Can Unsigned Artists be digitally distributed through iTunes?

An artist who has not signed to a major or independent record label can still get their music distributed via iTunes by a number of various companies also affiliated with Apple. The two that I will mention in this article are cdbaby.com and iFanz.com.

Out of the $0.70 cents remaining after Apple takes its $0.29 share, cdbaby only takes a 9% fee for each download, passing through to its artists a whopping 91% of the income! iFanz charges 40% per download. In both cases, the artist is responsible for all third party payments including any royalties payable to producers of the recordings and digital mechanical royalties which are paid to owners and/or controllers of the musical compositions contained in each recording.

With respect to digital mechanical royalties, the online service (i.e., iTunes), like a physical retailer, pays these royalties to the record companies (who own and control the recordings containing the songs) who in turn pay either the songwriters, music publishers or the Harry Fox Agency who in turn pays the music publishers.