# Twisted Jukebox - Late Payment of Royalties



## tsk (Jan 29, 2020)

Anyone here been paid by Twisted Jukebox since about June of last year? As far as I know other writers haven't received their royalties from this company and also as far as I know there have been some weird excuses and broken promises about it being paid before Christmas, then before some other date etc etc. It makes me wonder if the company is in financial trouble or something and can't pay.


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## Twisted J (Jan 31, 2020)

Hi Tsk, 
Feel free to email us or give us a ring to discuss this in person, we're always here to talk. All royalty statements have been sent and payments are being made without problems, no financial trouble at all. In fact quite the opposite, with this 6 month period seeing us send out our largest composer payments to date.

This thread does feel a little unfair as we actually pay our composers 6 months before most other libraries, as we work on the current 6 month period just finished, where as most work 6 months further back, so our composers get paid faster. This can lead to some small delays as we are sometimes waiting on our sub publishers to pay us.

We all come from a composer background so we like to treat our composers well, as we would like to be treated. 

As i say any other questions please feel free to say hi, our number and email address is on the website.

Thanks!
Twisted Jukebox


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## VI-Control Admin (Feb 6, 2020)

Twisted J said:


> Hi Tsk...


Minutes after their post, Twisted Jukebox threatened legal action against the forum if we did not remove this thread. They then repeated that threat twice more, giving us a deadline of Monday (3 days ago) to remove this thread, or else face the wrath of their "legal team."

Rest assured, VI-Control does not bow to threats. (We get at least one per year.) In fact, threats are a really stupid way to try to get our help. (I mean ... seriously?) So, assuming they are reading this, I will spell out a few facts they may be unaware of:

1. VI-Control is forum for composers to discuss various topics, such as which sample libraries to buy (or not buy), or to seek business advice, or for composition topics. Usually those discussions are very positive, since most samples libraries are very good, most publishers are good, most lawyers are good (although the "legal team" advising Twisted Jukebox is a little suspect), most Popsicles are good, etc.

Sometimes, however, comments about a product or service will be negative. Perhaps the editing in a strings library might be sloppy. Or maybe the recordings are, in some people's opinions, sub-par. This is where the real value of the forum comes in, because if there are flaws, better we know about them _before_ we plunk down hundreds of dollars on a purchase we would have regretted. Or better to find out a particular agent is useless _before_ signing.

That, to many at least, is a primary value of the forum - honest advice not only on what (and who) to buy or do business with, but also on what (and who) to avoid. This forum will continue to be a platform for that. Threaten all you like, this will not change.

2. We only have one lawyer (not an entire "team," like you guys do), but even in our numerically outmatched situation, the law is the law, and the law is very clear that websites (including forums) are not legally responsibility for what its members post. (Hint: Ever wonder why sites like Yelp aren't sued from here to kingdom come?)

3. "Malicious Prosecution." In the earlier days of VI-Control, Frederick (the previous admin) would sometimes bow to legal threats because certain developers are also attorneys. (Talk about an unfair situation!) So in Frederick's mind, a threat, even one without merit, could be costly.

New forum management, however, has a long history in the area of copyright infringement cases, and has aggressively used the concept of Malicious Prosecution to keep their legal bills down. "Malicious Prosecution" is a part of tort law (have your "legal team" explain this one to you), which is a counter-suit mechanism that does what the name implies. It's the ultimate ace-in-the hole when someone with a legally weak case tries to intimidate you.

4. For anyone reading this, none of what I'm saying should be taken as "legal advice." Get your own damn lawyer! 

5. Deep breath. (#5 was originally going to be "Blow me," which would have been so freakin' cool, right? Unfortunately, though, there's a wrinkle...)

The wrinkle:

Much as Twisted Jukebox has pissed us off with their threats (That's hard to tell, right? Trust me, the discussion amongst the moderators has not been pretty ... they're going to be really mad that I took out _"Blow me"_), there is also a certain amount of responsibility that @tsk (the OP) needs to take when he writes a post like his. It's not cool to post something that demands reply, then not even log back on to the forum for the next six days, and even then, still ignore Twisted Jukebox's reply, as well as ignoring our email to him to answer TJ in this thread.

So while our normal policy is to give the middle finger to bullies and let threads stand, we do take sympathy on Twisted Jukebox's situation. Mind you, the forum takes no position on anything @tsk or Twisted Jukebox has written. We have no idea what is, or is not, going on. We'd like to hope that this is all just a misunderstanding or a check lost in the mail or whatever, but we have no idea.

So even though we're not legally required to do anything here, and even though our normal inclination is to stand even steadfaster when someone tries to intimidate us, we do have a sympathetic side.

So for now (temporarily), we're moving the thread here in the Drama Zone. (The Drama Zone is a purgatory section that does not appear in the "Latest Posts" feed, so hardly anyone sees it.) If tsk still doesn't respond in the next few days, we'll delete it.


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## KallumS (Feb 7, 2020)

I love this place, never a dull moment.


