TuneTribe was a digital
music download
A music download (commonly referred to as a digital download) is the digital transfer of music via the Internet into a device capable of decoding and playing it, such as a personal computer, portable media player, MP3 player or smartphone. Th ...
store that offers content from
major record labels
A record label, or record company, is a brand or trademark of music recordings and music videos, or the company that owns it. Sometimes, a record label is also a publishing company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the produc ...
,
independents and
unsigned artist
An unsigned artist, unsigned band or independent artist is a musician or musical group not under a contract with a record label. The terms are used in the music industry as a marketing technique. Bands that release their own material on self-publi ...
s. It is unknown when the site became defunct.
Availability
The total number of tracks available on TuneTribe exceeded 3 million, all of which were in MP3 format. Also, a boutique physical store existed selling limited edition CDs, books and high-end music related products, complementing their digital offering.
Music and artist recommendations on products and artist pages were provided by
Last.FM
Last.fm is a music website founded in the United Kingdom in 2002. Using a music recommender system called "Audioscrobbler", Last.fm builds a detailed profile of each user's musical taste by recording details of the tracks the user listens to, e ...
, with TuneTribe recommending Record Union (https://www.recordunion.com) to unsigned acts that wish to sell their music on the site.
Digital Platforms
TuneTribe's sister company, TuneTribe Digital, was a digital music service provider that builds and hosts digital platforms for a variety of brands across all the industries, utilizing the most important component - music. The company offered services that included digital downloads, streaming, competitions, pre-release promotions and vouchers.
Founding and Ownership
Launched in 2005, TuneTribe was founded by Tom Findlay of Groove Armada and John Strickland of Interesource. It was owned by William Haighton, an entrepreneur and director of BGS Holdings Ltd and GMW Entertainment Ltd in the UK. From 1995 to 2002 Haighton was a director of both SENA and NVPI, the Dutch equivalents respectively of the UK recording industry bodies, the
PRS (the Performing Rights Society) and the
BPI (the British Phonographic Industry).
References
Guardian report on launch
{{Music digital distribution platforms
Online music stores of the United Kingdom