 |
|
  |
| What happened with CD Baby and Snocap |
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
I learned a hard lesson this year:
Sometimes the best deal for everyone is no deal at all.
In December 2004 Snocap contacted CD Baby about being one of our digital distribution outlets. They were a P2P fingerprinting service to help P2P services track and charge for music.
Since CD Baby has over 2.5 million songs directly from the artists, in full WAV format with clean metadata, they wanted to import our catalog into their tracking system.
After almost two years in ongoing contract negotiations, in August 2006 Snocap completely changed their business plan to what you see today. Now they still wanted our entire digital distribution catalog, but it was to create Flash widget stores on MySpace, which sounded like a great idea, so we said OK.
But there was one crucial hitch with this plan: our two options from Snocap were:
(1) - After delivering our entire catalog, step aside for the artists to deal with Snocap directly
(2) - After delivering our entire catalog, have all changes/additions/deletions administered through CD Baby's account
The downside to #1 was the obvious "tell your 200,000 clients about us, then make them our clients for free, and get out of the way."
The downside to #2 was that artists would have crippled accounts, unable to upload new material, change their pricing, or anything else.
But there's an important lesson learned, in hindsight: At this point we should have walked away, and chosen "neither". We felt screwed either way. But because of two years and thousands of dollars invested into these negotations, we chose option #2. We were assured that #2 wouldn't be so bad, that any audio we sent them would be activated within hours, that we could send through pricing changes, and many other things.
Unfortunately, everything went about as wrong as could be. Artists had to go through a 21-step process to activate their accounts, which left us with thousands of daily confused emails from artists. Furious artists trying to upload their songs into Snocap were wrongly told they can't because CD Baby "owns" their rights.
We had to hire 6 new full-time customer service people just to deal with the thousands of problems. We couldn't fix problems ourselves, only pass them on, because all fixes had to be done by Snocap. A hundred times a day we had to helplessly apologize to our clients.
Every company meeting revolved around Snocap. Every employee had to be trained in the endless FAQ about Snocap. For the last 8 months, the CD Baby office has felt like a Snocap office. All we were doing, all day long, was dealing with Snocap issues.
Then the sales reports came in.
$12,000 total sales for the 8 months they'd been active. Since we keep a 9% cut, that's $1080 for us, total. Ouch.
As a curiosity, I quietly enabled MP3 sales on cdbaby.com, without telling anyone. A "buy MP3" button showing up next to the "buy CD" button.
In 3 weeks, with no announcements, we sold over $110,000 in downloads. Hm.
We decided to do what we should have done in the first place: to choose "no deal" as the best deal for our artists.
We told Snocap we needed completely out of the contract, at any cost. Luckily, they agreed.
By breaking all ties with Snocap, our artists can go directly to Snocap with no conflicts at all, and we can free-up our 24 full-time customer service people to help our clients with other things besides Snocap issues.
We're happy with it, for obvious reasons.
Snocap is happy to have the direct relationships with the artists.
The artists are happy to have full control and one less middle-man.
And I share this tale with no hard feelings, for the few who have asked, "What happened?", and the many more that might recognize themselves in a similar situation, and remember that sometimes the best deal for everyone is no deal at all.
--
Derek Sivers, president, CD Baby
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
You did the right thing Derek, much better to be back to how cdbaby originally was. no more snow blindness
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Can somebody please suggest to Shawn Fanning that it's time for him to find a new sport?
Skiing, perhaps?
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
What? Shawn Fanning do something other than find ways to exploit musicians? It's apparently all he knows. No, wait, the gaming software industry seems in his sights now. :P
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| by
on Monday October 22 2007 @ 05:05PM PDT [ reply | parent ] |
|
|
|
|
Maybe Shawn Fanning is actually a failed artist intent on messing
wth the rest of us.....
