 2 hrs of googleing you find the address of tunecore. You then call the attorney general.
The attorney general, connects you to the better business bureau. You get the number. You call and...Someone answer the phone right away...Wow. You think. They must be busy processing payments. They explain to the rep that you want your money in the kindess tone.. He put you on hold..and then a guy named Tai comes on the phone. He tells you that they aren't going to pay you..because you don't have permission to sell your songs that you wrote.And...if you want your money..you need to produce the licenses for your songs. Now you are confused because you wrote all the songs, and registered them with the copyright office.
You are indeed pissed, but since you live in California and they are in New York, you can't strangle them. You yell you scream, but they just laugh. You hang up. Not knowing what to do. You wrote those songs. How can they do this to you you wonder. You call back and try to remain calm. You tell them there must be some mistake. They laugh again and say if you have a problem than go get a lawyer. You hang up, call and think to yourself, I am going to get me a lawyer. You find who you think is a good lawyer and you are confident until he says that he charges $500 dollars and hour. Saddend you call around to find a lower priced lawyer but the fees keep getting higher and higher. YOu only made a little over $1000 dollars. If you hire a lawyer you will receive no money because of the fees they charge. You call Tunecore again..This time you keep getting tossed around. Finally you are transferred to a fellow named Peter. He seems like a good guy.
You explain the situation to him.. he pulls up your account..He tells you that it is illegal for you to sell unlicensed music. Again you argue that it is your music and it is original. YOu ask for the anme and number of the person who says your are stealing music. He blows you off and says you will need an attorney to get that info. YOu think about the lawyers fees and now in your heart you know that you are fighting a losing battle. You are so pissed by this time that you asked speak to the Boss. You are than transfered to the CFO, Gian...He says he ain't gonna pay..You need a lawyer to get your money. You then in the calmest way tell him that it is yours music. And you tell him that you signed up at Tunecore so you want have to deal with lawyers. You thought they were on your side. He then laughs and says, "Buddy, Music isnt about you..It is all about Money and Lawyers." Almost in tears and barely able to speak you threatened to sue them which is a lie. He then yells "don't call here again." And don't you threaten my staff. And slams the phone in your face. **** This is a True story...And this happens to a lot of Tunecore customers. Tunecore will only steal money from those who cannot afford a lawyer.
They know you can't sue because it is too expensive. A record company won't sue them because of the lawyer fees as well. So who keeps the money. Tunecore!!! I am writing this to warn you about this practice. It doesn't matter if you have licenses or not for your songs. If you samples someone, do a cover of a song, you are really not safe. Tunecore is trying lock down the independent artist sector and steal there money because they don't have lawyers or money for them rather.
Tunecore has done this to thousands...and made millions in this shady practice. It is a good service on the outside. But shady on the inside. The Truth Exposed... If this has happened to you or you feel your royalties are a bit low for your efforts, feel free to email me xxxxx@yahoo.com We independents are only strong together..We can file a class action law suit and at least get a court order to audit there books.
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