Last month PledgeMusic, a service that connects artists directly to their fans by providing experiences, offerings, and limited edition collectibles, released a statement apologising for the backlog of artist payments. The post explained that the outstanding payments "will be brought current within the next 90 days."
Last Friday (1 February), PledgeMusic delivered an update on the develoments with the company, revealing, "We are in discussions with several interested parties about a potential partnership with or acquisition of PledgeMusic. These conversations, if successful, would lead to a transaction which would allow us to meet all of our outstanding obligations. As a result, we are hopeful that, as long as the company is given some breathing space to operate, a solution to these current problems will be found."
While they can't provide more details on the developments at the moment, they did explain they are in "advanced discussions with an independent third-party company to manage all artist funds going forward."
The post also revealed that co-founder of PledgeMusic Benji Rogers "has returned to the company as a volunteer strategic advisor and observer to the board of directors."
Benji Rogers delivered his own statement on the situation, revealing, "The first priority for the company is to sort the back payments issue as every penny that is owed to artists needs to get to them in the fastest possible time. A more detailed plan will be shared with the community shortly. Secondly all funds coming into the company from now on will be managed by an independent third party (to be named soon) so as to ensure that all campaigns that launch going forward, will be paid upon their campaign milestones being reached. The specifics of this will be detailed in the aforementioned forthcoming announcement."
While PledgeMusic close their statement asking those affected for "patience", users are continuing to voice their concern in the comments section. One user wrote, "Your statement sounds like you have absolutely no money to pay anyone now and the only way you hope to pay anyone is that “investors” will hopefully bail you out. Even if you can somehow figure out a way to make things right, your reputation is so damaged from the blatant fraud committed that slowly but surely everyone - artists and fans - are going to leave in droves"
