Music for your projects? never been easier and fairer

[BeatPick.com]

hi there -

we provide filmmakers with selected indie music. These are our features:

- Free use of our music for no-profit and non-commercial films (shown where admission fee is not charged including indie festival)

- Free testing of our music before your projects become commercial. (it means you get our music, you use it and test it as you wish, including pre-screening)

- License music for commercial projects instantly and online. It means no more hassle to buy a license. It takes a few minutes only to license a track. An automatic control panel helps you to choose the song you need, pick the type of license you wish, get a quote, pay, download a WAV file and a legal agreement in just a few minutes. Click license next to any album name to get a quote.

- free help with audio sampling, mastering, looping.

- commission work from our artists/bands.

- visit BeatPick.com and you'll find free entire album streaming for 70 selected artists playing all sort of music genres and we add new artists every week.

Any further enquiry do not hesitate to contact us.

Frank
BeatPick.com
info@beatpick.com

[BeatPick.com]

All our music is released under the creative commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 which means the concept of non-commercial is legally clarified: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.5/

We refer to filmmakers just as an example.

to developer we can say:

"Free use of our music for no-profit and non-commercial films and GNU/Berkeley/OSI licensed games/software that are given away for free."

Thanks -

[BeatPick.com]

Ah...by the way.. we don't really spam. I understood that this is a section where people can post this kind of messages. If I am wrong then please delete my post and I apologise to everyone.

Thanks -

[Sirrus]

Perhaps this is atypical, but I selected a song called Atlantis, the lowest unit volume (25k), 2 platforms, and 'Not a theme song' and the result was $1,700.

Am I missing something here?

[BeatPick.com]

Perhaps this is atypical, but I selected a song called Atlantis, the lowest unit volume (25k), 2 platforms, and 'Not a theme song' and the result was $1,700.

Am I missing something here?

Hi Sirrus -

thanks for the interest. The price to license a song for games/software use and produce 25000 units on 2 hardware platforms is 1700 US dollars. We think we have the lowest price on the web for music licensing which is not "stock music". Music that is part of a real album. We commit to match and cut by 10% any other better price you find. We really want to offer a fair deal to everyone and we think musicians deserve their fair share. I must also say that music licenses for game/software are the most expensive. It is supposed that you make a good profit by selling 25000 units.

No paid license is required for people creating new works for non-commercial use. Examples:
- GNU/Berkeley/OSI licensed games or software that are given away for free (or included incidentally inside a larger distribution, even in a pay-distribution)
- anything a student makes while attending school

Any further feedback is very appreciated.

Frank

[oNyx]

>It is supposed that you make a good profit by selling 25000 units.

But it isnt about sells its about "Units manufactured or distributed". Uhm... you know how the shareware model works and what this means? Distributing it 25k times usually yields like 250 sells, which pretty much means that a single song would eat up almost all profits. And what if you want to contract some artist or buy some sound effects... uh uh.

Doesnt really sound that appealing, does it?

[BeatPick.com]

>It is supposed that you make a good profit by selling 25000 units.

But it isnt about sells its about "Units manufactured or distributed". Uhm... you know how the shareware model works and what this means? Distributing it 25k times usually yields like 250 sells, which pretty much means that a single song would eat up almost all profits. And what if you want to contract some artist or buy some sound effects... uh uh.

Doesnt really sound that appealing, does it?

wikipedia: "Shareware is a marketing method for software, whereby a trial version is distributed in advance and without payment, as is common for proprietary software. Shareware software is typically obtained free of charge, either by downloading from the internet or on magazine cover-disks. A user tries out the program, and thus shareware has also been known as 'try before you buy', demoware, trialware and by many other names. A shareware program is accompanied by a request for payment, and the software's distribution license often requires such a payment."

Therefore it is not exactly as you say. We are exactly using the shareware model applied to music: we let all our users to stream entire albums for free (testing) and if you like what you hear, you can buy in high quality format.

I do not think that if you produce 25000 units, you are going to sell only 250.... as in that case you are better off just by offering your games as download or alternatively you may want to consider your costs of production as they are advertising costs. And if you have that much money for advertising, i do not see why you should not pay for the music you use.
I do feel that in order to offer a price to people we have to look at what the majority of people do. And i do not think that the majority of people produce 25000 units to sell 250 units... If you then decide to distribute all 25000 units for free....then you have our support and you can use our music for free. What i am saying is that there must be a difference between commercial and non-commercial use. We need to respect our musicians. They work as you do.

