We find your missing royalties and make sure you get paid. No upfront fees. No ownership grab. You keep 100% of your music.
Section 1. What Davincii Does For You
Davincii handles the administrative side of your publishing so you can focus on making music. That includes:
- Registering your songs with PROs (ASCAP, BMI, SOCAN, and others), mechanical agencies, and collection societies — wherever we're able to collect.
- Hunting down royalties you've already earned but haven't been paid — including money sitting uncollected before you joined Davincii.
- Collecting and sending you your share of every dollar we find.
- Handling registration paperwork on your behalf so you don't have to.
We only administer your share of each song. We have zero authority over any co-writer's interest. And we will never license your sync rights without your explicit written approval.
Your ownership is untouched. This agreement gives Davincii a non-exclusive right to administer your submitted catalog — nothing more. You keep 100% of your copyright, always. The writer's share of performance income that PROs pay directly to you as a songwriter is yours entirely and is never touched by Davincii.
Historical royalties. If we find and recover money you earned before signing up — through gap analysis, audit work, or registration corrections — that money is treated the same as any other royalty we collect: we apply the administration fee for that royalty type under §3.1 and send you the rest. One honest caveat: societies cap how far back claims can reach (BMI adjustment claims run about nine months, ASCAP about a survey year), and unmatched money that ages out is redistributed under society "black box" rules before anyone can claim it — so some past royalties are unrecoverable no matter how well we register.
1.1 Metadata. To maximize what we recover, you agree to give us accurate song info: writer splits, co-writer details, ISWC and ISRC codes, and release dates. If we receive incomplete or inaccurate data, we can't be held responsible for any resulting gaps.
1.2 Limited Power of Attorney. To register your songs, we need a narrow power of attorney — strictly limited to filing registrations with PROs, mechanical agencies, and collection societies for your submitted catalog (including Compositions added on your behalf under Section 2.1.2). If a society needs your signature on registration paperwork and you don't respond within 10 business days of our request, we may sign it for you under this power — administration purposes only, never ownership. This cannot be used to transfer ownership or encumber your rights in any way, and it expires the moment this agreement ends (except as needed to collect during the 12-month post-termination window in Section 4 — and never beyond it).
1.3 Digital Performance Royalties (Neighboring Rights). If you own or control the sound recording rights and haven't directed collection elsewhere, you can separately opt in — in your dashboard, by electronic signature — to authorize Davincii to register those recordings with SoundExchange and collect the sound-recording owner's share of digital performance royalties on your behalf. At this time, SoundExchange (United States) is the only organization through which we collect these royalties. This covers only the owner's share: the featured-artist share is never included and is paid by SoundExchange directly to you. The fee is the all-other-royalty rate in §3.1. We won't touch digital performance royalties without this opt-in, and you can withdraw any claim, or the authorization entirely, at any time. All claims under this section — including §2.1.3 proactive claims on Priority Accounts (§2.1) — are made under this authorization and your warranty that the recordings are yours, so reversals are your responsibility: if a claim is withdrawn, relinquished, or determined by SoundExchange to belong to someone else, SoundExchange may reverse (debit) royalties it previously paid on it. Whatever was credited or paid to you on a reversed claim is recovered as a §3.5 adjustment, and fees already charged on reversed royalties are not refunded.
1.4 Non-Exclusive Administration Grant. The rights you grant Davincii under this agreement are non-exclusive: Davincii takes no exclusive rights in your Compositions, you remain free to use, license, and deal in your songs yourself, and you can stop submitting new Compositions to Davincii at any point. One practical rule protects your royalties: when two administrators register the same share of the same song, societies flag the conflict and freeze payment on it. So while a Composition is in your submitted catalog, you agree that Davincii is the only publishing administrator registering and collecting your share of it. You may withdraw a Composition from your submitted catalog at any time by written notice — for example, to move it to another administrator — and we will promptly release or correct our registrations for it. This grant applies only to Compositions in your submitted catalog — those you have specifically submitted, plus any added on your behalf under Section 2.1.2. Songs outside your submitted catalog remain entirely your own to deal with as you choose.
1.4.1 Overlapping Arrangements. Because administration under this agreement is non-exclusive:
- (a) Pre-existing third-party publishing agreements. Any Composition already subject to a publishing administration or publishing agreement with a third party (for example, Songtrust, Kobalt, or a traditional music publisher) should not be submitted to Davincii while the prior commitment is in effect, so we don't both attempt to register the same share with the same society. You may continue honoring those obligations without breach.
- (b) Record label (master recording) agreements. Nothing in this agreement limits your right to enter into a record label agreement — whether now or in the future — covering the sound recording (master) rights to any Composition, including future releases. Publishing administration and master recording rights are separate, and Davincii claims no interest in your master recording income (see §2).
