(OT)Myspace Snocap Ripoff!

D K · Post by **D K** » Wed Dec 12, 2007 11:15 pm

well, the other day i noticed that my groups myspace page has snocap selling one of our releases.
interesting, i thought....my bandmate must have set that up.
well, apparently he thought i set it up.
wtf?
how the hell did this happen?
anyone else have this happen to them?
we're trying to put a stop to it....

here's the page:
http://myspace.com/302acid
neither of us authorized this....

Obineg · Post by **Obineg** » Thu Dec 13, 2007 12:22 am

Obviously Snocap has hacked into your account to sell your tracks right under your noses , how rude.

D K · Post by **D K** » Thu Dec 13, 2007 12:28 am

i kind of doubt it was the company itself, but i don't know...
the label that put out that particular release was less than reputable as it turns out,
but i don't believe they are currently active-
just wondering if anyone else has had this happen to them with their myspace account with this service..
unfortunately, snocap has been impossible to begin a dialogue with about the situation, which is the worst part of it all.

roby · Post by **roby** » Thu Dec 13, 2007 5:56 am

that's weird, but i think (though i'm not totally sure) that someone has to register/enter/submit your band and music to Snocap so they can sell your stuff the same way with iTunes and Beatport. You want to contact your previous label.

i know for a fact that our Snocap thingy on our MySpace was set by our label...

hacktheplanet · Post by **hacktheplanet** » Thu Dec 13, 2007 6:04 am

Yeah, how they hell did Snocap get your tracks in the first place? Isn't that pretty illegal? Did you guys ever upload any of your music or post links on Myspace? If not that, I'm willing to bet your label did it. I think it's legal if they own distribution rights. I'd contact your label and see whats up.

edit: I just googled, check this out: http://www.brendastardom.com/arch.asp?ArchID=1216
http://j-walkblog.com/index.php?/weblog ... ia_snocap/

mikemc · Post by **mikemc** » Thu Dec 13, 2007 11:09 pm

D K wrote:i kind of doubt it was the company itself, but i don't know...
the label that put out that particular release was less than reputable as it turns out,
but i don't believe they are currently active-
just wondering if anyone else has had this happen to them with their myspace account with this service..
unfortunately, snocap has been impossible to begin a dialogue with about the situation, which is the worst part of it all.

Did you release your disc for digital distribution through CD Baby? They did a thing with SNOCAP a while back.

kimbo · Post by **kimbo** » Fri Dec 14, 2007 12:38 am

the last I read was that CDbaby called off the negotiations, and SNOCAP issued a statement, basically stating that it didn't suit them to deal with another middleman like CDbaby, which is a silly thing to say, considering they deal with a lot of labels!

earsmack · Post by **earsmack** » Fri Dec 14, 2007 6:06 pm

snocap isn't worth it in my opinion...the cdbaby thing was plain strange...and you can get into itunes and napster, etc. easy enough. snocap overcharges for an inferior setup if you ask me.

smutek · Post by **smutek** » Fri Dec 14, 2007 6:18 pm

D K wrote:
just wondering if anyone else has had this happen to them with their myspace account with this service..

You aren't t alone. Adam X had a bulletin up about this a couple of weeks ago on myspace, apparently they did the same thing to him. There were a few bulletin responses from other artists complaining about the same.

Send them a cease and desist letter.

D K · Post by **D K** » Sat Dec 15, 2007 5:27 am

thanks for the input and info all, our music was released on itunes, perhaps snocap got ahold of the music through that?
i don't believe our account has been hacked, but password/etc. has been changed.
they are currently receiving a cease and desist letter daily....

tricil · Post by **tricil** » Sat Dec 15, 2007 6:13 am

courtesy of the flashbulb...
http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fusea ... BC24301990

smutek · Post by **smutek** » Sat Dec 15, 2007 4:34 pm

tricil wrote:courtesy of the flashbulb...
http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fusea ... BC24301990

Thanks, I'm going to copy/paste the blog below for those who don;t have myspace but might be interested in reading it.

