With high volume (and by high we mean only a few thousands transactions a month) that drops down to next to nothing. And when that happens we will drop the service fees and get even more of your money to the artists.
Also with the shopping cart model you can send money to multiple artists on one invoice and the.23 cents is spread across all of those 'tips'.
Matt
co-founder Fairtunes
Finally, with copyrighted music and movies, people will have to learn to pay even if they don't *have* to...
And that is the exact reason we setup something called Fairtunes that allows you to voluntarily pay for copyrighted music that you may (or may not have) 'stolen'/downloaded.
No artists ever made money off their CD. Remeber TLC? A top-ten band a few years back? They went bankrupt because they couldn't get enough money off their CD (namely, "Crazy Sexy Cool") sales because the RIAA screwed them over so bad.
I'll agree with the first statement.. But I ended up doing research on the TLC issue because of the nature of the website (www.fairtunes.com) I run. And the fact of the matter is that one of the TLC girls burned down a million dollar house and the insurance wouldn't cover... So yes they may be getting screwed by their label but at the end of the day TLC mis-managed their money and should not have burnt that house down. Google TLC and bankruptcy you might be able to find the real story.
Buycott, boycott. What do we do? What is going to hurt the RIAA the most? What will get their attention? Will it be a decrease in sales? Or an increase?
Forget the labels. Send your money to your artist directly. You can get out the checkbook and write them a check and drop it in the mail. Of course finding the right address isn't as easy as many think it is. But we are working on developing a list so that you don't have to get trapped in voice mail hell. It should be up in a few weeks.
Or you can go to www.fairtunes.com and send money directly to any artist with your credit card. We'll sit on the phone and get the addresses and ensure your money gets there. Lots of people have been concerned about us actually sending the money. Check out our FAQ. It should now cover everyone's concerns.
Of course can we the music consumers turn this protest of the moment into a future payment model? That is the big question. Can we be trusted and responsible enough to voluntarily give what is fair?
I really hope we can because the record label is screwing us the listeners and it's screwing the artists.
We've just released a draft of our Music Payment Protocol so any ambitious soul can integrate the Fairtunes voluntary payment model into something like opennap or XMMS or WinAmp..
Check out the stats at Fairtunes a website which enables you to send voluntary payments to ANY artist online.
People are usually sending between $5-$20US. Since there is no minimum limit a few people have put through transactions as low as $0.15. But usually people are being very generous. And I guess it's interesting to note that more money is being sent to "no-name" artists than the big name top 40 bunch.
Fairtunes (www.fairtnues.com) two weeks ago launched it's voluntary payment system to artists on the web. Yesterday we posted a draft of our Music Payment Protocol that would enable (open source) developers to use our system to build voluntary contributions into plugins and Napster-style downloading programs. We are looking for comments and suggestions on the protocol. The beta server for it will be up by the end of the week.
Check out www.fairtunes.com it is a website we started that allows music listeners to send money to artists directly. This bypasses the record industry and gets your money straight to the artist.
If you want to see our books we'd be more than welcome to fax them to you or you could come visit us (call first: 204-292-1321).
Didn't you even look into this? It's a payment service!
I typed before checking:). I'm talking to them and we're working it.
In terms of the trust issue we're going to apply to join the Better Business Bureau and then apply to join BBOnline first thing Monday morning. We'll keep you updated as to the status of it on our website.
I care about the service they are providing now, which basically sucks.
At any rate, paying through e-gold is simpler than the forms you have to fill out at Fairtunes.
We would welcome any comments and suggestions you have on making our website more user friendly and trustworthy.
Also how would we integrate the e-gold system into our site? We'd have to have a person manully verifiying everything. Or write some pretty crazy scripts to interface with their website as it currently stands. There is no nice server to integrate into like I can with visa cards.
they are audited by a very well-respected 3rd party.
Who?
why should we trust them?
Why shouldn't you trust us? If I wanted to steal money I think there would be a lot better ways of defrauding the public than through our looney scheme of depending on YOUR goodwill. If you really think we are scamming everyone, we now prominently display how much has been scammed (i mean sent), on our homepage. As you can see we are now filthy rich and will close our doors tomorrow and skip the country:).
All the musician needs is to create a free e-gold account and list it on their home page.
But is every musician on the web? How do I send money to someone who isn't on the web? Fairtunes on the other hand can work independently of the web. No web prescence, no problem. We'll still find that artist and get them the money.
If you can use PayPal (i.e. if you're American and the music group is American), you can send money for no transfer cost.
Big IF there.:)
If they were really serious about providing a service, they'd also list other means by which you can pay the artists directly, instead of insisting that all the money go through their own hands
We are currently working on this. We can only do so much at once!:)
Besides, the musicians have not said that they are willing to be paid this way.