Maybe he his sights are on the gaming industry basically because
most of their players are young enough not to know they are being
exploited.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Well I am relieved to read about this in this forum and I hate to add one additional concern whoever signed with SnoCap:
One of their clauses says:
they're allowed to:"..Reproduce and publicly perform any Composition embodied in a Digital Master derived from your Content (including any and all "server" or "ephemeral" copies), it being understood and agreed that we will not be obligated to account and pay mechanical royalties to you, all such sums being included in the wholesale price set by you"
What prevents them to use this huge database to syphon off the underlying ("embodied") compositions, make them available to a third party who likes your song and records it with their band/ artist..., they could even collect a fee for that.... and you (the composer) sees nada....
or did I misunderstand that totally??
The "embodied" compositions clause mentioned above raises a huge red flag to me.
As does the credit card info for address verification.
BS. They can find other ways to verify an address.
I wouldn't do it.
Sad thing is, SnoCap is the only service Myspace features and I sure would love to find a way to sell songs directly via Myspace...
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
You can embed any flash store, like the ones from PayPlay or SoundStation (SoundLoud) on your MySpace page. SnoCap not needed.
I've got SoundStation going on on my page now. Looks better than SnoCap. There is a 5-album limit to each store, hence the two stores. That's the only messy part. (Well, that and you can't directly offer all tracks from uploaded albums as singles - you have to upload them separately as singles. Meaning you have to upload every song twice to have it be part of an album and a single for sale as well. Hopefully they'll get a feature implemented to allow tracks from albums to be sold as singles without a re-upload...)
for reference: www.myspace.com/outout
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| by
on Tuesday October 30 2007 @ 08:23AM PDT [ reply | parent ] |
|
|
|
|
yes - it gives them the right to do whatever they want with your
music without further compensation to you.
Great company - huh?
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
That's a reply to GrooveConnection, correct?!
If SNOCAP does *anything* with my intellectual property without my consent or without due compensation (I know my lawyers won't cringe at that so-called 'user agreement') they'll be bummin'.
And that's a promise, not a threat.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
You can also embed a widget from music blaster. www.blastmymusic.com, we're using it with success
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
This is exactly why I didn't use SnoCap for the band I used to be in "Rite As Reign" because I read the fine print...Now I say to bad that I didn't since the singer got 2 others in the band to kick me out. Good luck is all I can say...
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
You are absolutely right! I read that in their contract also and I put on the breaks immediately.
The sad thing about it is that not everbody will read Snocap's contract all the way through and will sign with them. Then they are screwed. Snocap appears to be in the exploitation game.
I am just glad that many people are reading the contract and can see right through their scheme.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
This concerns me as well. I felt I'd signed up for a partnership of sorts and even though I own the songs and have copy write papers, it wouldn't surprise me to find business doings on the side. Is there any suggestion that unfair sales are occurring? Am I just being paranoid? Whatever, it's not like folks are really out there stealing music...are they?
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
> Is there any suggestion that unfair sales are occurring?
No. Snocap may have bad customer service, but they'd incur the wrath of a million major-label lawyers if they tried to hide even one sale from one client.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
That's what's up. Now how do I, for the sake of a well created relationship get my music on myspace to be sold through cdbaby. Although Snocap offers it, I'm not about company barge ins and am also not familiar with their services, but I am familiar with yours and would like to keep working through your site.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Derek, you are about as first class as they come! I am proud to be a long time CD Baby artist! http://www.charliesouza.com
As for SoSoSnoCap , I like the mini Mystore we can put up on any web page. (Could you get your programmers to build us one attached to CD Baby? with html codes PLEASE!)
Snocap has all of our credit card account numbers and will be hitting ua all up for a fee in a few short months. Not only that, the percentage to the artist is far less than it was through CD Baby.
Another thing snocap did without asking my permission, they added my MyStore to the myspace page of a national act I play with (The New Rascals) I had to get them to take it down and that took a week!
Enough asbout me, have you read my book?
