"Dynamically interesting and forward moving"

[MattCurious]

Hi Casey

It may be the classic problem of communicating in writing, but your tone is coming over a little pushy, verging on aggressive. I don't know why you've taken it upon yourself to defend a position that I'm not attacking.

I don't want to extend this conversation so please don't think me rude if I don't reply. I was aiming to let off some steam and provide Taxi with some feedback, not start a debate with other members - especially when the point is being missed so widely.

I wasn't aware that a direct email was an option, so I'll do that in future.

Best wishes
Matt

[Casey H]

I didn't mean to come off aggressive or nasty and I'm sorry if it reads to you that way. I was merely trying to get enough info to have a discussion about it and didn't think you provided that.

Wish you the best.
Casey

[admin]

I just skimmed this because I'm heading out the door, but copying and pasting the verbiage of the listing into a critique is Kosher. It serves to remind the member what the listing said when they read the comments from the screener. Copying and pasting feedback from one member's critique to another's will get a screener fired. Copying and pasting feedback from one song or track from the same member to another song or track on the same form can sometimes be okay, as we often see the same problems from song to song, and thee same feedback would apply.

Hope that helps,
Michael

[admin]

P.S. The screeners are not paid by the song or track. They are paid by the hour, and they're told to go for quality over quantity, Frankly, they make more money if they go slowly.

We have somebody whose only job it is, is to monitor the quality of their work, and answer members' emails about issues like this. I find the phrase "pay for play" inapplicable to TAXI, and frankly insulting. It has a negative connotation, and implies there's not any other value given. This forum is free, the Road Rally is free, the newsletter is free, TAXI TV is free, the community is free... we give a ton of value for free, and frankly, you'd be VERY hard pressed to find any members who ever had a piece of music signed to a publisher or placed in a TV show or film prior to joining TAXI.

Prior to TAXI existing, 99.9% of all musicians had no idea that the entire film/TV music industry (as it is today) even existed, 95% of all music licensed came from a handful of pro composers who wrote for a handful of libraries, or it came from Warner Special Products, Sony, Universal, etc. Sorry to sound cranky, but the pay to play moniker infers sleaze, and at this point thousands of musicians have their music heard all over the world every day of the year and get paid for that because of TAXI.

If you've got a problem with a critique or a screener, let us know. Going public FIRST comes across to me as looking for "Yeah, me too" support for emotional satisfaction rather than simply reaching out to us and having the problem looked at and resolved. We're pretty famous for providing great customer service.

Ask anybody who has been on these forums for years knows, it's EXTREMELY rare that I take down a post or kick anybody off the forum. But sometimes I feel like I should just to save people from looking problematic to the industry people who DO lurk here. I can think of three people who run listings with TAXI who've been on the forum this week alone.

We've also got two new screeners who are both working music supervisors, and I know one of them goes on the forum from time to time. I'm just guessing here, but I would think most industry people would prefer to work with composers/musicians who would come to them first with a problem, rather than going on a public forum first.

Sorry if that sounds harsh, but I really care about how our members are perceived by the industry. And yes, a big part of that is because the actions of a few can influence how the members as a whole are perceived. We've been riding the crest of a wave of "Holy crap, the music you sent me is better than anything I've gotten elsewhere," lately. I want to keep that positive, forward momentum going.

best,
Michael

[MattCurious]

Hi Michael

Thanks for taking the time to respond.

I appreciate that you’d only had the time to skim the discussion, so you probably didn’t see the post where I mentioned that I wasn’t aware it was possible to reach out to Taxi directly.

My understanding had been that this forum was the feedback mechanism because of its subtitle in the index – otherwise, I agree with you: an online forum wouldn't be my usual first stop for this kind of feedback. You probably didn’t get the chance to see the part where I shut the conversation down when it started to seem fractious - I agree that these things are important.

Regarding “pay to play” - I don’t think it always has a sleazy connotation, but maybe it’s used differently in the States. I certainly didn’t mean it like that, only as a convenient shorthand for a model where people pay to participate – to my mind, eBay, Uber and Airbnb are all two-sided, pay-to-play models.

In any case – "sleazy" has certainly not been my experience of Taxi, and I wouldn’t want anyone to think that it was.

In fact, I agree that Taxi provides a lot of value. The aim was principally to provide some useful feedback to improve an otherwise excellent service.

Now I know it’s an option, I’d be very pleased to chat about that with you (or indeed anyone else at Taxi) directly.

Best wishes
Matt

[admin]

Thanks Matt. Our 800 number is at the top, right side of our web pages.

If you're outside of the U.S., you can call us at 818-222-2464. You can also reach out to our headscreener (Andy) at headscreener(at)taxi(dot)com or Andy(at)taxi(dot)com. He's there to help!

best,
Michael