Karaoke Forums

Can someone please explain to me why SC charges for their voluntary audits, but if a KJ who is being sued claims to be 1:1 they offer them an audit at no expense?

Looks to me like SC would want 1:1 KJ's to come forward for the audit so they could avoid potential time and money spend on 1:1 KJ's that could be spent on actual pirates.

Wouldn't having an influx of certified KJ's across the U.S. especially areas they haven't swept through yet, help in the education of piracy within the karaoke industry?

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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.

Economically speaking, it's a loser for Sound Choice to offer free audits to "legal" KJ's. They have to pay someone to conduct the audit (expense of money) while the KJ expends time, but no money. Which would you rather spend?

The "audits-by-discovery" are not chargeable since the KJ's is currently in legal action. Just as the KJ cannot charge SC for the time it takes to conduct an audit while still engaged in the suit. It would be up to a judge to decide who could (if anyone) could charge the other for anything.



It would if you were really on a crusade to end it.... that's what is missing here. This is a "settle and run" operation, hitting as many KJ's as they can dig up for cash. It's really not about truth, justice and the American way...

Working with karaoke software producers would be another so that KJ's would know that it's "illegal and will get you sued" if you rip their brand of discs to a computer. Notice they've never bothered at all with them.... There's no money in it.

SC charges for the voluntary audits to recover the cost associated with administering the certification program. It is not a profit center for the company.

A KJ who is being sued is offered the chance to be audited at no charge as an incentive to engage in early, voluntary discovery so that we and the KJ can avoid the expense of doing the same thing in discovery. We have always considered it inappropriate to charge for that audit because (1) it saves us money, and (2) we don't really need the full court process to get 1:1 KJs into compliance with the MSP. We are considering requiring KJs we have sued to pay a fee for the post-suit audit, in order to incentivize KJs not to wait to be sued, but we have not yet decided to do so.

We do not always offer a voluntary audit, by the way. Sometimes we ask for (and get) a court order compelling early production and marking of the discs and hard drive, which is functionally the same as an audit. Since that's a court procedure we don't really have the option to charge for it.

Here is an excellent example of you simply making stuff up.

How would you have any idea whether SC has "bothered at all with" the karaoke software producers?

The answer is, you don't.

Costs associated with administering the certification program?

Average audit takes what 1-2 hours? How much does it cost to print out a certificate and have the webmaster add info to the SC Certified KJ page?


On the flip side:

How much does it cost to investigate a suspected pirate, file the paper work, and then have to do the audit for free or drop the case due to the KJ being disc based with orginal media or within the 1:1 requirement?

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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.

There is a lot more to it than that.



Less than it costs to wait until discovery to do the same thing for free.

How do you know I don't?

The answer is, YOU don't...


(BTW, that was a cute little antic with WallOfSound and the fake facebook pages...)

Other than filing the KJ 's information and the results of the audit I honestly don't see it being "a lot more than that".


Here's my beef with the whole thing.

I've been singing karaoke since the early 90's. In April of 2010 I did some web related work for a KJ that offered me some manu original CDG's and a disk player for partial payment. In June of 2010 I found KaraokeScene and joined the forum to further my knowledge of the karaoke industry with the intentions of hosting karaoke. I also started buying collections and disks where I could.

Around the same time of the following year I learned about the audit process that Chartbuster was implementing at no charge.

I had recently made a large CB purchase and decided to prepare for the audit process.

Just prior to submitting for the audit CB decided to start charging. Having spent my savings on legally aquired music and sound equipment I wasn't prepared for an additional $199 out of my budget.

At some point in there SC started the audit process and charging as well.

For a KJ who's been in the biz for a while and established with weekly gigs, I'm sure the amount is really no big deal. But for someone like me with no experience and in a rural area where there are more pirates than venues its not that easy to come up with $199 for CB and what is it $125 for SC audits just to be certified with a substantially smaller library than the local pirates doing gigs for $150 or less and even beer tabs.

It would almost make more sense for me to host and hope to not get sued so I could earn the money to pay for the audit or better yet host and hope to get sued so I wouldn't have to pay the money for the audit

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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.

Actually, the answer is, I do, because I know what the truth is, and it doesn't match up with your version.



I honestly have no idea what this is supposed to mean.

The "truth" according to who?... I don't believe you were around much in the karaoke world in the mid-90's and early 2000's were you? So you can only reference what you know from your experience... everything else is hearsay isn't it counselor?




If you say so...

Have you ever seen one of those sword fights where they start at one end of the castle
and end up at the other end before working their way back again and again and again?

Harrington... Do you get time off for good behaviour?

That's actually the better option. That way your competition would likely be getting sued as well, and you would survive with no cost except the ever so slight tarnish on your reputation (in a rural area no one would know anyway).

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KNOW THYSELF

Whether you're late for church or you're stuck in jail, Hey words gonna get around....Everybody dies famous in a small town.

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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.

No, but I bet his attorney's bill would be much higher.

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You can be strange but not a stranger

Absolutely.

Provided of course that your "competition" is actually a threat somehow to your business. Otherwise, the best of all options is to simply dispense with the brand like a used Kleenex® and any concerns with lawsuits against you or your customers will go away... permanently.

It really is ridiculous to keep them around for several reasons:

(1) They don't produce music anymore so what is out there is becoming "oldies" quickly.

(2) They will sue you if you use their product period..... (and as recently as October 2011, that would prove to include "their product in ANY form including original disc.")

(3) They will sue your customers as well.

