Hi, I've just registered to the site. From what I've read in other posts, there aren't any contracts in the checkout (like there is with BeatKings for example) and there are no contract templates on the site or anything. What's stopping the person who's buying the instrumental/beat from just using it how they want or claiming that they bought the exclusive one?

I guess your supposed to write a contract up yourself, get the email address of the 'client' after their purchase and then email them the contract - but they can't sign it!?

Also, what happends if 10 people leased the beat (you allow for 5000 releases on each lease for example), then somebody buys it exclusivly and owns the copyright (if a contract is made). Surely they're gon'a be pissed when they have paid all that money?

I'm not advertising, but on BeatKings (found the site through the producer MdL) they've got contracts for non-exclusive (leasing), exclusive and syncronization (film, TV etc) on checkout.

It all seems a little unprfessional and I want to be as professional as possible. The only contract info I've found on the site is:

www.myflashstore.net/faq/article/whats_t..._lease_and_exclusive

Also, I've read that 3rd party servers need to be used, I'm fine with this but it would be nice to have a section on the site briefly explaining the full uploading process and information about contracts.

I'm guessing on the Paypal reciept it says what type was bought?


James

I think beatkings takes a percentage of your publishing im not sure tho... but Thats not a good look.. Your better off setting something up on your own website if thats how you want to work

You need to write your own contracts and deliver them to the customer. Everybody has different terms to their contracts and it wouldn't be fair for us force users to comply to one standard contact that we designed. If you are intent of having the customer sign the contract then you can use third party electronic signature service like www.docusign.com/ (i've never used them, I just did a quick search on Google).

You only need to use a third party server if you are uploading track-outs for your beats. We want to keep our service costs at a reasonable level and if we were to allow large file track-outs uploaded to our server then we would need to increase this cost. So we recommend you upload your track-outs to a third party service like MegaUpload who offer 200GB free space, then just paste the download link into MFS and it will be delivered to all exclusive purchase customers. MP3 and WAV files are uploaded directly on to our server. All this information is explained when you got to upload a Track-out.

Ok, thanks for the replys. Ye I read about the servers before and that seems 100% fine to me. When I checked out the uploder, it says it only accepts MP3's? Is that because I've got the free account at the minute?

I think I will write up a few contracts soon and post them on the forum to see what you guys think.


James

You're welcome!

Well yes WAV and Track-outs are only available to Gold and Platinum members, but even so, when up upgrade, you have to upload the MP3 for streaming purposes and then upload the WAV afterwards.

For creating your own contract, are there any good links that you know are legit information?

When you go into the legal realm things can get grey very fast if you don't use the right wording.

I'm guessing you mean when you get the PayPal payment email, you send the contract to the email address that paid you.

Where is a good place to state your lease agreement terms before a purchase?

In other words, if the customer doesn't see it until they already made the purchase, they might get mad. Say they are thinking a 5,000 copy lease and your agreement says 2,000 copies, they're not gonna be happy.

I think once I write my contract up and decide how many copies per lease, I'm going to put it on the sidebar of my profile so cats know what the deal is.

Ye, it would be ideal to have a customizable contract in the checkout. Whatever you do it's not going to be very professional because the contract isn't intergrated in the player. So the customer could probably weasel their way out of it if they wanted to.

After thinking about it, I don't really see the use in sending a contract after the purchase as it will be void ... you can't tell people the terms after they've paid. Sending information on how you want them to use the lease might be an idea, just incase they didn't see before they purchased, then just hope that they are honest.

I suppose the important question to anyone using myFlashStore is; do you need a 100% secure contract?

In reality, when will you need the contract? Probably only if you had to take them to court and could also proove that they've used the beat more than you said they could in the contract. Basically if it's a hit and they wont buy the exclusive. Which is unlikely.

Can anyone think of any other time you would need the contract?


James

When I said "customizable contract", I meant that it's customized buy the beatmaker i.e. you pick from some contract templates.

Best way to protect yourself is to upload tagged beats....

Make sure wherever you are selling your beat to let the customer know that leases will include your tags. That way when they purchase you will have your tag on the beat and they cant reproduce without the tag. Fix your tag so that it doesnt over power the track, but can still be heard. If they want exclusive rights, the tag can be removed and its business as usual.

You can also spell out the terms/conditions of the "contract" on the page/site you are selling from. This way everything you want is read prior to making the purchase and is in plain view for all customers to see. Let them know that an electronic copy of what is on your site will be sent to them after purchase.