A company caled HitPiece is facing sharp criticism from numerous musicians for selling NFTs of their songs without their permission.
Beginning February 1st, artists such as Ted Leo, Amber Coffman, and Sadie Dupuis from Speedy Ortiz began tweeting that their songs were being sold as NFTs on HitPiece. “Hey you stupid fucks HitPiece,” Dupuis tweeted, “we don’t have any deal with you or any NFT site and there SURE DOES LOOK like an active auction going on for a Speedy Ortiz song.” She tweeted a screenshot of a direct message chat with HitPiece’s Twitter account as well. Other artists expressed their surprise at being sold on the platform as well, saying they never made a deal with HitPiece.
HitPiece responded to the criticism via Twitter, saying, “Clearly we have struck a nerve and are very eager to create the ideal experience for music fans. To be clear, artists get paid when digital goods are sold on HitPiece.” They went to say their platform is still in beta and that they are actively listening to all of the feedback. Upon visiting their website, a statement simply reads, “We started the conversation and we’re listening.”
Founded in 2021 by Rory Felton and Jeff Burningham (an early investor in Spotify), HitPiece accesses Spotify’s API to turn songs into NFTs for sale on their platform.