1.5 Sub-Publishing. Davincii may appoint sub-publishers or affiliated collection societies to administer your Compositions in specific territories, where necessary to maximize collection. Any such appointment: (a) does not change the administration fee percentages in §3.1 — though where a sub-publisher or local society charges its own fee, Davincii's fee and your share are calculated on the net sums Davincii actually receives after that charge, and any such charge is itemized on your statements; (b) does not transfer copyright; and (c) is subject to the same limitations on sync licensing as this agreement — no sub-publisher may license your sync rights without your explicit written approval (see Section 1 and §3.2). We will notify you of any material sub-publishing arrangement within 30 days of it taking effect.
1.6 Davincii's Service Warranties. Davincii warrants and undertakes that it will:
- Perform all registration and administration services with reasonable skill and care, consistent with industry practice;
- Maintain accurate records of all Compositions, registrations, and royalties collected on your behalf;
- Promptly notify you if any registration is rejected or if any issue arises that materially affects collection for your catalog.
Section 2. Your Catalog
Your catalog is yours to define. It includes songs you've specifically submitted to Davincii, songs we've accepted for registration, and in certain circumstances, songs that Davincii submits on your behalf as set out in Section 2.1.2 below.
"Compositions" means a musical work you authored or co-authored that is part of your submitted catalog, whether it existed when you signed up or was added later. "Royalty Income" means publishing income from those songs: performance royalties (publisher's share), mechanical royalties, sync income, and related publishing revenue. It does not include master recording income or label-side royalties.
2.1 Priority Accounts. Davincii selects certain accounts for proactive administration — we call these Priority Accounts. Selection is at Davincii's sole discretion, based on factors including catalog scale, commercial activity, and operational capacity, and Priority status may be offered or withdrawn at any time. Priority status costs you nothing: there is no additional fee, and royalties collected through the work described in this Section are subject to the same §3.1 schedule as everything else we collect for you. Before we begin each category of work described in §2.1.1 through §2.1.3 (and, for §2.1.3, only if you have opted in under §1.3) on your catalog, you will receive a written notification at least forty-eight (48) hours in advance describing the scope of work — the notice applies to beginning that category of work, not to each individual Composition or claim. You may opt out at any time before the work begins, or pause or cancel it while in progress, by writing to
info@davincii.co. Opting out doesn't affect any other part of the Service: your day-to-day registration of Compositions you submit through the dashboard continues under the standard Service terms either way.
2.1.1 Back-Catalog Audit Program. As a Priority Account, in addition to the day-to-day registration of Compositions you submit through the dashboard, Davincii proactively audits your historical releases across Spotify, the Mechanical Licensing Collective (MLC), BMI Songview, ASCAP ACE, and other public registries to identify unregistered works, missing IPI numbers, and recoverable royalty gaps, then registers qualifying works to your PROs and mechanical-rights societies under the publishing administration authority granted in this agreement.
2.1.2 Davincii-Initiated Submissions. For Priority Accounts, Davincii may identify and submit Compositions into your catalog on your behalf without waiting for you to initiate. This includes: (a) Compositions discovered through gap analysis or royalty audit work — including the §2.1.1 audit — that appear to be unregistered or misregistered; (b) previously released Compositions in your back catalog that were not submitted at onboarding; and (c) any Composition Davincii identifies as generating unmatched or unclaimed royalty income in your name. Davincii will not initiate submission of any Composition that appears to be under an active third-party publishing or administration agreement (see Section 1.4.1(a)) — those are handled only at your direction, and only once you confirm the prior commitment has ended or that you have the right to move them. Compositions submitted under this Section become part of your submitted catalog, and all royalties collected on them are treated identically to the rest of your catalog. If a Davincii-initiated Composition turns out not to be yours, tell us and we will promptly withdraw or correct the registration; your responsibilities under Section 5 apply to a Davincii-initiated Composition only from the point you confirm it as yours, or to the extent a claim results from information you provided.
2.1.3 Proactive SoundExchange Claiming. If you have opted in to digital performance collection under §1.3, you agree that Davincii may identify and claim on your behalf recordings that appear independently owned — meaning the recording's copyright (℗) line shows your own legal or stage name and no third-party label, licensee, or distributor — without a separate per-recording confirmation from you. We will never proactively claim a recording whose ownership signals point to a label or licensing arrangement. All proactive claims are made under your §1.3 authorization and are subject to its reversal rules. If a proactively claimed recording turns out to be owned by, or already committed to, someone else, we will withdraw the claim promptly, and you may instruct us to withdraw any claim at any time. If you have not opted in under §1.3, this subsection does not operate.
