Karaoke Forums

In the last week, we have reached settlement agreements with three KJs who are exiting the industry as a result of our suits. That business exit involves (a) turning over their equipment--hard drives, laptops, any discs they might have, and in some cases AV equipment; (b) making a significant payment to atone for past infringement; (c) accepting a 3-year exclusion from providing commercial karaoke services; and (d) accepting legal operation as a condition for re-entry after the exclusion period.

So, given that what we're actually doing is at odds with your unqualified statement of what you think we're doing, will you stop making the false statement that we don't want to put pirates out of business? If we didn't want to put pirates out of business, why would we offer the option stated above?

It is accurate that we will settle with defendants in a way that allows them to be legal going forward--and our latest settlements require full legality, not just being free of pirated SC material--but most of the legal KJs I talk to just want the playing field leveled. There is plenty of business for all of the KJs who are interested in operating legally.

If they did want to put them out of business, they wouldn't be treating them like "future" or "potential customers" would they?

And your reading comprehension is again in question. Read the title of the thread, please. Tt's not about what you quoted. Separate case altogether.

Harringtonlaw, I hope you have a cushion or a pillow and an ice pack if you are going to start banging your head against that wall.

Actuality, reality or facts will not sway the zealous.

Remember: Trademark infringement is merely a technicality.

The facts (there's that pesky word again) bear out that Dan Dan The Taxi Man or his representative(s) committed one or more procedural errors and this was compounded by an oversight from the bench. When I put the verifiable information, such as "we reached a settlement agreement with that defendant", into the again, verifiable, timeline it seems apparent to a layman such as myself that all that was left was for the court to acknowledge the settlement and conclude all relevant (open) matters. I have no idea why that seems to have been fouled up so badly.

Since it seems to be a major point of contention, I'd like to ask what would be considered grounds for a case to "go to court" with the goal of obtaining the holy grail: a ruling? I'm paraphrasing but, specifically, what would cause the plaintiff to reject settlement, or dismissal with someone who did have the discs but would not produce them. Another situation would be if someone didn't have the discs and somehow was able to forestall discovery and force you to litigate "in court".

Treating defendants like future customers seems to imply that "customers" are legal. They are no longer operating unfairly as thieves. Asset seizure and/or destruction as well as the stipulated "time off" and subsequent "legal operating clauses" that require verifiable legitimacy seem to me to be at the very least - adequate.

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Never the same show twice!

Once again, diafel, it is your comprehension that is in question. Read the post to which I responded in this thread, please. The aforementioned quotes are a direct response to JoeChartreuse's reference to the "separate case".

Rick I understand completely with what your saying and totally agree.

I was referring to what Joe had said. If SC is really out to fight piracy, something like that is (in my opinion) what its going to take. Make an example out of how ever many it takes to get the word out that you won't just get a slap on the wrist.

I'd rather see a $7500 judgement with whatever payment option they want to give as opossed to turning it into a sale of product. They're not even recovering losses if they give them product for the settlement price.

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My statements, opinions and conclusions are based on my own personal experiences, observations, research and/or just my own $.02. I'm not a "cheerleader", but that doesn't make me a Pirate.

When you say "we reached a settlement agreement with the defendant" are you talking about Ernie are are you talking about the taxi man?


If you think that has never happened, then you're the one missing "the facts."


Absolutely. Because that's exactly what they want. These defendants to be: future customers. If they were truly out to put them out of business, they wouldn't be treating them like anything other than the scum they are are. however, we see that that is not the case. They would much prefer to turn these pirates into your competitors rather than get them out of the industry for good.


If they're willing to go out of this business, they didn't need to be in the business in the first place, certainly not for economic reasons.

This is such a non-issue that I cannot believe that anyone takes this "argument" seriously.

Defendants are given several options:

1) They can show us that they have 1:1 correspondence; with an audit, they will have satisfied the terms of the media-shifting policy, and they're done with the lawsuit at no charge.

2) They can get legal by deleting all of their illegal material (all manus) and acquiring legal material, paying significantly more than retail for the privilege, and they are also required to divulge their source and any other operators they know to be operating illegally. I do not understand anyone's objection to this arrangement. It doesn't turn a pirate into a competitor. The pirate was already a competitor. It compromises the pirate's operation and forces him onto a level playing field.

3) They can leave the business, paying for their past infringement, forfeiting their karaoke equipment, staying out for 3 years, and promising to operate only legally if they return. This removes the pirate as a competitor for that period, then forces them into a level playing field if they choose to return.

