Stores like iTunes (and all those Windows Media-based alternatives, if anyone ever uses them) aren’t just the domain of major labels. Indie artists and smaller labels are finding their way onto these services, courtesy the power of distributors and other conduits. (For music, tools like CD Baby have been a big boon.)
But part of the potential of all of this technology was supposed to be video content as well as music. TuneCore has stepped up to the plate with a beta service that lets artists sell music videos via iTunes. Many artists, I suspect, will prefer to use videos as promotional tools only, but what’s nice here is you get iTunes to cover bandwidth for higher-quality downloads and get a little revenue stream, to boot. TuneCore explains the arrangement:
Delivery of the video will be completed with a flat, upfront fee paid to TuneCore and, as always, TuneCore customers receive 100% of the revenue from the sale of their music in a non-exclusive agreement that they can cancel at any time.
Here’s one example, a music video from Grammy winner Ziggy Marley, “Love is My Religion”, now available for purchase via TuneCore. (And I expect this could be commonplace: promote on YouTube, sell on iTunes, etc.)