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Copyright bots tried to sue Phototropic records over a release on Classic Goa Trax. (Update: Issue resolved.)


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Well i got a letter from a lawyer today about the releases

Synsun - Full Power of Goa and  Synsun - Sounds of Cosmic Lifeforms.

In it the lawyer claims that i violate the rights that Classic Goa tracks has for these tracks and that it my contract is "long due", and therefore i lost the right to the tracks and i have to pay the lawyer.

I didn't know at that time that my rights got lost at some point in time and also i was not contacted before that in any way by Classic Goa Tracks, the first contact was the letter by the lawyer.

I am now contacting Synsun to resolve the issue.

 

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I'm almost certain that lawyer is a scammer not actually acting on behalf of Classic Goa Trax / Suntrip, and that the lawsuit is the result of some automated (bot crawling) activity. In other words, I believe the lawyer was never retained but acts by himself, trying to scam people into paying warning fees for alleged copyright violations, claiming to act in the name of whomever.

These things seem to happen in waves anytime copyright regulations are "updated". It'll be interesting to see how this is resolved, and I hope nobody gets harmed.

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8 minutes ago, digitoxin said:

according to the lawyer

And I'm pretty sure this is the tricky bit.

Have you talked to Jos? He's the last person I guess anybody would expect to do fishy and completely absurd stuff like this. But why speak for him, he'll see this and reply, and probably be very cooperative.

As said, I hope this won't do any harm to anybody. :(

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Very much sounds like a scam due to the simple fact that no one would pay a lawyer to enforce rights for something that doesn't earn money. 
Look at bandcamp "Full Power of Goa" has 24 copies sold (possibly some of them given as promos). How many minutes of a lawyers time do you think the profit from those copies covers?
And if they sue you, what are they suing for? Damages for the 7 copies you sold?

Also I know how at least suntrips contract looks, and what you describe here is definitely not their style.  

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Jos Vranken of Classic Goa Tracks wants to remove the Phototopic releases of the Synsun albums by claiming that the Copyright is "long overdue" and the albums are now owned by Classic Goa Tracks.

The purpose of suing is to remove the Phototropic versions of the releases.

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56 minutes ago, digitoxin said:

Jos Vranken of Classic Goa Tracks wants to remove the Phototopic releases of the Synsun albums by claiming that the Copyright is "long overdue" and the albums are now owned by Classic Goa Tracks.

The purpose of suing is to remove the Phototropic versions of the releases.

So remove the music then until it’s resolved? :) If the rights expired, and Jos label now owns the rights. Then it’s obviously an issue.

My two cents, without having any insight into contractual agreements. I only see now that the music in question is available on Spotify and Beatport by Phototropic. And on Classic Goa Trax Bandcamp. So there’s obviously something which needs to be adressed.

I hope it gets resolved and that the music will still be available, on all platforms somehow. And I wish all involved parties the best.

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Woow, this is interesting. It is done automatically by our distibutor. I can assure you no lawyer or anything is involved in any way :D What the hell? 

Basically, Synsun gave us the rights to distribute the music of Synsun digitally online as he said there is no deal about digital with Phototropic. And we spread it, and it was conflicted. Thats all that happened...

Just drop me a line Harald: Anoebis@suntriprecords.com and we fix it in no time... People that know us, and we worked with basically everyone in the scene, know we are always respecting agreements, contracts and deals. Its the basis of doing bussiness :) 

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I never agreed that my Copyright would expire or get handed over to another label. This would not work in the first place because all 3 albums have CD releases and the physical CDs cannot be pulled out of distribution, in fact sounds of cosmic lifeforms is still sold at psyshop etc. You cannot tell a shop to remove certain CDs because the Copyright expired, so a contract like that is impossible in the fist place.

But i also do not have a written contract, it was just emails 10years ago, at that time no one cared about the release (it was unreleased for 10 years at that point), so i didn't think this would become an issue in the future.

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Classic Goa Trax is not about cds. I dont want you to remove your cds, let that be clear :) Keep selling them! They are great even! 
The artist just handed over the digital rights. That is possible obviously. But thats all, and the distributor send out automatic claims when they saw there was a double. 

Edit: We will solve this, we are now in touch via email

 

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You tried to get the Phototropic versions deleted by claiming my rights on the tracks "expired".

I hope you know the difference between re-releasing rare Goa albums and stealing releases from their original label.

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5 hours ago, digitoxin said:

You tried to get the Phototropic versions deleted by claiming my rights on the tracks "expired".

I hope you know the difference between re-releasing rare Goa albums and stealing releases from their original label.

Oh Come on, we have a contract and pay the artist, and its the distributor that contacted you. There is no "stealing" whatsoever.

- the artist clearly said he wanted to do digital distribution only via us (He wasnt paid for digital distribution in the past and the "contract" allows it)
- we made a deal with them and made an official contract. Since Classic Goa Trax they get a large part of the sales (!)
- we launch this digitally via another distribution channel
- This distribution must have noticed some "inflicted releases" on digital only shops/streamings such as Spotify/Beatport/...
- They send their bot to you to bring it down
- Its logical this happened. I never checked every shop to see what is online and what is not (there are over 60 shops being distributed!) and I trust the artists in this, because they know what happened with their music. Also, dont underestimate the amount of labels claiming music that isnt theirs anymore contractwise...