We will be sure to post the first time someone actually refuses money. Would you refuse a check that came in the mail? As a musician would you care if your money came via a royalty or via a tip? Money is money is it not?
While there is a trust issue with Fairtunes (I'm not accusing, but there's no reason to trust strangers who say they'll pass along money honestly when nobody can check whether they did)
The question remains, what are the solutions to this? We've looked at online auditing by someone like PriceWaterhouseCoopers. The answer was $15,000us. Or we could use CPA Webtrust but that is $65,000CA for the first year. We don't have that kind of cash. If we did we'd use it.
We're looking into trust accounts but again there are a lot of hurdles involved.
In terms of e-gold. We looked into it, sure it's cheaper, but how many people have e-gold accounts? Currently there are 58,885 accounts (I have one). How many web users have credit cards? A lot more than 50,000. It just isn't worth our time to implement e-gold. Maybe once it takes off, but till then it just isn't worth it.
We are working on verification and authentification protocols but it won't be something we can implement over night. But hopefully will be available shortly.
If you could split up one incoming payment into many outgoing payments, it would then be a good service. However, they still have to do something about the trust problem. With no 3rd party observers, there's no reason to trust them.
We are working on these problems around the clock and should have feasible solutions online shortly.
In terms of trusting us:
The money is worth more to us in the hands of an artist than it is in our pockets. We'd much rather have famous artist X proclaim they got a $100, than for us to have an extra $100 with which to go buy some more pizza.
If we were stealing your money then why would why charge you a service fee?? Wouldn't we get more money without a service fee?
We're working the problems out and are still looking for alternatives. Speak up if you have suggestions on the trust issue.
In terms of aggregation of donations we'll have an "open" solution up and online within 24hours for you guys to have some fun with.
4% plus 25 cents is way too expensive. It makes microdonations infeasible.
The break down is like this: We charge you: 4% per transaction + $0.25
Our cost in terms of Merchant Visa+payment processor: 3.5% per transaction + $0.23
Fairtunes then gets: 0.5% per transaction + $0.02.
With that little bit that we take we use it to pay for servers, computers, lawyers, accountants, banking, stamps, envelopes, cells, faxing, stationary, and labour costs.
We will not make any money on this any time soon!
When we have sufficient volume we will REMOVE ALL SERVICE FEES. If we were sitting on a load of venture capital there would be no services fees but this is not the case. This is a completely independent venture. We are affiliated with no big business.
Sure I would love to accept PayPal but we are Canadian. They do not service Canadians. And it isn't easy for us to open an office in the US. If it was we'd do it.
Be as negative as you want but we are not making money of this. And fact of the matter is, a whole lot more money goes to the artist through us in terms of percentages then when you buy a CD.
Will we're pretty confident we have a lot of the major issues sorted out. For example if someone donated money to Courtney Love/Hole we have an address for them on file. We'd write them a check, and drop it in the mail. It would be then up to the band/artist to figure out how it gets distributed.
We are working on the open-ness and it should be online today or tomorrow.
"You're just gonna have to trust us" doesn't cut it in the internet world. Until some type of verification system is in place, I wouldn't trust this for a second. Not because I think FairTunes is untrustworthy, but simply because of the nature of the Internet. (Remember PayPai?)
When there's a way to confirm that your cash is headed for the artist, however, I guarantee this service will get LOTS of use.
We could provide online auditing of our practices by CPA Webtrust but the cost would be $65,000 for the first year! We have no venture capital (but we're looking!:) ). There is no way we can afford this.
If someone knows of an alternative trust model we are very open to suggestions.
We are cutting the first batch of checks to artists Monday. Hopefully once the checks arrive we can get them to send us confirmation back which we will post to our site. Or alternatively we will get them to post something on their site or get them to speak out to the media about our service.
Remember $2 is worth more to Fairtunes in the hands of the artist then in our pocket. ($2 doesn't even begin to cover server fees!)
Well.. We are Canadian and can't use PayPal. So we have to go with the standard credit card companies and the discount rate is high. Ours is 3.5% and then a flat rate of around $0.23. So the money we charge barely covers our cost of processing your transaction. Then there is all the costs of sending the money to the artist which we have not factored into the amount we charge you. So I do not think what we charge is unreasonable.
Of course with sufficient volume the costs will drop and so will the service fees. Our goal is a service free environment. Each "donation" gets us one step closer to that higher volume.
This was posted earlier today (on slashdot) but I think still raises a lot of questions we don't have answers to.
--
What do people think about voluntarily paying your artist online for music you've downloaded?
We believe this is one answer to the MP3 situation and have started a website at www.fairtunes.com that allows you to do exactly that. It is the Stephen King model implemented for music. We allow you to securely send any amount of money using your credit to ANY artist.
