It's a bit of a 'long-and-winding-road' kind of tale, so I will not lay it out in detail, but suffice it to say that my account there was more or less "stagnant"; largely because I have very few 'fans'; consequently, low activity at my Google Play Store pages, and also because my unique-musique might not be what many folks think of as 'mainstream' music, and it is certainly not for everyone, so 'random listenership' tends to be low, for sure.
And, even though I do promote my pages at Google Play from time to time via social media and other means, getting 'steady traffic' is tricky and I don't even expect that for my kind of music.
I get that. I really do. And it's alright.
But I thought my (paid for) artist account was safe there, to be able to glean ongoing revenues (albeit slow and low) in perpetuity; without me having to perform a great deal of 'maintenance' on the account, and without fear of things like what has happened to my account and the 47 cents I had earned.
Further, because I had received at least one 'payout' (I believe it was for $1.38), my account information had my direct-deposit bank account already set up. I am still not sure why the 47 cents wasn't just sent there, except I was told it wasn't enough to meet the 'payout eligibility' of $1.00.
Again...
Huh?
After numerous back-and-forth e-mail communications, and after concluding that Google Play had no intention of trying to 'reinstate' the 47 cents, I pretty much gave up on saying any more about how I felt about their inadequate and inappropriate (IMhO) handling of my account there.
Fortunately, I am not relying on any revenues from my Google Play artist account for my livelihood, and my initial intent for even opening the account was to have a place to share some of my creations with friends, family, and yes, public listeners, if anyone found them to their liking.
I never expected a flood of people to rush to my Google Play pages to download or stream my tracks, because I know my stuff is "different".
It is home-recorded, and some of it is what I call 'ad-libbed-jamming', and it is not the kind of music one might want to try to 'cover', as much of it is made up of highly 'random' (i.e., "in the moment") segments and components of the compositions.
I'm pretty sure some of it even breaks the rules of traditional music protocols.
But, that's a whole other story.
So, it appears I've lost my 'fortune' of the 47 cents, but my music artist account at Google Play is once again "active". They had 'paused' it briefly, and asked me to update some information before reinstating it. The account has now gleaned another whopping 23 cents(!), so there's that, of course.
As part of my personal 'frustration-relief', I promised myself (and the folks at Google Play) that I would use the experience as a 'learning tool' for others, by posting it to my pages here.
It really all boils down to being careful to try to read and understand the myriad "Terms and Conditions" and other procedures, processes, policies, and other things that govern some of our online account memberships; and, what it takes, if anything, to maintain active membership at the various sites we might choose to use for digital marketing or other purposes.
It is another case of live and learn, though I have to say I am still very puzzled about the whole scenario surrounding my Google Play artist account. I will probably never know the 'whole story', but I cannot and will not let this experience keep me from keeping on, right?
Just sayin'...
If anyone is interested,
here's a link to my funky stuff.
here's a link to my funky stuff.
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