Section 3. Fees
3.1 Administration Fee. There's no upfront cost — Davincii is paid only as a percentage of what we actually collect for you, and that percentage depends on the type of royalty:
- Performance royalties (publisher's share) — 15%. Davincii retains 15%; you receive 85%.
- Mechanical royalties — 20%. Davincii retains 20%; you receive 80%.
- Sync you source (passive) — 20%. When you bring the placement and Davincii only administers and collects, Davincii retains 20%; you receive 80% (see §3.2).
- Sync we source (active) — 35%. When Davincii sources, pitches, or negotiates the placement for you, Davincii retains 35%; you receive 65% (see §3.2).
- All other royalty income — 15%. Including digital-performance / neighboring-rights income and money recovered through gap analysis or audit work: Davincii retains 15%; you receive 85%.
Historical royalties we recover from before you joined are treated the same as any other royalty of the same type, under this same schedule. The schedule that applies to you is the one in effect when you complete onboarding (or your most recent re-sign); we can change it for you only with your written sign-off under §7.3, and we never apply a new rate retroactively to royalties already earned. Percentages are applied to the amounts that actually reach Davincii: societies and platforms deduct their own charges before paying through (and §1.5 covers sub-publisher deductions), so your share and ours are computed on the same net figure.
3.2 Sync Licensing and Commission. Synchronization ("sync") means licensing your music into visual media — film, TV, advertising, games, and the like.
We will never license your sync rights without your explicit written approval. When a sync license is granted with your approval, Davincii's commission depends on who brought the deal:
- Passive sync — 20%. You (or a third party you work with) source and bring the placement, and Davincii only administers, issues the license, and collects. Davincii retains 20%; you receive 80%.
- Active sync — 35%. Davincii sources, pitches, or negotiates the placement on your behalf. Davincii retains 35%; you receive 65%.
This commission applies to the synchronization fee for the license.
3.3 Accounting and Payment. Every quarter, within 45 days of the quarter closing, you'll receive a clear statement showing what was collected, what was deducted, and what's yours — and your share is credited to your account balance in the Davincii dashboard at the same time. You can withdraw your available balance whenever you like through the dashboard, once it reaches $25 and your §3.5 tax form is on file; balances under $25 roll forward until they pass that mark. We pay via ACH, wire, PayPal, or another method we agree on. Foreign income is converted at the exchange rate applied when it reaches us, and balances waiting in your account don't bear interest. Keep your payout details current: a payment sent to the account you most recently designated counts as delivered to you. And if your account ever goes dormant while holding a balance, the money stays yours — we'll try to reach you and keep holding it, and if we truly can't find you, we hand it to your state's unclaimed-property program as the law requires. We never keep it.
3.4 Your Audit Right. Once per year, with 30 days' notice, you have the right to audit our records at your expense. Statements are considered final if no written objection is raised within one year of receipt.
3.5 Adjustments and Withholding. Royalty pipelines self-correct: societies and platforms sometimes reverse, recoup, or restate amounts they previously paid — for example, after detecting artificial streaming or a reporting error. If money we already credited or paid to you is later reversed or reduced at the source, we may deduct the corresponding amount from your future balances, and if your balance doesn't cover it, you agree to repay the difference within 30 days of our notice. The same pass-through applies to penalties a platform or society charges us because of artificial or fraudulent activity on your catalog — for example, Spotify's per-track artificial-streaming fee. Before your first payout we need a valid W-9 (US persons) or W-8BEN (everyone else) on file — the dashboard walks you through it — and we withhold whatever that form and the law require, plus any amounts we are ordered to withhold by a court, authority, or sanctions rule. You're responsible for your own taxes on what we pay you; we issue 1099 or 1042-S forms as the IRS requires, and you agree to receive statements and tax documents electronically (paper copies on request). If a bona fide dispute arises over the ownership or splits of a Composition — a co-writer claim, an overlapping registration, a third-party demand — we may hold the affected royalties until it's resolved, and you agree to provide the documentation needed to resolve it. We'll tell you when we place a hold, hold only the amounts actually in dispute, review the hold at least quarterly, and release it as soon as the dispute is documented as resolved. Societies do the same upstream: The MLC, for example, parks contested shares in suspense until the claimants sort them out. Every adjustment is itemized on your next statement. And this section survives the end of the agreement: societies can reverse money years later, and an adjustment owed doesn't expire just because the agreement did.
