RIAA Slams “Rip-off Operation” HitPiece, Urges NFT Web site to Completely Shutter – EDM.com
HitPiece could have endured the shortest lifespan of any NFT platform so far, however the implications of its transient existence are nonetheless unraveling.
Co-founded by entrepreneurs Rory Felton and Jeff Burningham, HitPiece leveraged Spotify’s API to be able to checklist 1000’s of NFTs on the market equivalent to singles from innumerable completely different artists.
The positioning rapidly triggered a stir when artists spoke up on social media en masse, claiming nobody from HitPiece had consulted them with regard to monetizing their content material in NFT format. The swift rebuke triggered HitPiece to take down their website as rapidly because it popped up, although they recommended the transfer is merely a short lived measure.
Immediately, all that continues to be of {the marketplace} is a observe on the location’s homepage: “We began the dialog, and we’re listening.”
Regardless of HitPiece’s hasty mea culpa, the RIAA is in search of solutions as to what precisely occurred whereas HitPiece was reside. Specifically, the group is searching for transactional information. HitPiece beforehand claimed that no NFTs had been bought whereas {the marketplace} was reside, however the RIAA understandably isn’t content material to take their phrase for it.
In a letter to HitPiece from the RIAA, the authors name the location a “rip-off” in no unsure phrases and strongly urge HitPiece’s administration to maintain the service shuttered completely.
“As music lovers and artists embrace new applied sciences like NFTs, there’s all the time somebody trying to exploit their pleasure and vitality,” wrote RIAA’s Chairman and CEO, Mitch Glazie. “Given how followers had been misled and defrauded by these unauthorized NFTs and the large danger to each followers and artists posed by HitPiece and potential copycats, it was clear we needed to transfer instantly and urgently to face up for equity and honesty out there.”
“HitPiece seems to be little greater than a rip-off operation designed to commerce on followers’ love of music and want to attach extra intently with artists, utilizing buzzwords and jargon to gloss over their full failure to acquire essential rights,” added RIAA’s Chief Authorized Officer, Ken Doroshow. “Followers had been led to imagine they had been buying an NFT genuinely related to an artist and their work when that was under no circumstances the case.”
Learn the RIAA’s full assertion here.