But do we live in a society that can adjust to a voluntary system when we've lived so long in a system that has always set the price for us? Can we handle the freedom that Napster gives us? Can we be trusted to use Napster responsibly? Young kids might always pirate music, and we accept that, but is voluntary payment an option for everyone else?
I totally agree. We NEED to support the artists on this one. And the big question is how do we do that?
We believe one answer to this is our website at www.fairtunes.com which enables you to send money directly to ANY artist thereby bypassing the record industry.
Support your favorite artist not the middle man. Matt
Exactly! And that is the beauty of the Fairtunes model. Fairtunes in a sense the middle man but we are completely controlled by you the music listener. What do I mean by this? You the listener gets to set how much money you want to send to the artist.
I have a suggestion though. You could close the gap even further by providing the opportunity to include the payer's name and/or a short text message saying how much they enjoy their music.
:) We actually provide this already. With every donation you can send a brief message to your artist. If you register as a user then we will optionally include your name on a list that we send to the artists.
Slashdot Mirror
Also with the shopping cart model you can send money to multiple artists on one invoice and the .23 cents is spread across all of those 'tips'.
Matt
co-founder
Fairtunes
And that is the exact reason we setup something called Fairtunes that allows you to voluntarily pay for copyrighted music that you may (or may not have) 'stolen'/downloaded.
Matt
co-founder
www.fairtunes.com
I'll agree with the first statement.. But I ended up doing research on the TLC issue because of the nature of the website (www.fairtunes.com) I run. And the fact of the matter is that one of the TLC girls burned down a million dollar house and the insurance wouldn't cover... So yes they may be getting screwed by their label but at the end of the day TLC mis-managed their money and should not have burnt that house down. Google TLC and bankruptcy you might be able to find the real story.
Matt
co-founder
www.fairtunes.com
Forget the labels. Send your money to your artist directly. You can get out the checkbook and write them a check and drop it in the mail. Of course finding the right address isn't as easy as many think it is. But we are working on developing a list so that you don't have to get trapped in voice mail hell. It should be up in a few weeks.
Or you can go to www.fairtunes.com and send money directly to any artist with your credit card. We'll sit on the phone and get the addresses and ensure your money gets there. Lots of people have been concerned about us actually sending the money. Check out our FAQ. It should now cover everyone's concerns.
Of course can we the music consumers turn this protest of the moment into a future payment model? That is the big question. Can we be trusted and responsible enough to voluntarily give what is fair?
I really hope we can because the record label is screwing us the listeners and it's screwing the artists.
Matt
co-founder
Fairtunes
Matt.
Don't punish the artist for what they have no control over (mainly the RIAA). Matt.
Matt.
We've just released a draft of our Music Payment Protocol so any ambitious soul can integrate the Fairtunes voluntary payment model into something like opennap or XMMS or WinAmp..
Matt
co-founder
Fairtunes Inc.
People are usually sending between $5-$20US. Since there is no minimum limit a few people have put through transactions as low as $0.15. But usually people are being very generous. And I guess it's interesting to note that more money is being sent to "no-name" artists than the big name top 40 bunch.
Matt.
co-founder
Fairtunes
Matt.
co-founder
www.fairtunes.com
The whole idea of Fairtunes is that you get to cut the middle man (the RIAA/the label) out and send money to your favorite artist direcly.
But of course will consumers be responsible enough to send money to artists whose music they've "downloaded"? This remains to be seen.
Matt
co-founder
Fairtunes
Matt
co-founder.
www.fairtunes.com
Didn't you even look into this? It's a payment service!
I typed before checking :). I'm talking to them and we're working it.
In terms of the trust issue we're going to apply to join the Better Business Bureau and then apply to join BBOnline first thing Monday morning. We'll keep you updated as to the status of it on our website.
Matt
co-founder
Fairtunes.com
At any rate, paying through e-gold is simpler than the forms you have to fill out at Fairtunes.
We would welcome any comments and suggestions you have on making our website more user friendly and trustworthy.
Also how would we integrate the e-gold system into our site? We'd have to have a person manully verifiying everything. Or write some pretty crazy scripts to interface with their website as it currently stands. There is no nice server to integrate into like I can with visa cards.
they are audited by a very well-respected 3rd party.
Who?
why should we trust them?
Why shouldn't you trust us? If I wanted to steal money I think there would be a lot better ways of defrauding the public than through our looney scheme of depending on YOUR goodwill. If you really think we are scamming everyone, we now prominently display how much has been scammed (i mean sent), on our homepage. As you can see we are now filthy rich and will close our doors tomorrow and skip the country :).
