[Art Munson]

It is a good thing that a petition is being started and that songwriters are talking to ASCAP. But will these efforts really do anything? I think that composers could better spend their energies doing other things.

[Art Munson]

This topic could be a good spot to add to and keep up to date. Thanks Mark.

[Art Munson]

I’ve only spent a few days on it but here’s what I like so far.

1.) Selecting, highlighting and lassoing clips is more logical.
2.) To move a clip you only have to grab the top of the clip. You don’t have to highlight it as before.
3.) Automation lanes are a big improvement though I haven’t quite figured out all the behavior changes for the cursor. There’s much more so check out the video above. It’s 26 minutes long but worth it.

[Art Munson]

I’m glad to hear you’re enjoying X2.  I’ll be upgrading soon myself.

Just out of curiosity, what are the changes that have made you a happy camper?

[Art Munson]

And companies like Revostock or Pond5, in my opinion, prefer royality free music. Just check the best selling. 80% of the composers pretend not to be pro members. They are simply Production teams. I guess everybody understands what that means. It is good to split those two systems. With royality free companies you ll make money evtl.faster but it can happen that your tracks will run in programs they are not supposed to run and with exclusive libraries you ll make money
for a long period if the company has good connections to tv broadcasters.
My personal rule is like…for little and medium projects I licence my tracks to stock market and royality free companies and for the big stuff I licence with exclusive libraries.

[Art Munson]

You can sign with  BMI if you’re not living in US. You just can’t do it via the online form but have to fill out some papers and send it back to them due to some taxation issues.

I will primarily be targeting the U.S. market and therefore BMI seems like a logical choice, but then again with most library music it could be broadcast anywhere in the world.

From what I’m been able to figure out (from different forums), getting something from BMI or ASCAP can also take a couple of years.

[Art Munson]

Hi folks,
Prs(England) and Gema (Germany) do a good job and those two countries are as well the biggest markets for production music in Europe. As a European citizen I recommend those Pros. But check their reglementations because they are both strict in some way. It is for sure ok with Bmi or Ascap but it depends for which market you’ll work more. I wait 2-3 years to get my U.S. Royalities. Welcome into the
reality.

[Art Munson]

I wonder , can you sign with  BMI or Ascap if youre not living in US ?

I have been with spanish pro (SGAE) and not received a penny yet and I might have sold close to a hundred songs over last five years (PT,Pond5,beatsuite…)

and I doubt they were all nonbroadcast licenses ,I even saw some cuesheets along the way and still not cent from SGAE.

I wonder how efective are they in collecting foreign licenses or are they reluctant to pay composers and need to be chased with tunesat and phonecalls.

[Art Munson]

Thanks Gale. Always an education to read your in-depth posts!

[Art Munson]

Yes, it’s worth it. I’ve had music, sold on RF sites, used for broadcast TV here in the U.S.

[Art Munson]

If you don’t like the terms of a contract you’re presented, don’t sign it.

Sweet.

[Art Munson]

well I was being polite – they are really good – always better to devalue your opinion of yourself though (constantly tell myself im rubbish as you know thats the only way to get better) – I think with a thousand I should be making 30k a year from them – im getting closer to the aim. Still believe you need 1-2 thousand tracks before you begin to see steady sales – thats just my opinion and experience so far as a noob as I know there are people with a hundred tracks doing really well.

[Art Munson]

thanks for the sense desireinspires – I know what you mean as some people do real well at having a consice cat – I’ve seen it work real well for some people – careful naming etc – I guess I have gone about it a diff way as a noob and just read from everyone you need a lot of tracks – so I stayed in and made a good 5 a day for a long time – Im jumping in with lots new guys today – just take the plunge – I’ve done my soul searching and now is action time. Good advice and I agree with what you say.

[Art Munson]

I mean take revo – I put about 400 tracks up – it sold for a bit ( a little ) then now next to nothing – entire months will pass with nothing sold – the site is a quality looking site – my tracks are good ( ish ) so its hard to know whether to add anymore to it – but the shots in the dark are just really hard punts and I wanted to know if others felt the same in the non ex lib game – the thought of addding another 500 to revo and seeing next to nothing is a real drain. The site is good looking it should be generating sales. So when looking to add to unknowns with no info on internet I wanted to see how others deal with this and whether the unknown shots work out for them

 

You have too many tracks. Weed out some of them and raise your prices if possible. I know that I used to add as many tracks as possible at low prices. I would make a few sales and then it would all stop. You have to get focused. Quantity is necessary, but you do not need 1,000 tracks on one site. A good range to aim for is 50-100. You can build from there.

Also, do not sell low! Low prices = inferiority. It is true. Some people think they may be getting a bargain, but most will just see cheap tracks and will bypass them. I see royalty-free sites all the time where people add too many songs and charge too low. Do not sell yourself short. People will pay for quality music.

One other thing to do is to stop working with sites that have a poor interface. Cheap looking sites are even worse than cheap tracks. Target the few sites with the best user interface. The best way to do this is to actually search for tracks and then buy a few. If the process is easy and uncluttered, this means that it is easy for other end users to buy materials. If you try to buy material from a site with poor search engines and user interface, that site is a waste of time. Take your material away from those sites and go elsewhere.

Having 1,000 tracks is nice. But you have to get focused after you build up that catalog. You can make great money with around 500 songs spread on a few sites that generate the correct traffic and have the best interfaces and search engines. Be a customer first. That will tell you everything you need to know.

[Art Munson]

@adam. I’m with MichaelL. No offense intended but if you have 1000 tracks and not generating enough income then there are other things to look at.

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