Peace & Love to CD Baby,
Charlie Souza
P.S. Snocap is "Craptastic!"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
CD Baby is a dynasty with in itself, and pretty soon the majors are going to be knocking down your door, if they already aren't! Don't add anyone else to the mix, just adapt and keep doing what you do.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
you people are great and you know your business. I'm thrilled with the ability to download from cdbaby. Great idea. any possibility of downloading individual songs?
You guys and gals are wonderful
dancetime with linda & roland
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Thanks Derek,
I had no idea. You have something great going on here and it works well for artists as well as for cdbaby. I've seen you a few times during seminars, you're a very cool person and I'm very proud to be part of this awesome community/opportunity. We all like to keep things simple and easy!
:)
JVB
Otto's Daughter
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| by
on Monday December 17 2007 @ 04:08PM PST [ reply | parent ] |
|
|
|
|
thats why i fuck with cdbaby!!! they tell it like it is!!! thanks for holding us down
(the artist's) and always keeping us informed. israel ceo buckhouse records
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
I unfortunately didn't receive the email about getting out of snocap. so now now i seem to be unable to get my songs out of there... i can hide the store but i can't sign in to snocap. the orginal user name was 18192-3c7e@cdbaby.net and it doesn't work. does this mean they have my songs forever...?
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Hi, I had same issue after reading this thread. I had no idea about the CD Baby / SNOCAO fiasco. Going to remove my music from Snocap.
If you set it up through MySpace, it looks like you have to get in through the MySpace Manage My Music thing on your profile.
Same login that didn't work going direct to Snocap site. Hope this helps.
Erik J
http://cdbaby.com/cd/seededplanet
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Yea SNOCAP left a bad taste in my mouth when i had a situation that happed with my email account. There was a problem with me accessing it, so i needed to let SNOCAP know because this is the email i used when i signed up with SNOCAP and i got terrible customer service from them. Just letting people know!!
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Dear CD Baby, I thought that the whole Sno-cap affair was a tedious process and a complete waste of time in the end. The work that Derek does with Digital distribution is far superior with his knowledge and genuine dealings with us ( the artists ) and is a good lesson for SNo-cap, if they took the time to see what is going on at CD Baby, they may not have carried on the way they did at My Space.
Keep up the good work Derek, you are the best at it. I have 3 new Albums to add to my account with my 'Brother Goose" album. Will contact you ASAP. Merry Christmas, Lil Goose.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
What concerns me was this statement 'By breaking all ties with Snocap, our artists can go directly to Snocap with no conflicts at all, and we can free-up our 24 full-time customer service people to help our clients with other things besides Snocap issues.'
WRONG. We are entitled to sign up who we want whenever we want - the CD Baby agreement is non exclusive.
I understand your issues - but you should be understanding ours. I would be wrong in any format for CD Baby to restrict the copyright owner in ANY way - that is what the CD baby agreement is? or is it?
tonym
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
> wrong in any format for CD Baby to restrict the copyright owner in ANY way
Exactly, which is why we got out of this deal.
The restriction was on Snocap's side, not ours.
When an artist was submitted to Snocap through CD Baby, it made it hard for them to go direct.
Anyway, this is all past-tense now. The deal is long-dead. We have no affiliation with Snocap in any way.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Good choice .
Snocap are chancers. They want a yearly fee and 50% of artist sales.This kind of deal is ridiculous in the world of mp3 sales where there is no 'physical' product to handle and therefor less overheads, also when there are so many other quality mp3 distributors that offer a no yearly fee service and take a more acceptable cut,i am amazed that anyone goes for this.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
I agree. Something similar just happened to me which showed that I should have followed my instincts. Now it's a lesson well learned. I can move forward for the better.
Kamal
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Well done, Derek. Once again, you have made all the right and rational moves and behaved wisely throughout..Thank you for looking after our interests...
Now, how can I dissociate myself completely from those idiots at Snocap, (which should be renamed Snomoralitysenseorvalues), in my opinion. In other words, I want nothing to do with Snocap..How can I ensure that?