3.6 Interest on Funds We Hold. Between the time a society or platform pays Davincii and the time your share reaches you, the money sits in Davincii's business bank accounts, some of which are interest-bearing. Any interest those accounts earn belongs to Davincii and is not allocated to you — it goes toward the cost of running registration, collection, and payout operations. This does not change what you're owed: your share is calculated under §3.1 on the amounts that reach us, so our holding the funds never makes your share smaller, and it never makes it larger either (§3.3 says the same thing from the other side — your dashboard balance doesn't accrue interest). We won't delay a payout in order to earn interest on it: the §3.3 quarterly schedule governs regardless of what the money is doing in the meantime. If the law of your state or country requires that interest on funds held for you be passed through, that law controls over this subsection.
Section 4. Term and What Happens When You Leave
This agreement starts on the date you complete onboarding and continues until terminated. Either of us can end it at any time with 30 days' written notice — no minimum term, no lock-in, no penalty. Either party may also end it without waiting out that notice period if the other commits a material breach and doesn't fix it within 30 days of written notice of the breach.
Suspension for cause. We may suspend your account, or end this agreement immediately without the 30-day notice, if we reasonably determine that your account or catalog is involved in fraud (including artificial or manipulated streaming), infringement, or other unlawful activity, or if a collection society or platform requires it. Where practicable, we will notify you and give you a chance to respond. Royalties you legitimately earned are still paid under §3.3; amounts a society reverses or recoups are handled under §3.5.
After you leave. For 12 months after this agreement ends, Davincii continues collecting royalties you earned during the term — including historical royalties covered by Section 1 that we were already pursuing — making sure you get paid for work already done. Our administration fees (per the schedule in §3.1) apply only during that window, and quarterly statements under §3.3 continue throughout it. We also stop making new registrations once the agreement ends, and at your written direction (per §7.2) we release, relinquish, or hand off our society registrations within 30 days — the letter-of-relinquishment paperwork a new administrator needs — so your next setup can take over; the 12-month window then covers only money still routed to us through the old registrations. Once the 12 months are up, Davincii has no further right to collect or take any fees, regardless of when the money was earned — and if royalties nonetheless land in our accounts after that, we forward every dollar to you without taking anything, net only of any §3.5 adjustment still owed. Within 60 days after the collection window closes, we'll send you a final accounting and everything owed. The one obligation that outlives this window is §3.5: if a society later reverses or adjusts money that was already paid, that still gets squared — in both directions.
Section 5. Your Promises to Us
By signing up, you confirm that: (a) you have reached the age of majority where you live and are at least 18 years old — or a parent or legal guardian has reviewed and accepted this agreement on your behalf as the contracting party and agrees to be personally bound by it — and you (or that guardian) have the authority to enter it; (b) you own or co-own the songs you submit to Davincii, the splits and metadata you give us are accurate, and you have not already committed those specific rights to another publishing administrator or publisher; (c) your songs don't infringe anyone else's rights, and any samples or interpolations in them are cleared in writing; (d) if you are accepting as an Authorized Representative, you have the authority to bind the Artist, and these Terms bind the Artist as if they had accepted directly; (e) neither you nor anyone acting for you will generate or purchase artificial streams or otherwise manipulate consumption of your catalog — and third-party "promotion" services you hire are your responsibility; and (f) you aren't subject to sanctions that would bar us from serving or paying you. You'll tell us promptly if any of these confirmations stops being true — including if you sell or transfer your interest in a Composition, or terminate a grant that covers one.
If a claim arises because one of those things turns out to be untrue, you agree to cover us. Your side of the split is also yours to distribute: co-writers, producers, and anyone else you owe a share are paid by you out of your share, and their claims are yours to resolve — we administer and pay only your share. Both of us also agree to keep each other's private financial and business information confidential — during this agreement and for three years after it ends.
5.1 Promotional Use. You grant Davincii a non-exclusive, royalty-free license to use your name, artist photo, cover artwork, and song titles to promote Davincii — on our website, social media, and marketing materials. You confirm you hold the rights to this content, and may withdraw this permission in writing at any time.
5.2 Your Account. Keep your login credentials private and your contact details current. You're responsible for activity under your account until you tell us something is wrong — if you suspect unauthorized access, email
info@davincii.co and we'll lock it down. We may suspend access to protect you or the Service while we investigate.