____________________

Sunday, June 24, 2007

Create Your MySpace Music Store! (If you're a fucking asshat)
Category: Music

Wow. A couple weeks ago I noticed this "SNOCAP MUSIC STORE" bullshit on this Myspace account, and I couldn't find an option to remove it...or even find out where the fuck it was coming from. It seemed almost scary to me that somehow Snocap, who I nor my labels have anything to do with, had ripped my CDs for me and put them up for sale on my Myspace page without letting me know. I checked out Sublight, and they're fucking filled with them!
It kind of confused me where any of this purchase money was going, or who gave them permission to use my music. We still haven't quite sorted that shit out...

But this isn't about me, this is about YOU (if you're a Myspace artist).
Be sure to read carefully through the informative FAQ Myspace has supplied for this new service to sell your music, because it tells you absolutely no details about the actual transaction. After following the dead link to "more information" and googling my way to the actual numbers...
Snocap Myplayer charges $0.39 per transaction!
Oh but that's not all, read the fine print:
SNOCAP's fee for sales through a SNOCAP-powered retailer is the greater of $.10 or 15% of the wholesale price set by the artist.
Ok. What?
How is the average bong hitting musician supposed to figure this out...oh yeah he's NOT!
So basically, if you charge $1.00 per song....they'll be taking $0.54 of the transaction.

Transaction: $1.00
- Myspace: $0.39
- Snocap: $0.15
___________________
Your cut: $0.46

Also, I'm not sure if this applies to Myspace or not, but Snocap charges you upwards of $30 per album you have on their site. It's possible that this will be initially deducted from your already sorry-ass 46% royalty. I couldn't take reading the deceptive conjunctive agreements any longer to figure this part out.

You are a moron if you sign up for this. You spent hours/days/whatever working your ass off on the song...they didn't. There are plenty of sites that do this for MUCH cheaper and you can just post an HTML link to it from your page.

Example: Payloadz.com, upload ANY type of file for sale. Zips, lossless, etc. Be way more creative that way! They charge 15% and give you a gig of storage, or you can even buy storage and not deal with giving them a cut of your sale!

There's literally hundreds of services like this, some just for music, some much more diverse.

Until then, they've finally allowed/posted how to get rid of it...

Click on Account Settings > Profile Settings (the red "change settings" link) > uncheck the box marked "display music store".

Also, those who have asked me (some very good) questions regarding the recent essay I wrote. Please ask them on the essay blog! That way I won't have to respond to the same ones multiple times.

Thanks!
I'll be posting more on all of this stuff as time goes on, so feel free to subscribe to my blog. I promise not to post stories about my boring fucking kids...if I ever have any.

Finally, Myspace, congrats, you've made a GREAT success for yourself. A lot of this success has been your free tools to help smaller artists promote themselves. Remember MP3.com? Same start...was once the internet's biggest success story. Then they started selling downloads and CDs, and constantly upping their cut of the artist's hard-earned money. Guess what...everyone moved to Myspace. Don't make the same mistake...because there's a LOT of entrepreneurs out there who would just LOVE to run away with all your glory.

Thanks for listening.

D K · Post by **D K** » Sat Dec 15, 2007 5:01 pm

thanks again, all, i've posted the links on myspace...

darkenedsoul · Post by **darkenedsoul** » Sun Dec 16, 2007 12:25 am

My band had that on their website and I sent a flame-a-gram to both myspace and snocap. They were looking into it. Come to find out it was via our label that that happened. We're *supposed* to see some cash from it at some point. I don't know how many tracks have been purchased either. Guess I'll ask the leader of the ban(ne)d what he has heard so far after we got that information. Still, that's pretty damn shady from Snocap and myspace to keep it going.

4ace · Post by **4ace** » Sun Dec 16, 2007 3:27 am

"SpySpace" is shady overall,i've never dealt with the other one mentioned but i'm sure you aren't the first or the last.

We really gotta watch out for stuff like this,...it's waaayyy too easy to steal in this manner.