As i said we have tried to keep our prices as low as possible and I appreciate if you can show us companies offering lower prices (remember we do not offer stock music but genuine selected music from established or up & coming artists). And on top of this we offer a few completely free services trying to make life for open source developers easier.

A person wanting to produce only 250 copies (it is rare..) then can just contact us and we will be able to offer them a very low price (probably we would consider his/her project as non-commercial and offer a free use of our music.

This is an interview we have done for openbusiness.cc explaining our philosophy: http://www.openbusiness.cc/2006/05/12/interview-with-beatpick-fairplay-music-label/
Hope it'll show that we do believe in shareware, open source and the creative commons.

to contract artists just click "contact the artist" next to any album name. We are still not able to offer sound effects (it's in our future plan)

btw... really interested in knowing what you think. it's helpful for us in order to offer a fairer services.

Frank
www.beatpick.com

[Sirrus]

I do not think that if you produce 25000 units, you are going to sell only 250.... as in that case you are better off just by offering your games as download.

Most of us DO offer our games as downloads ;)
But there is no option in your liscensing to specify this...

[papillon]

... I'm quite confused about what you think it is that we *do*. What do you mean by "produce" copies, exactly?

[PoV]

Yeah, you might not have been aware, but it's actually quite common to see low sales as suggested around these parts. The media seems to paint a different picture of how well things are in indie/casual gaming, but it's really just those developers you hear about that are having success. Obviously, everyone wants 25k sales, but breaking 1k is an achievement in itself, especially with many developers starting out. And even with more mass distribution (portals), some developers see as little as $2 per game sold, and that's often only a few thousand copies.

Sure, it's great to see another music licensing service in the same vein as Magnatune, but it sounds like you may have been misinformed regarding exactly what the state of indie/casual gaming is.

[spellcaster]

Let's say I use your music in my game. Let's the the demo gets downloaded 10000 times and I sell 1000 copies of the full version. With this scenaro, will I have to get a licence for 10k copies or 1000 copies (assuming that such a licence exists - if it doesn't just multiply by any factor that gives you something working).

[BeatPick.com]

OK. i'll try to clarify our point of view:

To Sirrus:
"Most of us DO offer our games as downloads
But there is no option in your liscensing to specify this."
You are right. There is no such a option as we could not find a way to give you a price without knowing a few things about you and where you are planning to sell. Therefore we tend to discuss such licensing agreements with you. We are doing this with www.soundspectrum.com. Any ideas on how to improve our service to this respect is very much appreciated.

To Papillion:
"I'm quite confused about what you think it is that we *do*. What do you mean by "produce" copies, exactly?"
"produce copies" means simply to "manufacture units" (physically pressing CDs, DVDS etc. etc.."

To POV.
"Yeah, you might not have been aware, but it's actually quite common to see low sales as suggested around these parts. The media seems to paint a different picture of how well things are in indie/casual gaming, but it's really just those developers you hear about that are having success. Obviously, everyone wants 25k sales, but breaking 1k is an achievement in itself, especially with many developers starting out. And even with more mass distribution (portals), some developers see as little as $2 per game sold, and that's often only a few thousand copies.

Sure, it's great to see another music licensing service in the same vein as Magnatune, but it sounds like you may have been misinformed regarding exactly what the state of indie/casual gaming "

we are absoluting taking no opinion on the state of the indie/casual gaming industry. I am just saying that if you produce 25000 copies then we ask 1700 dollars. This comes to be 0.068 US dollars per unit!! if you want to produce 1000 copies than you are welcome to do so and we will charge a different price (e.g. 100 US dollars). I said that if you produce and sell 25000 units you are bound to make a good profit. I have never said indie gamers make a lot of money... (quote me if I have...)

to spellcaster:
Let's say I use your music in my game. Let's the the demo gets downloaded 10000 times and I sell 1000 copies of the full version. With this scenaro, will I have to get a licence for 10k copies or 1000 copies (assuming that such a licence exists - if it doesn't just multiply by any factor that gives you something working).