Section 6. The Legal Stuff
6.1 Liability. Royalty amounts are controlled by third-party organizations — we can't guarantee a specific outcome, and we aren't responsible for the acts, errors, delays, or insolvency of societies, platforms, or payment processors (though we'll always help you chase what they owe). Except for the §1.6 service warranties, the dashboard and website are provided as is, and we disclaim implied warranties — including merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose — to the extent the law allows. If Davincii is ever found liable for a claim, our liability is capped at the greater of $100 or the fees we retained in the 12 months before the claim. One thing this cap never touches: royalties we've collected that belong to you. Those aren't damages — they're your money, and we owe them in full. And except as noted below, Davincii isn't liable for any indirect, incidental, special, or consequential losses — including lost profits, lost future royalties, lost business opportunities, or lost data — even if we were warned such losses were possible. That exclusion is about speculative projections: royalties you can show we failed to collect in breach of our §1.6 warranties are direct damages — covered by the cap above, not excluded. None of these limits applies in cases of gross negligence or willful misconduct on our part. Some states don't allow the exclusion of implied warranties or consequential damages, so those parts may not apply to you; where they don't, our liability is still limited to the fullest extent the law allows.
6.2 Force Majeure. Neither of us is on the hook for delays or failures caused by things outside our control — acts of God, government action, internet or platform outages, failures at societies or payment networks, pandemics. We'll notify each other quickly and get back on track as soon as reasonably possible. One thing such an event never excuses: money we've already collected for you stays owed — delivery just pauses until we're able to transmit it.
6.3 Disputes. If we have a disagreement, talk to us first: send a written description of the dispute to
info@davincii.co, and we'll both try in good faith to resolve it within 60 days. If that doesn't work, the dispute will be resolved by binding individual arbitration administered by the American Arbitration Association under its Consumer Arbitration Rules, held in New York, NY or the county where you live (hearings can be by videoconference) — not by a class, collective, or representative action, and both of us waive the right to a jury trial. The Federal Arbitration Act governs this section. Fees follow the AAA's consumer schedule: your filing fee is capped at the consumer amount, and Davincii pays the AAA's remaining administrative fees and the arbitrator's compensation. Two carve-outs: either of us may bring an individual claim in small claims court (yours or ours — the New York County clause below doesn't override this), and either of us may go to court for injunctive relief to protect intellectual property. Each side bears its own attorneys' fees, unless the arbitrator finds a claim was frivolous or brought in bad faith and awards them. If 25 or more similar demands are filed against Davincii by coordinated counsel, the AAA's Mass Arbitration Supplementary Rules apply — batching for efficiency only; no outcome binds anyone who wasn't a party to their own case. If the class-action waiver above is found unenforceable for a particular dispute, this entire arbitration provision is void as to that dispute — nothing in it permits class-wide arbitration. You may opt out of arbitration entirely by emailing
info@davincii.co within 30 days of accepting these Terms — opting out doesn't affect any other part of this agreement. If we ever materially change this section, the change won't apply to disputes that already arose, and you get a fresh 30-day opt-out. New York law governs this agreement, and anything that belongs in court (including if you opted out) goes to the state or federal courts sitting in New York County, whose jurisdiction we both accept — except where the law of your home state or country guarantees you a local venue or its mandatory protections. And if you live in the European Economic Area or the United Kingdom, the arbitration requirement and class waiver don't apply to you at all: you keep every protection of your home country's consumer law and may bring disputes in your local courts.
Section 7. Everything Else
7.1 Assignment. Davincii may transfer this agreement to an affiliate or successor, as long as they take on all obligations and you're notified within 10 days. Your rights and protections carry over fully. You may not transfer this agreement without our written consent.
7.2 Notices. We'll reach each other by email or certified mail, using the contact info provided at onboarding or updated later in writing. An email notice counts as received two business days after it's sent, unless the sender gets a bounce or delivery-failure message.
7.3 Full Agreement and Changes. This is the complete agreement between us — except that if you and Davincii have also signed an individual administration agreement, that signed agreement controls wherever the two conflict. Any change to your fees or your rights requires written sign-off from both parties — no surprises, no unilateral edits. Changes never reach backward: the version you accepted governs royalties already earned and disputes that already arose. Davincii may make administrative updates that don't reduce your rights, increase your obligations, or change your fees (clarifications, contact details, process descriptions) by posting the updated Terms and notifying you at least 30 days in advance.
7.4 Severability, No Waiver, and Survival. If any part of this is found unenforceable, everything else stays in effect. If we don't enforce a provision right away, we haven't waived it. And the parts of this agreement that by their nature outlive it survive termination — including §3.5 (adjustments), §4's collection window, §5 (your promises and confidentiality), §6, and anything concerning money already collected. Electronic signatures are valid and binding.
7.5 Metadata Delivery Format. You agree to deliver song metadata in a format reasonably requested by Davincii (such as a completed intake form, spreadsheet, or digital upload). Davincii will provide a template.
Davincii LLC — New York, NY — davincii.co — Terms of Service v13 — Last updated August 3, 2026