Fuck Tunecore, and fuck AI-generated music

First off, let's open with some good news:

If you go over to my music page you'll find all my releases have been updated. Some with new covers. Some new releases in general..

..And all have been moved to Bandcamp, each for just $1 (no matter how many tracks there are), plus the ability to just outright listen there.

I did this for one reason:

Tunecore fucking shit the bed, and rather than switch to another distributor, I decided to say fuck it and stop distributing to streaming platforms entirely.

Tunecore has decided that now they are into AI-generated music, and are working with Google to ensure that the enslopification of music streaming continues to get worse, so folks like me are going to be even harder to discover on streaming platforms.

I made sure to let Tunecore know how I felt about it, and their bullshit canned response? It's below.

Thank you for reaching out! We support the use of GenAI in music when artists’ rights are respected, datasets used to train models are properly licensed, and creators retain transparency and control over their work. For this reason, and as GenAI detection technologies have progressed significantly, TuneCore enables the distribution of music created using GenAI tools only where the underlying models rely on fully licensed datasets.

This approach reflects our responsibility as an artist development company to protect creative ownership and revenues, striving to eliminate low-quality, mass-generated AI content, while supporting responsible innovation.

When evaluating a GenAI tool in their music content creation process, artists should look for:

· Clear information about how the tool is trained

· Explicit statements regarding the licensing or rights-clearance of training datasets.

· Transparent terms of service outlining ownership and usage rights.

If a tool doesn’t clearly explain where its training data comes from or how it is licensed, artists should proceed with caution.

For more information on our GenAI framework, you can refer to our FAQ here: https://support.tunecore.com/hc/en-us/articles/46914166185236-TuneCore-s-GenAI-Music-Content-Framework

Here's the thing: This is literally bullshit. We can be pretty fucking sure that Google is not actually actively "licensing" music for their models. Nobody is licensing jack fucking shit for their models; at best they are scraping content platforms they own, relying on their Terms of Service and Privacy Policy in order to give them some vague sense of legal justifications.

I've already cancelled my Tunecore account, and shortly after publishing this? I'll be submitting requests to remove all my releases from streaming platforms.

Here's the funny thing: I'll honestly probably make more money doing it this way just because of how fucking little I make on streaming revenue (hint: Artists make literally fractions of a penny per stream). My account currently has.. $0.53 in streaming revenue since releasing my last record.

Just one sale of any of my releases will earn me more than I have on streaming to major platforms.