You will need a license for 1000 copies only as the downloadable demo versions does not count for us. You can have 1million people downloading your demo and you will always pay a license only for 1000 copies.
Onyx referred to manufacturing units. We think downloading and manufacturing is different. However I must also say that in some occasion we could actually accept you manufacturing 5000 copies of which 3000 are full version and 2000 are demo and you would pay a music license only for 3000. It depends on the genuinity of your proposal. Onyx made the example of manufacturing 25000 and sell only 250...that sounds weird to me...

What I am trying to say guys is that we are really open and our prices and licensing options are flexible depending on your needs. If you do not find satisfactory our prices and options in our licensing control panel then just contact us and explain your project. We will do our best to meet your needs. We know that life for indie artists/developers is not easy. It's just a matter of helping each other and explaining your needs. We're not a big corporation. We're an indie label too.

Keep the questions coming if you wish. It's interesting.

Frank
www.beatpick.com

[MiceHead]

[Edit: Producing vs. Downloading confusion. Rrr. :) ]

It's just a matter of helping each other and explaining your needs. We're not a big corporation. We're an indie label too.

It may be that what's economical for you just isn't economical for me. At the rates you specify, I'm more likely to look for a local artist to create a work-for-hire, or to go to a flat-rate royalty music library (e.g., MusicBakery).

[BeatPick.com]

What is economical for you is definitely your call :). We are not interested in services such as MusicBakery. They provide you with stock music. It's completely another business (they're good tough..). btw: we do work-for-hire. Just enquiry some of our artists. They might give you a good deal if they like your project. :)

www.beatpick.com

[PoV]

Ok, I guess I was confused by Onyx and the other responses. ;)

So basicly, what your saying is I:

1. Browse your catalog of music
2. Pick some tracks I'd like to license for my game
3. Contact you with the list, and an approximate/minimum number of titles I will sell (1000, 10000, ...)
4. You get back to me with a quote to license these tracks, and some other quotes for subsiquent additional sales (per 1000 more, per 5000 more, etc...)

Then do I pay you now, or later?

And to be clear, did I read right there would be no fees for having the music in my demo versions? It's purely when I make money, we both make money?

[edit] Oh, I didn't notice that license link on the per song page.

[BeatPick.com]

Ok, I guess I was confused by Onyx and the other responses. ;)

So basicly, what your saying is I:

1. Browse your catalog of music
2. Pick some tracks I'd like to license for my game
3. Contact you with the list, and an approximate/minimum number of titles I will sell (1000, 10000, ...)
4. You get back to me with a quote to license these tracks, and some other quotes for subsiquent additional sales (per 1000 more, per 5000 more, etc...)

Then do I pay you now, or later?

And to be clear, did I read right there would be no fees for having the music in my demo versions? It's purely when I make money, we both make money?

[edit] Oh, I didn't notice that license link on the per song page.


POV -
you can use our automatic licensing control panel which helps you to license a track in a few minutes and download a WAV file + a legal agreement. Alternatively you contact us and discuss your special requirements. It works fine for us either ways. If you contact us we will also be happy to help you with eventual looping, sampling, re-mastering or if you want instrumental only for a rock band.

You pay only when your project becomes commercial. So you can use and test our music as you wish until the day before you release your commercial version. You do not pay a license fee on demo versions.

[papillon]

But... the demo version and the commercial version are 'released' at the same time.

I'm still not sure you understand the sort of business that the majority of people on this board are running.

We make a "demo version" of a game that individuals can play for free. They usually download this demo from various websites. No hard copy needed. This demo either does not contain the whole game, or allows you to play the game for only a limited time, like an hour or so.

Then, when they decide they want the full game, they pay online and download either a new, expanded copy, or a code to 'unlock' the demo they originally downloaded. Again, nothing is physically pressed. That's why it's so hard to give numbers of how many sales we will have - everything is digital, copies can be made infinitely.

The commercial version is not released at a separate date. In many cases, it isn't even a separate version. When there's a keycode involved, the whole game is downloaded for free - buying the code just allows you to play it as often as you want.

And yes. Most people who download the free demo version will never pay to upgrade to the complete version. Only a small fraction do. So we could easily get 25,000 downloads and only 250 sales.

Many of us never manufacture _anything_.

[Daire Quinlan]

And just to clarify (bearing in mind that I'm no lawyer), using something (graphics, code, music etc etc) in a demo version of a game that was intended to be sold would almost certainly be regarded as 'commercial use' of that resource. I'm pretty sure that the creative commons non-commercial clause would forbid resources licensed under it to be used in such a demo.

