Interesting proposal of sponsorship of composers

I have found an interesting proposal of Switzerland company about sponsorship and promotion of composers:

http://www.load.cd/loadcd_can_sponsor_you.html

It would be interesting to know your opinions about this proposal.

Looks too good to be true.

That is amazing :D I'm definitely going to look further into it.

Sooo a brand new member with no other posts shows up with a "too good to be true" kind of offer? In the interest of fairness, let's investigate, shall we?

From their agreement:

c)

Load.CD as exclusive online platform for digitized

works

In the case Client ordered Load.CD to digitize a

work or to create sound- or video recordings, Client

agrees not to allow any third party, especially no

other internet platform, neither directly nor indirectly,

to publish or distribute the sheet music or grant

licenses for performing rights for the work online,

nor will he/she do so him-/herself, except via Load.

CD. This also applies to all other works and repro-

ductions/incorporations of works like texts, pictures,

sound- or video-recordings, if created by Load.CD

by order of Client.

And then:

8.

In the event of a breach of provisions in section c), 6 or

7, Client agrees to pay Load.CD 10’000 USD for each

work (sect. c) or 7) / each case (sec. 6) as liquidated

damages

Then:

9.

Load.CD shall not be held liable for slight negligence.

Furthermore, Load.CD shall not be liable for indirect

damages, deprived earnings nor loss of data.

So, in short, you're signing into a 3-year, auto-renewable contractual agreement to allow only Load.CD to handle all your music publishing, distribution, and performance rights granting. That means you're signing away your right to spread your work through as many venues as possible. And, by the way, if you breach that agreement you get to pay no less than $10,000USD per work (!!) that infringes the terms. Want to escape the contract? You get to pay any outstanding balance between you — and the numbers are scary, check the appendix.

Oh, and if Load.CD happens to forget to pay you (deprived earnings), or totally destroy your work (loss of data), they've excused themselves from liability so you can't touch them. Nice. I'm not even going to try and decode what the hell "slight negligence" might refer to.

But the best part of this deal is that the final term in the contract says that Load.CD gets to arbitrarily pick which of your works they're actually going to provide these services for. So not only are you granting them exclusivity to publish and distribute your music, but you're giving them the right to totally ignore you if they so choose.

So. It looks like a scam, smells like a scam, walks and even — as we've seen — talks like a scam. Thus: SCAM.

QED.

Good eyes, Marius.

So. It looks like a scam, smells like a scam, walks and even — as we've seen — talks like a scam. Thus: SCAM.

Ahh! But what does it taste like?

:mellow:

That is the worst contract I've ever read through.

Ahh! But what does it taste like?

Toasted rye bread.

:mellow: