something i’ve noticed recently is digital releases that will be worldwide except for china, especially on independent artists. this is even the case on my own release, even though my distributor told me it would be available worldwide. oddly, when i ran it with atisket and included itunes, china was removed. (i won’t be changing the release because i know it’s available on other chinese platforms). is this the fault of the distributor or something to do with itunes? should we make releases “worldwide” if itunes excludes china, since the artist probably expected it to be worldwide?
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iTunes doesn’t exist in China. Only Apple Music. Because of this, occasionally the Apple Music release in China has a different barcode. Also, keep in mind that China gets removed if it’s only on Deezer, so you need to re-run on marlonob’s original a-tisket just to double check. Much of the time this will take care of the issue because it’s actually on Deezer. Double check Jaxsta (https://jaxsta.com/) and see if they say it’s in China. The distribution list there comes directly from the distributor and not the music stores. Also, you can just directly search for iTunes releases anywhere in the world by the following site, just select China and see if it’s there: Experience the App Store and iTunes Anywhere | fnd
Update: Hoax by peeinmysock | a‐tisket: A multi‐source seeder for MusicBrainz (marlonob.info) shows it as Worldwide. This is why I’ve asked several times for the mirror of a-tisket to be updated, but it has fallen on deaf ears.
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I’d run every release in a-tisket on the original and not the mirror if the mirror says it’s exempted in any country if Deezer also has the release. See the a-tisket thread for all the explanations.
ohh thank you for explaining! i didn’t realize this was a problem with other countries, and not just curaçao. i hope it’ll be fixed soon, because i’d much rather just use the mirror.
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The main three are Curacao, China & India.
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so i think i figured out the issue with china. it is not the fault of atisket, it is the fault of either apple music or the chinese laws. i’m pretty sure only major labels have access to apple music in china. every time i add an independent release (through distrokid or routenote for example), china is excluded. however, if it’s distributed through umg, warner, etc, it will include china. the reason the old atisket recognizes china is because deezer reports all the countries they’re licensed to release in. so if deezer ever does become available in china, these releases will be available, but it’s not there right now.
i’ve been setting these as worldwide because it ususally is available in china through other platforms
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I’ve also been seeing releases marked as excluded from iTunes/Apple Music in Myanmar, Burkina Faso and Brunei.
i’m not sure about myanmar, but i think burkina faso and brunei are a glitch with preorders. every time i add a preorder, it shows up with those two excluded, but once it actually is released, they’re available.
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Has this issue persisted on any releases of yours after they were released? I’ve seen quite a few releases that remain unavailable in those territories years after they were released.
Here’s an example. It’s available on Apple Music only, which may explain the problem. (I seem to recall some other releases that weren’t Apple Music exclusives that are also affected; I’ll edit this post again with updates when I find one.)
on my own releases, i’ve only seen the china issue. this is weird because when you change to the bf and bn itunes sites, they are available… maybe this one is an atisket issue? these countries are relatively new additions to itunes/apple music, so maybe the itunes api doesn’t work the same way there.
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IIRC, only Apple Music is available in China, which is what is causing all the API exclusions.
@tigerman325, is the iTunes Store active at all in Burkina Faso or Brunei?
iTunes doesn’t exist in China, only Apple Music does. Apple Music uses a different API that’s not free.
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According to Wikipedia, both started on iTunes in 2012. They both still seem to be active as if I go to a release and replace the country code (“US”) with the “BF” or “BN” both pages have the link “Also available in the iTunes Store”. When they are Apple Music only, they don’t show that link on the page.
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