Karaoke Forums

I'm thinking about what cueball wrote concerning the question of having to have certification for all the different trademarks. You would have to take that along with your song book. From what I have seen of alleged pirates books, the one carrying the certificates might just be bigger. What would those certificates be worth if the issuing company is no longer in business? If you sell the disks, can you transfer the certification?

hiteck wrote:

That's $3200 for them to say its ok if you have any of their product during that time frame regardless of where you got it and if you don't have all of it feel free to acquire it however you want?

That's it in a nutshell: pay them $3,200 and you can use the whole library....

Follow the link and see for yourself. Basically states, "Send us the money 'n we won't ask any questions."

One one hand, I admire the bluntness. On the other hand I wanna send Uncle Guido and a few cousins to modify a few kneecaps.

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Dave's not here.

SC hasn't produced anything new for a couple of years now. You don't hear me crying about it.

Or even me.

Got the info first hand from their CT office. Think his name was Tony. $3200 was for what he referred to as a covenant not to sue. When I asked for discs instead, according to him he claimed that most karaoke licenses have a three year duration. Technically they are not even able to sell their inventory for discs older than 3 years even if the royalties were paid in advance so he couldn't really sell most of the older discs even if he wanted to.

It sounded like a reasonable alternative to a lawsuit to me, however I can see the other point of view as well. What I was really referring to however was their position on law suits. I got the sense that the reason they haven't done so yet is that they are doing their due diligence. According to their guy in CT, they are being very cautious as to whom they name in their lawsuits, as they don't want to alienate their customer base by suing an innocent person and/or one of their customers by mistake. However in my opinion, the real reason could be that they don't have the stomach for that kind of thing. At least that's what's been rumored anyway.

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So if I understand this right a company Technically, cannot even sell their old inventory if the discs in question are older than 3 years, even if the royalties were paid in advance. That brings up the question can manus sue hosts for materials that are over 3 years old then? I can see why Sound Choice was the first to start these legal proceedings since the window of opportunity is about a 1 year right now. It is so uncertain to CT who is legal v.s. who is illegal that, they are being cautious about whom they would even consider filing against. They realize that a protracted legal battle would cost them, time, money, and potential customers that might stop using their product all together. Again I see that this particular company has taken the pragmatic approach, and decided to make pirates customers, since they are unable to put the cork back on the bottle, of the technology genie. The manus realize if they want to stay in business they have to keep as many hosts as possible in the game, since they are basically the only game left in town. All these suits are mere posturing, trying to browbeat hosts into either being audited, or buying their product. So in the next year we should see Sound Choice win in court and establish precedent, or drop all the suits, thereby admitting this was just an attempt to shake all the hosts down.
All of these added costs to the hosts, audits, fees, covenant not to sue, are just different forms of protection money. Which we all know is one of the Mob's rackets. The idea of paying for an license to operate your business seems a better approach. You pay into one central fund that is divided by all the competing interests, allowing the host to focus on his business. It is true the cost of license could rise, but at least it is a once a year expense that can counted on our taxes. You would just have to show your license, and not produce reams of certificates, for each trade mark. Then if all the manus go under maybe you would not even need the license. It will be very interesting to see how this all plays out.

Licenses for "X" number of copies don't expire. You license "X" copies, they're pressed, and the artists, songwriters, and publishers don't care how long it takes you to sell them. They got their money up front.

Why are you spreading blatantly false information?

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This would seem to make sense, since many a karaoke shop owner does not get rid of it's old or discontinued inventory. It just sits on the self until someone buys it. The shops still in operation keep a tighter control on inventory, since their discs sales are down dramatically.

The licensing agreement is between the publisher and the music label. It is not binding on the retailer or the consumer. Therefore once a product has been placed into commerce it is no longer subject to the terms of the publishing agreement. Stated differently, once a reseller or a consumer has purchased the product they can do whatever they please with that product outside of any illegal activities of course, i.e. illegal copying, or other forms of infringement, etc.

Contrary to some other comments, nearly all licenses issued for "karaoke sync" whether they be blanket, compilation or single composition, do have a three year term. Even if a company does not sell thru its advances, it can no longer sell that product from its inventory. Once the term of the license expires, a new license must be negotiated for that product including new fixing fees and advances.

In the case of compilations, even if only one song on any given compilation has expired, then the entire compilation is no longer sellable. Unless a sound recording falls under the category of "fair use" or a Section 115 compulsory (which exludes the products in question), it MUST be negotiated. The terms of the negotiated agreement are dictated by the music publisher, and not the music label. It's a "take it or leave it" proposition that usually weighs in favor of the music publisher.