4) They can fight, in which case the result will almost certainly be number 3, but at a much higher cost and with a permanent injunction rather than a 3 year exclusion.

We prefer option 1 or option 2 equally, because we are not at the point where the number of legal operators is adequate to satisfy the demand for karaoke. We want and need more customers, just as any business would. There may be some point in the future where we would prefer option 3, but we're a long way from that.

The defendant that Harringtonlaw is referring to as having reached a settlement is NOT Dan. I believe he's referring to Ernie, whose case we are not discussing here at the moment, as they were a part of the same lawsuit, before the judge ruled it to be separated. There is also at least one other defendant still tied in with Dan, so it could be him, but I don't think so.

This is not correct. You have muddled up the facts.

As far as I know, the defendant you named has not committed any procedural errors, nor have we reached a settlement agreement with him.

The defendant who had his motion to dismiss stricken was a different defendant. He re-filed his motion to dismiss, then settled with us immediately thereafter. The court did not "acknowledge the settlement" because the court had not been informed of the settlement yet. (As I indicated before, there were some additional things that had to be done first, and the defendant did not do them.)



It is pretty clear to me that the people who are urging us to pick someone out and pin them to the floor have never litigated in federal court. Judges do not like it when plaintiffs do that. They expect the parties to disputes to make reasonable efforts to settle them. They will, on occasion, make it clear to a plaintiff that life will become difficult if a case is not settled on reasonable terms. On top of that, a defendant who was targeted in that manner could file a petition in bankruptcy and stop the proceeding, at least temporarily. So it is not realistic to expect us to do that.

Then why don't you find out what went wrong? You should know and want to find out if this is your case. I know I would.


You're kidding me, right? How hard is it for you to ask a defendant, "These are the dates to choose from. Here's what works for us. Please let us know what works best for you." Sorry, but that's just lame. I did my own scheduling and while it was necessary to to know which judges were able to rule on a previous court order, it was ME, that had that knowledge, not the lawyer from the other side. She kept offering me dates that Masters were sitting at. I had to school a LAWYER on the fact that a Master cannot overturn or otherwise rule on a judgement from a Supreme Court Justice.Seems to me that Dan is a little smarter than you give him credit for.


Not really. The judge DID order you to go back and include ALL defendants, did he not?

Sound like you weren't crossing your "t's" and dotting your "i's", then. Also, I was not referring to Ernie in regards to the motion to dismiss, but the most recent motion to dismiss, filed by the other defendant (not Dan).


Sounds like just an excuse to me. Either that, or you need to get a new secretary. I know as I client, I would not accept that as an excuse for muddling up my case.

Again, I wasn't referring to Ernie and no questions about his part of the case.


Clearly you do consider them difficult to answer. You gave me an "I don"t know why", two feeble, barely plausible excuses and then referred to a completely different defendant.

So instead of paying $4800 they choose to forfeit all their equipment, plus "make a significant payment" and exit the business for three years? Prove it - name the names for us. That makes no sense at all.

I'm sure with the mandatory non-disclosure agreement, he will not be at liberty to disclose that information.

Surprised?

1) I was speaking of Dan Dan, but your quote refers to Ernie M. You're confusing the two. I know of no settlement at all from Dan Dan, and I know that Ernie only paid a small bit of his settlement, and when the court dismissed the case, he paid no more- and won't.


2) I agree that many have rolled over, but not those two.
Because they DIDN'T roll over, they didn't pay the the protection fee. Looks like those who don't roll over and do the "doggie submission" come out ahead to me.

3) Here, we are in complete and 100% agreement. Unfortunately, to get evidence that cannot be disputed, SC will have to do a complete and professional investigation. That costs money. Again, it's much easier and cheaper to just move to the next KJ that can be intimidated and get a few thousand more dollars than it is to do what would be neccesary.


I would like to add the following, though I have brought it up before:

As much as I am against SC's methodology, it really is the KJs who have caused the problem in the first place, and after having business bleed away from their self-inflicted gunshot to the foot, are now depending on SC to fix-a-boo-boo.

It's never been their priority, it never will be, and honestly, it never SHOULD be. SC is a For Profit corporation. It's function is to make money. Period. They couldn't do it in the karaoke production business, and I don't like the way they are doing it now. However, that is their function.

I'm as surrounded by low-ballers ( some pirate, some not), as anyone, yet they are pretty much gnat farts in regard to hurting my business.

So it's not the money.

I am also surrounded by PC hosts ( some pirate, some not )who carry much larger libraries than I do. Still no problem.

So it's not the library.

