Following general outcry from artists and labels, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has sent a demand letter to the attorney representing the HitPiece.com site, which offered NFTs from a wide variety of artists without authorisation from rights holders and accused the individuals behind the project of “outright theft.”

Even though HitPiece.com has been taken offline with its operators, the RIAA’s letter asked that its founders stop infringing music creator intellectual property rights, provide a complete listing of site activities and revenues to date, and account for all NFTs and artwork auctioned off.

RIAA’s Chairman and Chief Operating Officer Mitch Glazier explained why the association made the decision to move quickly: “As music lovers and artists embrace new technologies like NFTs, there’s always someone looking to exploit their excitement and energy. Given how fans were misled and defrauded by these unauthorized NFTs and the massive risk to both fans and artists posed by HitPiece and potential copycats, it was clear we had to move immediately and urgently to stand up for fairness and honesty in the market.”

Liability for prior conduct

In the letter, RIAA Senior Vice President, Litigation Jared Freedman wrote: “Your clients’ operations have been variously described in recent days as a ‘scam’, a ‘complete sham’, ‘immoral’, ‘unethical’, and a ‘fraud’. All of these criticisms are of course accurate. Although it appears that your clients now contend that they did not actually include any sound recordings with their NFTs (which, if true, likely amounts to yet another form of fraud), it is undeniable that, to promote and sell their NFTs, your clients used the names and images of the Record Companies’ recording artists, along with copyrighted album art and other protected images, the rights to which belong to the Record Companies and their artists. Your clients’ outright theft of these valuable intellectual property rights is as outrageous as it is brazen.”

The letter continues: “We are aware that your clients have recently taken down the Hitpiece.com website, although it appears that they may have launched a new and as yet content-free website at GetHitPiece.com. Regardless, this does not absolve them of liability for their prior conduct. Accordingly, we demand that your clients immediately: (1) cease and desist from any further infringement of the rights of the Record Companies and their recording artists, whether through the Hitpiece.com or GetHitPiece.com websites or by any other means, (2) keep the Hitpiece.com website offline and inaccessible to the public, (3) provide us with an accounting of all revenue derived from Hitpiece.com, and (4) provide us with a complete list of every NFT, along with all artwork and text associated with each NFT, that was ever offered for auction on the Hitpiece.com website.”

Selling without permission

Opposition to the site was immediate when artists noticed that HitPiece was minting NFTs without their approval and without compensation. The site promised the following: “Each HitPiece NFT is a One of One NFT for each unique song recording. Members build their Hitlist of their favorite songs, get on leaderboards, and receive in real life value such as access and experiences with Artists.”

Rock band Eve 6 was one of the first to react on Twitter: “this site ‘hitpiece’ is selling nft’s of our band and MANY others without permission. if you’re in a band click the link you may be on here. cease and desist motherfuckers. nft’s are fraud”

British artist Nat Puff tweeted the following message: “My art is currently being sold on the blockchain by people who are not affiliated with me at all. I do not know who uploaded them to @joinhitpiece. They profit. NFT’s are shit & if you support them you’re indirectly supporting the downfall of independent artistry. FOH.”

Fraudulent NFTs

Singer, songwriter and activist David Lowery published a series of tweets once he noticed that HitPiece was featuring material from one of his bands, Camper van Beethoven. “Look at all these fraudulent NFTs for @campervanbeethoven. NFTs are totally a scam. Anyone hyping this shit is gonna end up in jail. Let’s start with the folks at @joinhitpiece.”

After identifying Rory Felton as one of the project’s co-founder (the other partner is Michael Berrin, according to Meaww), Lowery tweeted: “Dude portrays himself as on some mission to help musicians. Also he holds himself out as an expert on complicated music rights. He cannot claim ignorance.”

Felton is a former record company executive. According to his LinkedIn page he was the co-founder/CEO of los Angeles-based label The Militia Group/Sony Music, between 2000 and 2012. He also created in 2015 Feltone, described as a “post-media music group with global distribution through Sony Music/The Orchard.”

A scam operation

Lowery also urged indie labels’ organisation A2IM to take action. “Last night a person by the name of Rory Felton posted a site–Hitpiece.com–with many artists’ tracks as NFTs. A2IM takes this very seriously, and has taken steps to address this gross infringement of intellectual property rights. A2IM is in no way associated with this action” reads a tweet from A2IM.”

For RIAA’s Chief Legal Officer Ken Doroshow, HitPiece “appears to be little more than a scam operation designed to trade on fans’ love of music and desire to connect more closely with artists, using buzzwords and jargon to gloss over their complete failure to obtain necessary rights.”

He added: “Fans were led to believe they were purchasing an NFT genuinely associated with an artist and their work when that was not at all the case. While the operators appear to have taken the main HitPiece site offline for now, this move was necessary to ensure a fair accounting for the harm HitPiece and its operators have already done and to ensure that this site or copycats don’t simply resume their scams under another name.”