Music licensing is a complex process. Those who actually do this for a living would be the first to attest to that fact. If the process where that simple, none of the mentioned companies would have a need to hire a full time staff dedicated to the process, nor would there be the volumes upon volumes of books written on this subject. One would only need to pick up Al and Bob Kohn's (Bob is a co-founder of eMusic) book "Kohn on Music Licensing" to begin to understand the true complexities of this process.

It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so. ~ Mark Twain

BarryTone wrote:

The licensing agreement is between the publisher and the music label. It is not binding on the retailer or the consumer. Therefore once a product has been placed into commerce it is no longer subject to the terms of the publishing agreement. Stated differently, once a reseller or a consumer has purchased the product they can do whatever they please with that product outside of any illegal activities of course, i.e. illegal copying, or other forms of infringement, etc.

Please advise what would be "legal copying" since "illegal copying" implies that there is a legal route as well.

BarryTone wrote:

Contrary to some other comments, nearly all licenses issued for "karaoke sync" whether they be blanket, compilation or single composition, do have a three year term. Even if a company does not sell thru its advances, it can no longer sell that product from its inventory. Once the term of the license expires, a new license must be negotiated for that product including new fixing fees and advances.

This is not a problem and you know there are lots of ways of sidestepping this entirely. The easiest is to simply open a distributorship and transfer your inventory there as a sale. You can still sell from the distributorship until you grow old and die. The manfacturer inventory is then technically zero.

BarryTone wrote:

In the case of compilations, even if only one song on any given compilation has expired, then the entire compilation is no longer sellable. Unless a sound recording falls under the category of "fair use" or a Section 115 compulsory (which excludes the products in question), it MUST be negotiated. The terms of the negotiated agreement are dictated by the music publisher, and not the music label. It's a "take it or leave it" proposition that usually weighs in favor of the music publisher.

And that is simply the occupational hazard of being a manufacturer isn't it? You should always pick music that will sell.

BarryTone wrote:

Music licensing is a complex process. Those who actually do this for a living would be the first to attest to that fact. If the process where that simple, none of the mentioned companies would have a need to hire a full time staff dedicated to the process, nor would there be the volumes upon volumes of books written on this subject. One would only need to pick up Al and Bob Kohn's (Bob is a co-founder of eMusic) book "Kohn on Music Licensing" to begin to understand the true complexities of this process.

Apparently even after decades, this process continually eludes these manufacturers.

I didn't mean to imply that there was a "legal route" of copying, but seeing you characterized it in that manner, it's fairly safe to say that copies made of a lawfully purchased CD for your own personal use are legal. This means you can copy that CD or burn a copy of the CD onto a CD-R for which an archival copy would be a good example. Copying them to a hard drive for commercial use is a bit more of a gray area but in my opinion this could very well be deemed as a "fair use" if ever challenged in a court of law.

As far as your comments on the expiration of licenses . . . this is a very big problem for music labels. It is one of the reasons for which several of them have been sued. There really is no way around this other than the scheme that you mentioned which is to open a separate distributorship and SELL the goods to that entity. The problem for the labels is in knowing just how much prodict to SELL to the distributor. If you give this a bit more thought, I'm sure you will begin to see the problems in using this scheme. Be as it may, even though it isn't the ideal solution, your observation is correct.

Judging by your remarks regarding licensing compilations, I think you missed the point entirely. You may want to re-read that paragraph. Song selection has no bearing whatsoever on this matter. The most popular song on the compilation could be the one and only song (although in the majority of cases most songs) on that compilation which has a three year term. Referring to this as "simply an occupational hazzard", would be no more or no less akin to saying that KJs being indiscriminately sued by karaoke labels is an "occupational hazzard". I don't see why either should be the case.

I sort of agree with your final comment, but probably not for the reasons you may think. The licensing process is very elusive. I guess we all have a tendency to put things in neat little boxes and color them black or white. The reality is that like most things in life there is an on-going dynamic that precludes that tendency.

[size=85][quote="BarryTone"]

I didn't mean to imply that there was a "legal route" of copying, but seeing you characterized it in that manner, it's fairly safe to say that copies made of a lawfully purchased CD for your own personal use are legal. This means you can copy that CD or burn a copy of the CD onto a CD-R for which an archival copy would be a good example. Copying them to a hard drive for commercial use is a bit more of a gray area but in my opinion this could very well be deemed as a "fair use" if ever challenged in a court of law.