Matt - mgoyer@fairtunes.com
co-founder
Fairtunes.com
But is every musician on the web? How do I send money to someone who isn't on the web? Fairtunes on the other hand can work independently of the web. No web prescence, no problem. We'll still find that artist and get them the money.
If you can use PayPal (i.e. if you're American and the music group is American), you can send money for no transfer cost.
Big IF there. :)
If they were really serious about providing a service, they'd also list other means by which you can pay the artists directly, instead of insisting that all the money go through their own hands
We are currently working on this. We can only do so much at once! :)
Besides, the musicians have not said that they are willing to be paid this way.
We will be sure to post the first time someone actually refuses money. Would you refuse a check that came in the mail? As a musician would you care if your money came via a royalty or via a tip? Money is money is it not?
Matt
co-founder
Fairtunes.com
The question remains, what are the solutions to this? We've looked at online auditing by someone like PriceWaterhouseCoopers. The answer was $15,000us. Or we could use CPA Webtrust but that is $65,000CA for the first year. We don't have that kind of cash. If we did we'd use it.
We're looking into trust accounts but again there are a lot of hurdles involved.
In terms of e-gold. We looked into it, sure it's cheaper, but how many people have e-gold accounts? Currently there are 58,885 accounts (I have one). How many web users have credit cards? A lot more than 50,000. It just isn't worth our time to implement e-gold. Maybe once it takes off, but till then it just isn't worth it.
We are working on verification and authentification protocols but it won't be something we can implement over night. But hopefully will be available shortly.
Matt
co-founder
Fairtunes.com
We are working on these problems around the clock and should have feasible solutions online shortly.
In terms of trusting us:
We're working the problems out and are still looking for alternatives. Speak up if you have suggestions on the trust issue.
In terms of aggregation of donations we'll have an "open" solution up and online within 24hours for you guys to have some fun with.
Matt
co-founder
www.fairtunes.com
(is my sig broken?)
The break down is like this:
We charge you:
4% per transaction + $0.25
Our cost in terms of Merchant Visa+payment processor:
3.5% per transaction + $0.23
Fairtunes then gets:
0.5% per transaction + $0.02.
With that little bit that we take we use it to pay for servers, computers, lawyers, accountants, banking, stamps, envelopes, cells, faxing, stationary, and labour costs.
We will not make any money on this any time soon!
When we have sufficient volume we will REMOVE ALL SERVICE FEES. If we were sitting on a load of venture capital there would be no services fees but this is not the case. This is a completely independent venture. We are affiliated with no big business.
Sure I would love to accept PayPal but we are Canadian. They do not service Canadians. And it isn't easy for us to open an office in the US. If it was we'd do it.
Be as negative as you want but we are not making money of this. And fact of the matter is, a whole lot more money goes to the artist through us in terms of percentages then when you buy a CD.
One of the co-founders of Fairtunes,
We are working on the open-ness and it should be online today or tomorrow.
Matt.
When there's a way to confirm that your cash is headed for the artist, however, I guarantee this service will get LOTS of use.
We could provide online auditing of our practices by CPA Webtrust but the cost would be $65,000 for the first year! We have no venture capital (but we're looking! :) ). There is no way we can afford this.
If someone knows of an alternative trust model we are very open to suggestions.
We are cutting the first batch of checks to artists Monday. Hopefully once the checks arrive we can get them to send us confirmation back which we will post to our site. Or alternatively we will get them to post something on their site or get them to speak out to the media about our service.
Remember $2 is worth more to Fairtunes in the hands of the artist then in our pocket. ($2 doesn't even begin to cover server fees!)
Matt
www.fairtunes.com
Of course with sufficient volume the costs will drop and so will the service fees. Our goal is a service free environment. Each "donation" gets us one step closer to that higher volume.
Matt
--
What do people think about voluntarily paying your artist online for music you've downloaded?
We believe this is one answer to the MP3 situation and have started a website at www.fairtunes.com that allows you to do exactly that. It is the Stephen King model implemented for music. We allow you to securely send any amount of money using your credit to ANY artist.
But do we live in a society that can adjust to a voluntary system when we've lived so long in a system that has always set the price for us? Can we handle the freedom that Napster gives us? Can we be trusted to use Napster responsibly? Young kids might always pirate music, and we accept that, but is voluntary payment an option for everyone else?
Matt.
We believe one answer to this is our website at www.fairtunes.com which enables you to send money directly to ANY artist thereby bypassing the record industry.
Support your favorite artist not the middle man.
Matt
Exactly! And that is the beauty of the Fairtunes model. Fairtunes in a sense the middle man but we are completely controlled by you the music listener. What do I mean by this? You the listener gets to set how much money you want to send to the artist.
Matt
www.fairtunes.com
Check it out!
Matt
www.fairtunes.com