George bolam : InZaneCountry
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Thanks Derek for Righting a Wrong. These guys are in the "business" and care nothing about the artists, like Statue Records they suck too!!
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
yO d-MONEY YOU ARE RIGHT ON THE MARK! I TRUST YOU TO MAKE THE RIGHT MOVES.DERRY SHEPHARD
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Derek, Your'e a true entrepenuer...Genius.
Everybody wins.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
thanx for the honesty.
i am just now reading this.
i never "went for" the sno cap deal...seemed to complicated...a
3rd party tends to add complications....
better for you to expand and deliver the service...all under one
roof, so to speak.
all sounds good & in a flow
blessings
m
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Just more evidence of Derek doing the RIGHT THING. By the way, we still haven't set up with Slow Crap and I never intend to. Did I say that?
Sorry.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
yeah... My band has had big issues with snocap! We have several hundred people saying that they have downloaded tracks from the snocap store, yet we have only received $6.00!!!!
Way to go...
Down with snocap!!!!!
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
I completely agree with your decisions, Derek. You are one of the best things to happen to independent artists.
Sadly, the very last part of the breakup still has not happened - I cannot access either of my SnoCap accounts (that is, they're still the crippled ones) as the supposed Oct 11 changeover has not happened for them. So I am now stuck with a service that has my works, I have no control over them (I want to remove them all) and they have not replied to my email, *AT ALL* in over two months.
And with the rumor that they're trying to sell the company, I think they're deliberately holding on to "assets" to try and sweeten the sale. My lawyer might have to get involved (which, of course, will cost more than I've ever made from digital downloads to date.)
Argh.
But again, Derek, I know that's not you or your excellent company. I'm still 100% thrilled with CDBaby! :)
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Snocap just emailed us last night to say they're still trying to get all stores removed that should be removed. Because of their 60% staff reduction, this is taking longer than the October 11th date they predicted. They're trying to do the right thing, though.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Coming from you, Derek, I'm actually reassured.
They should at least acknowledge my emails with *something* though.
But thanks for that. Coming from anyone else, I don't know if I'd believe it. :)
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Hello other CD Artists-
Our management company had to track down SNOCAP for us to
protect our trademark/band name.
To save you time and aggravation - here is the information to
contact SNOCAP. No one handles the phones but here is their
legal dept.
General Counsel| SNOCAP, Inc.
201 3rd St., 2nd Floor | San Francisco, CA 94103
+1.415.216.2200 ext 249 |
rmosher@snocap.com
eFax +1.415.520.9214
Hope this is helpful.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Good. Thanks for that info. I will be likely sending them a registered letter soon.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Thank you, Derek, for keeping us in the know. Keep being one of
the good guys in the Music Biz!
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
One of the latest news reports puts the total staff at Snocap around
two dozen. With so few working on the project, delay is inevitable.
www.pacificcoastband.com
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
The downside to #2 was that artists would have crippled accounts, unable to upload new material, change their pricing, or anything else.
Yep I'm still caught up in this too and no answers to my emails I sent weeks ago.
You'd think they would at least have the courtesy to send out a canned email to CD Baby artists explaining the circumstances
I should have followed my gut and stayed away from them entirely.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
I did follow the link from the email announcing that Snocap would begin dealing directly with artists, and pre-registered with them, in anticipation of the change-over. Then I began getting the idea that they were not a great company to be affiliated with, and I wanted to delete my account. I have no idea how to even log in to a Snocap account. However, I deleted Snocap from my Myspace page. That should take care of it, right, even if it still leaves me with a sort of "ghost" snocap account?
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
I have tried to do the same thing. I emailed them, and no response.
The proof is in the pudding.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
If you signed up directly with them, and no longer want the
account, you need to be sure that you do cancel it entirely as your
credit card will be charged for the annual fee eventually.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| by
on Saturday October 20 2007 @ 10:27AM PDT [ reply | parent ] |
|
|
|
| | |