(4) There are plenty of manufacturers creating the same songs that were once only on SC. So there are viable alternatives. And speaking from experience, if you run a good show, you don't "have to have" the brand even if you consider it to best made of all time. Dropping it will NOT harm your business. (how many of you still have SGB or MM because they had a song SC didn't?)

(5) It doesn't cost anything. Did I say it's free?

As long as a KJ continues to use their product, they will be subject to some kind of legal exposure and continued invasive scrutiny and added expense -- whether or not they have a "covenant not to sue."

So, if SC puts out new music, that will remove one of your justifications, right?



It is true that in one instance an operator who plays from original discs was sued by mistake. His name is Rodney Burge. At the venue where he was playing, there are actually three different operators on various nights, two of whom use computers. Rodney himself uses a computer to play DJ music as filler, but he plays karaoke from original discs. As soon as his claims came to my attention, we took steps to determine what had happened. I personally visited Rodney at one of his venues in Orange County, California, examined his system and his discs, and recommended that he be dismissed immediately. He was dismissed. An apology was extended. As far as he and SC are concerned, the matter is concluded.

It is SC's policy not to sue KJs who play exclusively from original discs. If that policy had been followed by the persons with day-to-day responsibility for the matter, he would not have been sued. There have been and will be consequences for those persons. That being said, mistakes happen. What matters is how those mistakes are dealt with. I believe we dealt with that mistake on a timely basis and in an appropriate manner. Chip, for his part, is disappointed that Rodney didn't use our mistake as an opportunity to undermine SC, but Rodney recognizes that doing so would just be cutting off his own nose to spite his face.



Only if your customers have been previously warned not to hire operators who use unauthorized karaoke tracks, yet hired you anyway. And we wait, often a considerable amount of time, before suing a KJ's customers.



If your choice is "pirate the SC" or "pirate somebody else," I'd much rather you pirated somebody else.

It's possible to do without SC. It's very unlikely that you will lose a customer because you don't have some song because it is only available on SC. But there is a quality difference, most of the time, and it's reflected in the fact that at 90% of the shows I attend, more than 50% of the tracks played are SC.



Chip, you're really not going to like the newest part of our lawsuits. Suffice it to say that dropping SC may not be enough to keep you out of a suit, if you are pirating other brands.

Batter up!


That's a really big "if" wouldn't you say counselor? Currently, I've put out more music in a couple months than SC has in the last few years. So, technically, I'm a "manufacturer" too.... right?


This is where I take exception: It was most certainly NOT "a mistake." There was no on-site "investigation" before your client knowingly and willingly filed a Federal Lawsuit against Rodney claiming he was using counterfiet discs, participating in unfair business practices, etc...

So no, I don't accept your excuse that it was a "mistake" at all.




Gee, it looks like you did more investigation than the licensed investigator....

Your "recommendation" apparently fell on deaf ears since your visit was in December....



Yes, he was dismissed... January 18th with a slew of others. Over a month since you found out about it and 3 MONTHS since the filing. No "special consideration to conclude the matter quickly" at all. Just toss his "mistaken" name in the bucket with the rest of them....

In the meantime, your cheerleaders (who shall remain nameless) were busy challenging his story, insinuating that he was lying or that he was not even who he said he was.

How special he must feel.


"Policy?" Like SC could sue a KJ playing from original discs and get anywhere with that? C'mon... don't insult us so blatantly because it doesn't do anything good for your profession.




Had Rodney decided to take the matter further, he would be cutting off SC's nose so don't make it look like you did him any favors here. He was unjustly sued and no matter how many times you say it, it was not "a mistake." And this "mistake" was NOT dealt with in a "timely manner." The investigator did NOTHING and your client sued based on NO EVIDENCE against him.



Using venues as an economic hammer against any KJ isn't going to help the legal (or even "certified") KJ's that you're claiming this crusade is designed to "help." It will simply force venues to drop the form of entertainment altogether.... But that doesn't appear to be of any concern to your client. In the end, the venues wouldn't even hire Joe Chartreuse or Rodney for that matter. Great logic here.



I've done just fine without it thank you. As a matter of fact, I've even offered to sell my SC discs back to your client... even he won't take up the offer.



Based on the obvious track record of your "investigations" (or lack thereof) this sound like an insinuation as well as a direct threat Mr. HarringtonLaw! Is this allowed on these forums?

Are you planning on expanding your "fishing operations?"

My visit was on January 9, not December. The instruction to file a dismissal went out the next day. The attorney handling that case was slower than expected filing the dismissal, but it was filed.



I did not mean you specifically, but "you" in the sense of "a person." No threat to you was intended. I assume that all of your material is properly licensed, because no intelligent person would be as vocal as you are while exposing himself to litigation by being a pirate of any brand.

Re selling your discs back...what do you have, and what are you asking for it?

Is Rodney reading these posts? If so, I'd like to know why Rodney didn't decide to take the matter further. Did his attorney suggest against it?

Of course, my questions are for Rodney to answer if he is reading this.

But you were made aware of this in December.... weeks before your visit. Nothing happened.... Another "mistake" perhaps?



I'm just fine thanks, but it certainly appears that that fact alone really doesn't mean anything to you and your client..... because now it appears that;

(1) You will be sued if you own the discs and use a computer for not "asking for permission" [trademark]
(2) You will be sued if you own the discs and use the discs ["oops! mistakes will be made]
(3) You will be sued if you do NOT use the brand at all. [apparently unfair business practices?]

BOTTOM LINE: If you're in the karaoke business, you will be sued.


Why? Are you looking for a new line of work? Besides, based on what you've been alluding to, I'll need them for "evidence" or the value of them just went way up....