Dear FULLNAME,

We're sending you this email as you currently have a seller account at Score Exchange and we're considering changing the method of selling music to customers. This may affect you and your sales, it will also affect you even if you currently make all your music available for free. Please read all the details carefully, then give us your opinion.

The problem that we're facing

For some time we have known that Scorch for Mac has not worked in an ideal way, in that the plug-in has only worked in Firefox (not in Safari, or Chrome) and only then when Firefox is running in 32-bit mode.

We have received many customer support enquires about this problem asking when we will be updating the plug-in to support more browsers. As Scorch is a plug-in developed by Avid Technology we have no control over future updates, so we are at the mercy of their development and release schedule.

This situation has worsened with the release of Firefox 18 in January 2013. In this version of Firefox, Scorch no longer works at all on Mac. The current situation is that Mac users wishing to view content on Score Exchange must make sure they are using Firefox in 32-bit mode, and do not install version 18 or later. This is far from ideal.

For Windows users the situation is somewhat better, in that Scorch (currently) works in Internet Explorer, Firefox and some versions of Chrome.

For users of any other systems e.g. Linux, iOS, Android etc, the Scorch plug-in is not and has never been compatible.

The statistics

About 75% of the visitors to Score Exchange use a Windows based computer, and approximately 20% of visitors use a Mac computer, the remaining 5% is made up of a variety of other systems, and mobile devices. This means that about 25% of visitors to the site currently have no way of viewing your music on Score Exchange without jumping through a lot of technical hoops.

This means that 25% of potential customers can not make a purchase.

Why use Scorch in the first place?

We use Scorch to display music on Score Exchange, because it has good digital rights management (DRM) systems built in. This means that customers who purchase music can not print more content than they should, and it's hard to share the purchased content with other people.

Scorch can also playback and transpose the music all using the same web browser plug-in.

Isn't Avid going to fix Scorch?

The current development schedule for Avid Sibelius products is currently unknown. Avid do not release details of their developments ahead of the main public announcements.

As you are probably aware, there has been some major changes in the development of Sibelius over the last few months. We currently do not anticipate a quick solution from Avid.

What other systems are available that do the same thing as Scorch?

To summarise - nothing. There is no other system that does exactly the same job as Scorch.

There are other systems that are designed to prevent printing of content in various different ways. Most of these require the user to install some sort of 'viewer' application, which uses a proprietary file format. The viewer application will then decide if the customer is allowed to print the file in question. Many of these systems only work on Windows based computers.

What other options are there?

Another option would be to make the process of accessing content on Score Exchange as easy as possible, with the least amount of barriers for customers. All content protection systems are barriers that the customer must work with. In some cases the technical challenges of working with a copy protection system is too much, and the customer abandons their purchase.

Score Exchange could use unencrypted files, and not worry about trying to restrict the number of times a file could be printed after it was purchased. This could be achieved using a regular PDF file that is made available to a customer after they have made a purchase.

Unrestricted printing of purchased content at any time in the future, would only be a minor change from the current situation on Score Exchange, where purchased content can be printed unlimited times for 24 hours after the first print.

PDF files are easily viewable on all computers, and most modern mobile devices, meaning that many more customers would be able to access and purchase the content in a highly compatible file format.

What should Score Exchange do?

Whatever the outcome, we intend that you will continue to upload the Sibelius files of your music, and they will be automatically processed into a suitable format to display online. You would not be required to perform any file conversion or use any other software to prepare your content.

Obviously we would implement a preview system, so that content for sale is not accessible until payment has been received. This would probably be a low quality image-based preview resulting in a similar quality preview as currently presented by Scorch.

Considering the current options, at this time we are currently in favour of changing Score Exchange to provide a PDF when a customer makes a purchase, instead of the right to print some content using Scorch. Not only would this solve all of the technical problems faced by buyers, but a PDF file is also the most common request that our customer support department receives.

Changing to providing content via PDF files would remove all Scorch installation and compatibility problems. It would also mean that the customer could print as many copies of the content as they required at any point in the future.

Comparison

	Scorch based sales (current)	PDF based sales
Preview before purchase
Works in all web browsers on all current major platforms
Also works on mobile devices and tablets
No special software required
Previews can easily be printed at high quality
Playback of content via MIDI
Playback of content via MP3 (not synchronised to the display)	(MP3 player is not part of Scorch)
Content can be easily transposed
Immediately after purchase
Content can be accessed on all modern devices and operating systems
Content can be used digitally (mobile / tablet devices) as well as printed on paper
No special software required to access purchased content
Can be printed at high quality
Can be printed multiple times (allowing for printer errors etc)	(prints allowed for 24 hours after initial print)
At any time after purchase
Content can be printed at any time in the future	(prints allowed for 24 hours after initial print)
Content can be printed as many times as required	(printing many copies is allowed for only 24 hours after the initial print)
Content can easily be copied to another computer or device for printing or display
Hard to share purchased content with other people, which would be illegal anyway.

What do you need to do?

After reading all the above information, we want your opinion on how Score Exchange should respond to the current problems that we face. We have created a short survey to collect responses from Score Exchange sellers like you.

Please take a moment to give us your feedback.