My Bad Experience With Beatstars.com And Their Content ID / Distribution Service – Review

They attract with making money by streaming your beats on Spotify, YouTube, Soundcloud and many more. But the truth is that BeatStars will take the control of your beats and don’t care about the producers and their rights. I don’t want to write down all details of my story cause this article would be far too long. But what I’ve experienced with BeatStars is unbelievable.

On the start page they advertise:
“Wouldn’t you like to get paid from other peoples´s YouTube videos that use your music?”

The correct sentence (in my opinion) would be:
“Wouldn´t you like to get ripped of from BeatStars who use your music as their own?”

Here is the “short” version of my story just to show you how BeatStars is handle their distribution service:

More than 1 year ago I entered the distribution service on beatstars.com. I send maybe 40 of my beats for distribution. Later I was wondering why I got YouTube claims (by INgroove, later by BeatStars directly) on so many of my beats on YouTube. I wrote INgroove more than 3 times but never got any answer. Later I was able to found out that INgrooves opened this claims for BeatStars. They put all my beats into their Content ID system and I’m not able anymore to monetize my videos on YouTube. I wrote the BeatStars support multiple times. After a lot of unanswered emails I opened oppositions for all of my claimed instrumentals on YouTube.

I finally got an answer from BeatStars. But unfortunately not on my previous unanswered emails. I got an angry message from the BeatStars CEO Abe Batshon, that I gave them the right to monetize my beats on YouTube etc. and that I should close the disputes asap. I asked him for the terms of use where this is written with the Content ID system (because it was nowhere written at this point) and got no answer anymore. After that I wrote him again and again and all I got was an old YouTube video where he explains how to enter and use the distribution service. There was no word about the Content ID system or the claims or anything else. I asked him again for the official terms of use and never got an answer about this (because it was nowhere written at this time!).

Only then did I realize that my beats on Spotify & Co are all UNTAGGED (without voice tags). This was also nowhere written in the BeatStars terms of use. That means that everybody with a minimum technically skill is able to download my beats. In other words, anyone could use my BeatStars distributed beats without buying a license.

After I realized that BeatStars distributed my beats everywhere without voice tags, I contacted the support again. I asked for a takedown of all my beats from their Content ID system and all partner sites, where they uploaded my untagged beats. The support told me that I have to pay for every single beat that should be removed from the BeatStars distribution system. So what? I asked you again where I can find this clause in their terms of use. The answer was that they will make an exception and delete my beats free of charge (cause it was nowhere written that I´ll have to pay for a takedown). They told me to wait 60-90 days for the takedown.

After the BeatStars support told me to wait 60-90 days, for the full takedown of my beats, I waited longer than that. Unfortunately, my beats were not removed even after this period of time. So I wrote the BeatStars support on a monthly base, for more than a half year, before they started to remove just a few more of my beats from their Content ID system. But 90% of my beats still online after more than 6 month. I needed more than 4 additional month and a official (paid) lawyer to get 70% of my beats removed from their Content ID system and partner sites!

It’s unbelievable but true, they just don’t give a sh** about the rights of producers and customers. They also don´t care if I would take legal action. I sold a lot of this beats exclusively in the meanwhile. I wrote them that they should delete this beats asap cause I don’t have any rights anymore for this beats. But they just claimed the YouTube videos from my customers who bought exclusive rights and just give a sh** about it!

I deleted my whole BeatStars account and told them that I don’t need a refund about my already paid subscription for 1 year. I just wanted to get my beats removed from their distribution system. After I canceled my subscription and wasn’t a BeatStars member anymore I thought they don’t have the rights anymore to make money by monetize my beats etc.. But I was wrong! Also after I deleted my whole paid advance account on BeatStars, they still was claiming me and my customers YouTube videos. They still making money with my and my customers beats by streaming them on multiple platforms and open claims on YouTube. They just stopped to send my payouts for the distribution service. So BeatStars is trying to making money with beats from producers in any way and absolutely give no sh** about the rights of their producers + their customers! I would say that at BeatStars it´s all about the money. BeatStars is dead for me!

BeatStars is, in my personal opinion, the worst platform I ever saw in the beat selling industry! BeatStars is making money outside of all international copyright laws and give a sh** about producers, lawyers and customers. I know that BeatStars offer a lot of good features and for some people it´s maybe really profitable. But do you really want to offer your beats on such an ignorant and “greedy for money” beat selling platform? I’m not saying that everything is bad on BeatStars. This is just my experience with BeatStars. Just think about it if it’s worth to make some additional dollars in a month to get trouble like this.

Maybe you had similar experience with BeatStars?

Feel free to write your experience and / or opinion in the comments.

If you are looking for a legit platform to sell your beats, I recommend to go with airbit.com.

– InsaneBeatz

CHECK OUT HOW THIS STORY CONTINUES:

BEATSTARS DID IT AGAIN AND EARNED MONEY WITH MY MUSIC BEHIND MY BACK!

CLICK HERE TO READ PART 2