Again though, IANAL, so take the above with a grain of salt.

D.

[oNyx]

>Onyx referred to manufacturing units.

I referred to distributed copies (the demo needs some music, too). As papillon said most of us will never manufacture anything.

With a 1% CR distributing it 25k times only yields 250 sells. And each download means that you distribute it once more. Thats why distributing it 25k times for $1700 is damn expensive. $6.80 per sold unit and thats for one song. Thats totally out of the question expensive.

If you didnt mean it like that, change the wording.

[Sybixsus]

And just to clarify (bearing in mind that I'm no lawyer), using something (graphics, code, music etc etc) in a demo version of a game that was intended to be sold would almost certainly be regarded as 'commercial use' of that resource. I'm pretty sure that the creative commons non-commercial clause would forbid resources licensed under it to be used in such a demo.

Again though, IANAL, so take the above with a grain of salt.

D.

IAANAL ( also ) but I agree. That's my reading of the license too.

[cliffski]

I've always bought stock music, non-exclusively for a fraction of these prices. The fact that the indiegamer forums are swamped with musicians selling music shows that there is a big supply/demand inbalance going on. I think your average indie developer will pay no more than $50-100 for a full length bit of music, on a non-exclusive, no-royalty basis. I'm sure people like popcap pay more, but the vast majority of us arent going to pay more than that.
Its supply and demand.

[VladR]

I might understand it wrong, so correct if I`m wrong, but as far as I understood it (based on an example with 25.000 downloads), I`ll pay you $1.700 for ONE song that has already been picked from some list of already made tracks.

This isn`t even funny. There are plenty musicians that shall create the new music from scratch for your game for several hundreds of dollars or for a fixed percentage of sales (say, 10% of revenues).

This is an entirely different market compared with film-making. Try to read through this forum to find out what is considered a pretty good revenue here.

[BeatPick.com]

Hi guys... I think now we're coming back on the same argument over and over again.

onyx:
you referred to units that are manufactured. or at least that price is for units to be manufactured. Just go on our website and you can check that out. I think no more clarification are needed.

Papillion:
Thanks. we understand very well as demo version works (we understand that so well that you need just to go to www.beatpick.com and you'll see that we are applying the same principle to music... try and then (maybe) buy a superior version. we do: try a mp3 128 kbps and then maybe buy a WAV file....

What is most important is that we clarified our position. just read my previous answer to spellcaster:
"You will need a license for 1000 copies only as the downloadable demo versions does not count for us. You can have 1million people downloading your demo and you will always pay a license only for 1000 copies." and to buy a license for 1000 copies it will probably costs around 100 us dollars.

Whether this is compatible or not with the creative commons license leave it to us (btw: i disagree with you for a zillion reasons).
You will get a legal agreement that say you do not pay for demo versions.

to clarify once more:

you pay only for what you actually sell. demo versions do not count.
The price of 1700 us dollars is for 25000 manufactured units and your game running on 2 hardware platforms.
If your game run only on 1 hardware platform then the price is 700 US dollars for 25000 units manufactured.

If you want to license 1000 copies, your license fee will be around 100 US dollars. We we also help you with looping, mastering, sampling for free.

No paid license is required for people creating new works for non-commercial use. Examples:
- GNU/Berkeley/OSI licensed games or software that are given away for free (or included incidentally inside a larger distribution, even in a pay-distribution)
- anything a student makes while attending school

Something i also like to say is that none of you wrote a company that offers a better deal for music which is not stock music[/U]. saying "X is better then Y for these reasons"... is always more useful for everybody than just saying "X is not good for these reasons.." but we love critics so keep them coming... i am learning a few lessons from this discussion..

[Sybixsus]

Something i also like to say is that none of you wrote a company that offers a better deal for music which is not stock music[/u]. saying "X is better then Y for these reasons"... is always more useful for everybody than just saying "X is not good for these reasons.." but we love critics so keep them coming... i am learning a few lessons from this discussion..

Well what advantages do I get by using your music over using stock music? Until now, I've seen two ways of getting music, and used both. I've used stock music, which means someone else somewhere could be using the same track, and I don't get any rights to reuse it. I've paid a musician to write music which I own when it's done, and I know no one else will be using it.