And as said by mail, we are super flexible, I dont care at all how to solve this. Keep your stuff online, no problem. 
 

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It is a bit shoddy of the distributor...but it is probably further down the line.
For example Beatspace, which most psytrance labels use, uses Label Worx for digital distribution I think. They are big enough to have bots/lawyers writing cease and desist letters.
So it is the ugly side of the music business rearing its head, and probably nothing to do with any psytrance freaks other than them having to rely in part on the music-industrial complex :(

They will not sue you, it is not worth it for them, but they might get digital distribution channels to remove the releases since Classic Goa Trax has given them rights to handle digital distribution, and you probably cannot prove that you have such rights any more. 

Unfortunately it is unlikely Jos can do much about it even if he seems wiling to.

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I think I can ask them to reclaim (although this was not done via beatspace) but as you say. It are massive companies, I'm not sure how much is human and how much is AI. And even if reclaimed both will stand there next to eachother (which is ok for me, really). 

As for the music bussiness, thats another topic. And it should be discussed one day. This online world is one of the most mad things you can imagine. Fake labels, people claiming music that isnt theirs etc... 

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6 hours ago, digitoxin said:

You tried to get the Phototropic versions deleted by claiming my rights on the tracks "expired".

I hope you know the difference between re-releasing rare Goa albums and stealing releases from their original label.

 

We now have a fuller picture of the events leading up to this. What we don't have is input from Synsun, however it seems obvious that no one "stole" the music. Synsun willingly sold it to Goa Classix. To accuse someone of theft is not a small thing, certainly if there's no evidence presented to support the claims. I do think one needs to plan for a host of different outcomes when doing decisions in life in general, and certainly when it comes to deals/contracts/agreements. That beeing said, it comes across as not very nice of you, to create this topic here online with the name of Jos in the title. Instead of first trying to solve this with Synsun and Classic Goa Trax behind closed doors.

So something that could have been mitigated easily with proper communication with all involved parts (including Synsun). Or could have been avoided altogether by using foresight and logic. For some reason Synsun decided to leave your label, why I don't know, maybe there's more to this story. So I won't speculate on that. Bottom-line is no one forced anyone. And obviously since Jos didn't personally send some bots your way, the thread title isn't justified. He didn't sue you if I understood it correctly. So in that case the thread is grossly misrepresenting Jos and his label and their intentions.

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Might seem strange, but probably artist don't really have any say in this either. 
Distributor still have agreement claiming they have the rights for digital distribution, which artist agreed on when giving Classic Goa Trax the rights, and even if he wanted he has no power to withdraw those rights.

Also artists get cease and desist letters for putting up their own music on digital channels.

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I look at this topic as a modern newspaper: a title that sounds very spectacular and accusing. You click it and when you read it you think "oooh, thats only it". 

Anyway, to give some more detail, Synsun didnt leave any label. An artist is free to give their music to anyone if the contract allows it. So they can be part of many labels in some cases (although rare). In this case we never even wanted to "fight" with Phototropic in any way, as they are clearly the ones doing the cds. I support that 100%. As everyone knows Classic Goa Trax is only about digital goa-trance anyway. 

There is no suing involved at all either indeed. I think they just send out the basic mail, and see what happens. And well, or we come to an agreement or they go "further" which is kind of extreme of course, but it will never happen, for sure not if you know we are talking about 15€ every 3 months, of which 10€ is for Synsun in our case :D 

And yes, as Leo/Resonantearth sais: artists are not really involved in all this. Its companies and copyrights, no more no less, and the basics for this are contracts/deals/agreements. Once signed/agreed, many artists cant do much with their music... 

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Thanks for clarifying Jos and Resonantearth. :) Yeah it seems like drama for nothing really. These things are bound to happen sooner or later anyhow, and by the look of how the modern music industry works. It all seems very robotic/automated indeed.

What I always was curious about, altought it must vary considerably from case to case. Is what happened for example with the rights to the old school goa albums? Some I understand expired long ago, others changed ownership I guess with different label aquisitions/mergers.

But that’s something to create a new topic for. 

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24 minutes ago, AstralSphinx said:

Thanks for clarifying Jos and Resonantearth. :) Yeah it seems like drama for nothing really. These things are bound to happen sooner or later anyhow, and by the look of how the modern music industry works. It all seems very robotic/automated indeed.

What I always was curious about, altought it must vary considerably from case to case. Is what happened for example with the rights to the old school goa albums? Some I understand expired long ago, others changed ownership I guess with different label aquisitions/mergers.

But that’s something to create a new topic for. 

Well yes, do that in another topic, ask all you want and I get back to you :) 

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If the case was indeed malevolent then a post on a forum makes sense because it stirs up publicity. However it all seems like a misunderstanding and a bunch of gun-ho bots. I don't see the point in keeping this discussion open further as everything seems resolved. I'm editing the title and locking the thread.

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  • Penzoline changed the title to Copyright bots tried to sue Phototropic records over a release on Classic Goa Trax. (Update: Issue resolved.)
  • Penzoline locked this topic
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