The only hosts, whether with bigger or smaller libraries / higher or lower fees that give me any competition are good hosts.

Hosts that suck will not keep shows and cannot compete.

You want to fight piracy and put them out of business? Be better than they are at what you do, and be better than they are at making sure everyone KNOWS you're better.

Learn what the "host" part of Karaoke Host means.

Know your equipment inside and out, and learn enough electronics to both repair AND buy intelligently.

Take the time to learn how to mix sound properly, not just the way you think it should be.

Practice your people skills- you've got non-singers to keep happy as well.

Visit crappy shows to see what they do that ticks of the patrons the most, and don't do it.

Go to the shows that are the most popular and find out why.

You are never in this business long enough to stop learning.

BE better! Let the market KNOW you're better, and can bring more money into the venue- becaust THAT's the bottom line. Do you really think a venue will choose a $75 host that may bring in $350 bucks over a $200-$250 host that can bring in $1500-$2500? No.

Then go kick some pirate a$$.

That's how it's done.....

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"No Contests, No Divas, Just A Good Time!"

" Disc based and loving it..."

Because as far as I'm concerned, nothing went wrong. The other attorney claims that we didn't send him two things that I have a record of having sent him, that I personally put in the mail. I've verified the address. If there is a problem, it's on his end.



You seem to be confused about what they were not asked to participate in. This was not a question of picking dates from an available list. There are about 15 different items to be decided, some of which require a fair bit of technical knowledge of the law. Most pro se defendants are not capable of contributing meaningfully to an initial attorneys' conference. The order was very specific.



No, he did not. This is what he said:





We did respond to that motion. There has been no ruling on it yet. I can see why you thought there might have been, because the email that was quoted in the first post makes it sound as though there has been.



I don't have a "secretary" per se. I have support staff, and at the time we had other attorneys. No one in my office received the document that indicated that the court was going to rule, either, because it was an email problem with an upstream provider.



I referred to the only defendant who actually fit the profile for what you were saying.

The settlement demand is $8500, not $4800. I'm not sure where you got the $4800 figure.

I don't particularly care whether you think it makes sense or not. That is the offer. The "significant payment" is $2000 per system for a KJ, although we sometimes will reduce that if the defendant provides some financial documentation that shows that it would be a hardship.

I'm not going to name names, not because I can't, but because I see no reason to do so. Even if I did, you would just find some other non-reason to complain.

I am not confusing the two. You are correct, my quote does refer to Ernest M. and it does so to enlighten you to the real reason "Ernie's" case was dismissed.
"Ernie's" case was dismissed after being settled. It is misleading to say it was "dismissed because of a lack of pursuit".

Since my original reply to this part was deleted for reasons unknown ( it was simply observation, no personal negativity involved), I will try again.

When important legal documents are sent via mail, they are normally sent- at the very least- Certified, so that a signed receipt of the document is sent to the sender.

If the sender didn't receive verification of receipt, and didn't follow oup, the sender dropped the ball. If the sender didn't use Certified Mail, then the sender dropped the ball.

It seems that if there was a problem, it was NOT on the other attorney's end. It was with the alleged sender.

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"No Contests, No Divas, Just A Good Time!"

" Disc based and loving it..."

No, it's not. The case was dismissed because SC didn't follow up and answer Ernie's statement to the judge on why it should be dismissed. They didn't pursue it. They also won't get any more from Ernie than the tiny piece of the settlement that he paid prior to the dismissal- because they can't, and won't bother pursuing it for that reason.

Lack of pursuit- which will happen anyone tries to take SC to court. Why SHOULD they pursue it? Again, easier and more profitable to scare an uneducated KJ into paying them thousands with nothing more than a letter than paying for a day in court.

Rolling over goes both ways. If the KJ rolls over, he pays. If the KJ DOESN'T roll over, SC rolls over, to save time, money, and to keep a precedent of a loss in court ( which would almost surely happen) from appearing on record, thereby depriving them of their income.

Simply business. Those who still want to hold on to a dream of SC solving ANY of their problems please feel free to do so- but I still suggest working harder on your skills...

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"No Contests, No Divas, Just A Good Time!"

" Disc based and loving it..."

Sorry, Joe - I'm actually going to have to disagree with you. Normally, legal documents in the course of an ongoing lawsuit are sent regular first class mail, just like anything else. The only exceptions, based on requirement of the court, are a summons or subpoena, both of which must either be served by process server or certified mail. A party that cannot be served in those ways can be served by alternative service with permission of the court. Once a party has been served with a lawsuit, there is no such requirement, and everything can be served regular mail.

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Birdofsong