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## Polkasound (Feb 13, 2020)

I wish Twisted Jukebox had never threatened legal action, because the two posts on their own serve as positive advertising for Twisted Jukebox. TJ responded to an allegation with a cool head and diplomatic candor. Tsk has a moral obligation to follow up on this thread, but never did, which leaves TJ coming out smelling like a bouquet of roses. I was so impressed with the professionalism of TJ's written response that I felt compelled to check out their website to learn more about them. (If only they had a polka category!)

Maybe if TJ would be willing to see this thread for its advertising value and drop the threat of legal action, VI-Control Admin could add "[resolved]" to the thread title and edit their own post to simply explain that the matter was resolved due to Tsk being unable/unwilling to substantiate his allegations.


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## Twisted J (Feb 13, 2020)

Hi Polka Sound, 

Thank you for the kind words and nice to hear you checked out what we do. 

We're a small indie, as i mentioned made up of staff that are all composers (or now ex composers due to time restraints) so we all know very well how important royalties are to composers. That's why this thread is pretty hard to take for us, as it's made up entirely of hear say, false information and a sweeping accusation with zero grounding, from a composer who hides behind a forum name (whilst being happy to name our company name in full on a public forum, where it remains forever) and then fails to reply or contact us. 

We've actually emailed VI admin to apologise if we came across as bullies, that was not our intention. As i say we are a small company really, so damaging false statements like TSK made can be really harmful for reputation (we were contacted by two worried composers immediately after TSK posted so you can see why we might of panicked and sort legal advise, in hind site made our approach was wrong). We are not taking legal action.

TSK stated that no one has been paid since June, well that is because we pay our statements in May and November, so it's a totally ridiculous accusation. Novembers was a little late but as also mentioned above we actually pay our composers 6 months in front of most other libraries, so for that reason some times 
things happen that are out of our hands and get delayed a little. 

We do actually wonder if TSK might be a competitor trying to harm us.

Sadly we've not heard back from either TSK or VI admin to our apology and was hoping after this length of time, this thread might of been deleted by now as promised.


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## Polkasound (Feb 13, 2020)

Welcome to VI-Control, even though the circumstances that brought you to VI Control are very unfortunate. It looks to me as though tsk made a hasty post without really understanding the payout process, and is probably now too embarrassed to apologize. That's just my guess. Either way, your level-headed responses exemplify the kind of professionalism that makes this forum unique, so I hope you'll stick around.


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## VI-Control Admin (Feb 14, 2020)

This is tricky situation. Personally, I don't think deleting the thread does you any favors. As Polkasound said, your reply sounded reasonable, so this thread could be seen as a positive, rather than a negative. (Many developers here insist that we do not delete negative comments for this same reason. Better to be talked about with a happy ending than not talked about at all.)

tsk hasn't logged on since my last post, so I'll give him until Monday. Reading between the lines here, it sounds like November's payments were late, likely after Christmas, and possibly even after January 29th (the day he posted), in which case I'm not so sure tsk's post is unreasonable. His other posts on the forum seem normal, so I don't think there's anything nefarious going on.

A little side note suggestion - If sub-publishers are late in paying you, I would roll those over into the next royalty statement, rather than delaying the current royalty payout. Everybody understands that you can't pay them until sub-publishers pay you, so that's easier to explain than paying late.

With all that said, it isn't cool that tsk hasn't yet responded, so on Monday, if he hasn't yet responded, I'll delete the whole thread, or if you prefer, I'll keep the thread with the [RESOLVED] marking that Polkasound suggested (good idea), and also delete my posts and the related discussion to my posts.


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## tsk (Mar 8, 2020)

Hi,

I apologize to everyone for the delay in returning to this thread to reply. It was not my intention to disappear. I will admit that I am not good at keeping up to date on the forum.

I would like to address the following points:

1. I did not state that TJ had not paid anyone since June. I ASKED if anyone had been paid since June.

2. I said "as far as I know" other composers had not been paid (I meant the November distribution). That was true to my knowledge at that time.

3. I did not accuse TJ of scamming anyone. Again, as far as I know, they ARE an honest company and they DO pay their composers.

4. However, I was concerned about not being paid and I was worried if I would be.

5. I have documented correspondence in which payment was softly promised to be made before Christmas. Bear in mind this was for a payment which is USUALLY delivered in November, and ultimately, this payment was not made until after the date of my first post in this thread, and after further inquiries.

6. Above all, I am shocked that TJ threatened VI-Control so harshly over this. I got on with TJ well but honestly, I'm scared of them now.

Considering the delay in payment, I felt it was fair to ask publicly what was happening. I voiced my worries and I did not state they were scamming anyone, because I didn't feel they were. And I don't think they are scammers now either. I think they're honest people. But I sure am freaked out by their response.

Feel free to review my other posts on the forum, as the admin already has done themselves as stated above. I am not a competitor and am only a concerned composer.

Thank you and I am sorry for the pain that this has caused.

To the admin - I really respect that you posted publicly about the threats received. Thank you for this.

And TJ - I am sorry for the way this appeared to you. I'm not trying to accuse you of acting in an underhanded way. I was worried and I wanted to know what other people thought in the same position as me. I don't have any composer friends and sometimes I can feel kind of isolated in this game.


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