Remember Kanye West tweeting that his album would never be on Apple or available on sale and would only remain on TIDAL? Well his influence and gimmicks alone was able to sign up over 2 million subscribers to the streaming platform.
However, one of those subscribers was enraged on April 1st, when TLOP dropped on Apple Music and Spotify. Justin Baker-Rhett feels Kanye West deliberately deceived fans in an effort to boost TIDAL's membership numbers and has outlined a class-action lawsuit against Kanye West, Jay-Z, and TIDAL. The lawsuit intends not only to refund users who were misled to the "exclusivity" of Kanye West's album. The real issue is in the way the app is designed. After the 30-day free trail the app automatically renews memberships opposed to having users accept a paid membership extension. With TLOP's album delays, members had locked in a contract after the 30-days and demand they have an opportunity to opt-out with a refund.
If the lawsuit sticks and moves forward into action, TIDAL could be forced to refund users with a negative renewal option which could hurt future profits and projections. TIDAL will also face negative perception in the marketplace for delivering empty promises.