So if I license a track of yours..

a) Can anyone else use it?
b) Do I get all rights to sell a CD with that music on commercially, and generally do whatever I want with it at no additional charge?
c) Do you give up all rights to the music?
d) If none of the above, what DO I get that I don't get with stock music?

Perhaps I'm a bit slow, but I don't see how your music differs from stock music from my perspective. I don't see what advantage(s) it offers me. So of course, I'm going to compare it to stock music. If you can tell me what advantage(s) it offers, then hopefully I'll see that I should be comparing it with something else.

[BeatPick.com]

Well what advantages do I get by using your music over using stock music? Until now, I've seen two ways of getting music, and used both. I've used stock music, which means someone else somewhere could be using the same track, and I don't get any rights to reuse it. I've paid a musician to write music which I own when it's done, and I know no one else will be using it.

So if I license a track of yours..

a) Can anyone else use it?
b) Do I get all rights to sell a CD with that music on commercially, and generally do whatever I want with it at no additional charge?
c) Do you give up all rights to the music?
d) If none of the above, what DO I get that I don't get with stock music?

Perhaps I'm a bit slow, but I don't see how your music differs from stock music from my perspective. I don't see what advantage(s) it offers me. So of course, I'm going to compare it to stock music. If you can tell me what advantage(s) it offers, then hopefully I'll see that I should be comparing it with something else.

sure sybixsus. it is a good point and it really depends on what type of music you are looking for.

a) yes of course. we grant you only the non-exclusive rights to use the music. If you wish an exclusive rights then you should contact one of our artists and ask if they are willing to work on commission.
b) you get rights to sell the music commercially depending on what you pay.
c) absolutely NOT!. Music belongs to indipendent artists! it does not belong to us and we are absolutely against artists loosing the rights to their music.

d) it's just a matter of how important for you is the music. That is really your choice. We have nothing against stock music. It's just a different business for many reasons. "Stock music or "Laid-In" music refers to production music that was specifically made for films, games etc. etc.

wikipedia: "Production music is background music used for many media sources, such as television and radio advertisements. They are presented as a less expensive option than commissioning a composer for custom music or paying for the rights to use commercial music, as some organizations may find the cost for either one of the latter two options prohibitive (or at least uneconomical)".

It is often supposed that stock music is less exciting and less original. It really depends on what sort of music you are looking for. If you want a 30 seconds breaks loop then you are OK with stock music. If you want an original piece of sound then you are better off seeking to license original music. Also very popular games use stock music... so it is really your call!

We offer music which is not stock music and that's all I have been trying to say. And i do believe that our prices are the lowest possible for this kind of business. And i do believe that to offer free music to GNU/Berkeley/OSI licensed games or software that are given away for free is something that should be appreciated. I do not think that stock music companies offer the same opportunity.
There are many developers that are after original piece of music and also many developers that are after stock music. 2 different businesses.

[JGeer]

I have to agree Sybixsus on the stock music. There are a lot of *original* sounding pieces in stock libraries today and it's not all just "30 second break loops". It sounds like all your saying, Beatpick, is that the music you offer for license on a non-exclusive basis(just like stock music) has a more original sound.

I agree that a lot of stock music libraries have canned music that is not incredibly fresh and original, but there are a lot of stock music sites that do have more interesting music now. Right now I'm working on a project for Parterns in Rhyme and I pretty much have complete creative control over what I'm doing. I feel like I'm writing music that I want to write and music that is fresh and exciting. Yet I would still classify is as stock music because absolutely anyone will be able to purchase and use it on a non-exclusive basis.

I consider *original* music as you put it is something that is made specifically for a game or project and ONLY that game.

[papillon]

Well, the biggest thing that almost no stock music sites offer is VOCALS. Most of us don't need them, but you do have to go this sort of licensing route if you want a singer, from what I've seen...

[BeatPick.com]

Thanks to everyone for the comments you have made. We understood that our current price schema is optimal for the upper sector of the market for games while it penalises lower budget productions.

We have partnered with www.gametrove.net to devise a new price schema that may appeal to low budget productions.
Prices are very low both for custom made tracks and pre-cleared music.

Special offer is valid only for gametrove.net members.

More info at: http://www.gametrove.net/forum/viewtopic.php?p=29#29 and in the gametrove's newsletter.

No paid license is required for people creating new works for non-commercial use.

Frank
www.beatpick.com