iZueL_

Electronic music producer (and sometimes Dj) based in Munich

About that YouTube Channel “HATE” 🤔

Almost four years ago I started realizing how powerful YouTube can be related to reaching people with music.

I discovered then the channel called HATE, which had close to 2k subscribers, back in the days. For those times it was a lot.

HATE Logo

I used it to discover new music and new releases in a more “natural” way than using other music portals. There were very few releases not being covered by HATE. I even supported them buying a merchandising T-shirt because I liked the work they were doing.

After some years they even started with a sub-channel called HATE Lab for those “not so popular” Techno labels. Normally they were only digital releases.

It was then when I had the idea of writing them in order to publish my Numbers EP on their sub-channel. I just wanted to reach some more people.

I wrote them an Email and they just ignored it. Maybe because I was not famous enough or the music was not good enough for them.

My second try was time ago with my Track Robicious, which then I had available on my Bandcamp page. They politely replied to my email two days later, asking for a donation. I replied that I had already donated time ago by purchasing the T-shirt. They asked then for a €2,50 donation, which I then understood, because of time investment and effort.

After having my first release published on the HATE Lab sub-channel I saw one release from the Techno label Counterstrike. (Edit 20190109: changed to a fictional label name due a privacy request) They are people which I know personally . I spoke with them about the donation, and they just started to laugh.

They had donated nothing.

MEME_RAPTOR

Their release was even on the main HATE channel. Then I started to wonder how those channels were “helping” those small underground artists.

After that, I contacted the people from HATE again for different releases from a Techno label of mine. They were asking always for a “donation” of €2,5 per Track, which I always paid. Only one release was not uploaded on their channel. Curiously it was exactly that one where I didn’t mention the “small donation”.

For my last Album release Speranza in the Dunkelheit, I wrote them a long email. I was asking for the upload on their sub-channel, but this time without that “small donation”. On my email, I argued that I was not feeling well at all having to pay a “small donation” for each Track or release. I’m a small artist spending huge amounts of money on mastering, because of caring about my end consumers. I was neither spamming with new requests every month. I was already “supporting” them with the donations done through my Label. They replied a not so long email explaining about their time invests. In the end, I paid again.

I think I wrote that Email because somehow I was slowly feeling scammed about that. Having to pay a “donation”, which was not optional or a donation at all. For me a donation is when you have the option for pay or not to pay.

I wrote them some weeks ago about the last release from a release series of my Label. That time I did not mention the donation amount.

I’m still waiting for a reply.

The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing.

– Henry Ford.

In my opinion, if you are working with big and small labels, you should try to get a percentage of profit from them. If you don’t ask for money to those big labels but to the small ones, you are not helping this community at all. If you don’t miss any big label release but you ignore those small labels and artists, neither.

I don’t want to think about how many other Techno Labels have maybe rejected that donation. How many releases me and thousands of people have missed.

Think about your information sources and ask everything twice.

The Cake is (sometimes) a lie.

PS. If you have questions or you don’t believe me, I can provide the Emails to prove what I write.

PS2. I don’t think that this post will have any relevance, but the more you know…

PS3. No, you will not see posts like this on Facebook or on Instagram 😅, but I’m sure that I was not the only one facing this situation.

PS4. This is not a “rage” Blog Entry.

Click to rate this post!
[Total: 0 Average: 0]

Next Post

Previous Post


© 2024 iZueL_


Subscribe to Telegram

contact@izuel.xyz

If you want you can get any updates via email. Just subscribe to my Newsletter.

No SPAM, I promise

[matomo_opt_out]