Today, I got a notice from Findaway that the terms of usage is being changed. They are owned by Spotify. The contract contains the following:
Licenses that you grant to us
a: User Content
You retain ownership of your User Content when you post it to the Service. However, in order for us to provide the Service to you we do need a limited license from you to that User Content. Accordingly, you hereby grant Spotify a non-exclusive, transferable, sublicensable, royalty-free, fully paid, irrevocable, worldwide license to reproduce, make available, perform and display, translate, modify, create derivative works from (such as transcripts of User Content), distribute, and otherwise use any such User Content through any medium, whether alone or in combination with other Content or materials, in any manner and by any means, method or technology, whether now known or hereafter created, in connection with the Service, the promotion, advertising or marketing of the Service, and the operation of Spotify’s (and its successors’ and affiliates’) business, including for systems and products management, improvement and development, testing, training, modeling and implementation in connection with the Spotify Service.
I have bolded the problematic terms in this above statement.
As such, I am removing all of my audiobook titles from distribution with Findaway Voices immediately. I will be uploading audiobooks directly with Kobo in the upcoming days. Apple will continue to be distributed to through ACX. Audible is unaffected. I will be looking for a new distributor for places like Everand, libraries, and so on moving forward.
This sort of sly inclusions is why it’s critical for authors to always read their distribution agreements, especially when dealing with corporations.
I will be making my audiobooks available at my Patreon store in the upcoming days as well.
I’m sorry for the inconvenience, but I can’t remain with a distributor who blatantly participates in a rights grab.
Don’t blame you. That reads weasel-y in the extreme.
Hope the rest of your day is drama-free!
As an avid audiobook fan I fully support your decision and I am glad you read the contract … so many don’t bother until it is too late.
I do have a question. You said “I will be looking for a new distributor for places like Everand, libraries, and so on moving forward.” Does this mean you will be removing your books from Everand?
Yes, because Findaway was the distributor handling them, and that contract covers books submitted to Everand. I am looking for a new distributor now, so hopefully the outage at Everand won’t be long.
I HIGHLY recommend Kobo Plus; my audiobooks will be moving to there first.
That’s quite an alarming grab. Thank you for sharing it.
Gaah !
I too would reject such assholeishness.
I would ask a lawyer if I had any grounds to sue for attempting to make such changes to your existing agreement.
A third-party that distributes your content needs some very limited rights in order to do so, but what you showed is pre-meditated theft.
I don’t have grounds to sue because it hasn’t taken effect yet. I DO have grounds to sever the contract without penalty, which is what I have done.
Bloody hell!!
It just gets worse. 🙁
I would sever that contract too.
Agreed. I became annoyed less than half way through that “agreement”.
Really? What jackweasels! I am glad you are so diligent. Another company that wants to make as much money possible through screwing others. Maybe the other artists such as singers and songwriters should start looking at their contracts too. It’s just a matter of time. This makes me rethink my whole association with Spotify.
They got screwed first. That’s how I knew to read the contract when it changed.
Well I have cancelled Spotify and next is Chirp.
I am absolutely addicted to your audiobooks, so I want to thank you for producing them and not completing pulling them. You are by far my favorite listen on an almost daily basis. Please ignore the haters as you have many more loyal and devoted fans, we may not be as vocal but much more dedicated
Thank you again for producing audiobooks. I look forward to whatever you gift us with.
You missed a couple of items that needed to be highlighted. Basically they are stealing all rights to you creative content, now, in the future on any technology whether it exists yet or not. That is so wrong!
Yep. I highlighted the most critical tidbits just to get the point across. The entire clause is a clusterfuck.
Sounds like a attempt to keep all of their authors with them
No, it’s an attempt to grab rights so they can make movies, sell ebooks at other sites, etc.
That is kinda insane. I can see someone at a brainstorming meeting — we need more access to content but without those pesky authors telling us what we can’t do, any ideas.
And a (soon to be promoted) subordinate speaks up — well this is really crazy, and I can’t see many agreeing to it, but what if we… (cue evil laughter)
Do they own Chirp, too? That’s where I’ve been buying your audiobooks.
Chirp distributes through them, so unfortunately, my time with chirp is terminated as of today unless they provide a sane distributor.
OMG! Do authors really sign this? This basically gives the book to Spotify to do whatever they want with the book, sell it how they want, alter it how they want all without paying a dime to the author, and it cannot be undone or canceled! I really, really hope no one will ever sign this.
There are some who will, but a lot are abandoning ship in a hurry. Most of my friends have been cancelling their contracts today. The ones that don’t? They’re fucked. I wish them the best of luck. They’ll need it.