It is this so called gray area that the manus are unwilling to get legal precedent established on. If they were to loose in a jury trial, they would no longer be able to threaten the host. All of these suits would crumble and be blown away like so much dust. Interesting.

BarryTone wrote:

I didn't mean to imply that there was a "legal route" of copying, but seeing you characterized it in that manner, it's fairly safe to say that copies made of a lawfully purchased CD for your own personal use are legal. This means you can copy that CD or burn a copy of the CD onto a CD-R for which an archival copy would be a good example. Copying them to a hard drive for commercial use is a bit more of a gray area but in my opinion this could very well be deemed as a "fair use" if ever challenged in a court of law.

Absolutely, however it's not as gray of an area as you would lead us to believe because this same archive copy (not specified whether CD-R or hard drive) is allowed to be used in commercial business because when it gets right down to it, whether the media is plastic or iron oxide, a backup copy is still a backup copy.

This position/permission was stated by both Kurt and Derek Slep on many occasions in several public forums on the internet. Interesting how years later, they sue for "using a backup copy while keeping the original in archive..."

BarryTone wrote:

As far as your comments on the expiration of licenses . . . this is a very big problem for music labels. It is one of the reasons for which several of them have been sued. There really is no way around this other than the scheme that you mentioned which is to open a separate distributorship and SELL the goods to that entity. The problem for the labels is in knowing just how much product to SELL to the distributor. If you give this a bit more thought, I'm sure you will begin to see the problems in using this scheme. Be as it may, even though it isn't the ideal solution, your observation is correct.

There is no problem in deciding "just how much product to SELL to the distributor." Sell all of it. You are in effect selling it from your left pocket into your right pocket. Doesn't matter it's all a paper transaction anyway. Like licensing out the U.K. or Australia...

BarryTone wrote:

Judging by your remarks regarding licensing compilations, I think you missed the point entirely. You may want to re-read that paragraph. Song selection has no bearing whatsoever on this matter. The most popular song on the compilation could be the one and only song (although in the majority of cases most songs) on that compilation which has a three year term. Referring to this as "simply an occupational hazzard", would be no more or no less akin to saying that KJs being indiscriminately sued by karaoke labels is an "occupational hazzard". I don't see why either should be the case.

Doesn't matter. The manufacturer knows exactly when that single track will expire, it's not a surprise is it? Time for a blow-out sale or sell it to your wholly-owned distributor. (Didn't Karaoke Warehouse own Top Tunes?)

You're making is sound like manufacturers are some sort of helpless victim when it comes to licensing. They're not, they've made millions, just ask them. (You can't claim to "lose millions" if you didn't first make millions and if you inherited millions and lost it, you'd be labeled an idiot. Wouldn't you agree?)

BarryTone wrote:

I sort of agree with your final comment, but probably not for the reasons you may think. The licensing process is very elusive. I guess we all have a tendency to put things in neat little boxes and color them black or white. The reality is that like most things in life there is an on-going dynamic that precludes that tendency.

Well, that may be true for some things, but not licensing. There are always a number of steps that are required in licensing of any kind, some more complicated and/or convoluted than others. But at the end of the day, either there is or there isn't a valid license in place. There is no room for a "grey area" of any kind and there's no such thing as a "sort of license."

Judgments and injunctions prove that licensing on the part of manufacturers isn't as important to them as you'd lead us to believe. If the manufacturers are somehow dancing in the "grey area" that's their choice but I know if i ran a large commercial operation -like SC or CB - you can bet your bippy that licensing would be nailed down on paper with specified range and scope. There would be no question about it.

You may be right about that, but in my opinion I don't see how a ruling either way would hinder their attempts at suing hosts considering that it appears as if the main argument to their lawsuits is one of trademark infringement and not copyright infringement.

Or the distributor (aka wholesaler, aka middleman ). I haven't heard of a music label yet that wasn't able to unload all their inventory to a distributor within three years. At least not one that was run by persons with a smidgen of common sense.

You're telling us the folks at Stellar are stupid enough to be surprised by a three year term limit in a contract they agreed to?

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Dave's not here.

Bingo! That's the bottom line!

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Dave's not here.

So, I must ask: BarryTone, what is your affiliation with the manufacturers?

Here's a bunch of PHM stuff going back to 1996 but I don't think it is everything.

http://cgi.ebay.com/POP-HITS-MONTHLY-Ka ... 0785633644

I've bought from this distributor & FYI, I am not the seller.

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