Karaoke Forums

Take a potty break.....this is long.

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(by the way....I know it isn't proper grammar to lead off a sentence with numerals, but I like the effect in this case.)


Anyone older than 15 year old has witnessed some pretty dramatic changes in technology in their lifetime. For those of us older than 40, it is practically magical to see what has taken place. Here is some perspective....

20 Years ago the VCR was king of the hill for recording TV and watching Movies. 10 years ago DVD's and DVR's moved in and killed the VCR in a matter of years. 5 years ago, streaming technologies started becoming more viable. The DVR is still very much alive and probably will be for a while, but it won't be long before live and recorded TV/Video will be reliably streamed on demand and DVR's are obsolete.

20 Years ago, the Modem was the primary means of connecting computers to networks. 10 years ago, broadband was well established and modems were on the edge of being gone. Today, very few people have heard that modem screeching during a connection attempt.

20 years ago having a pager on your belt was all the rage. 10 Years ago you only had one if you were a doctor or in some sort of on-call profession.....or.....a drug dealer. Now, the cell phone handles "paging" along with a myriad of other duties.

30 years ago, we still bought the occasional 8-track, lots of cassette tapes and vinyl record albums. Fast forward to today and 8-track is dead, cassettes are in the closet, and vinyl is available but considered somewhat rare and for audiophiles. The everyday consumer probably doesn't use any of these any longer and hasn’t in 10 years or more.

20 years ago, you had to have pretty deep (and large) pockets to have a cell phone - and it only made/received calls. 10 years ago, the move to mobile phones was in full swing and people started dropping their land lines. Today 12 yr olds have cell phones and use them as their primary means of communicating with......everything. If you still have a land line in your home, it is probably a requirement to have DSL or a bundled package for Phone/TV/Internet. Or.... you are older than 24 and you have just kept it because it has always been there. If you are in your early 20's you probably don't have a land line and never will in your lifetime.

In all of these cases, there are people who still do have the "old" technology, but they are getting harder and harder to find. When you do find them, most often they will be folks that are older and have it just because they always have. Twenty something’s rarely have any of the old stuff.

The Internet has not always been there…..

This is something my teenagers have a hard time understanding. They can’t imagine a world without the “always on, always connected” world of the Internet. They see my vinyl record albums and unless I taught them how to care for and handle them, they would have no clue. We have an encyclopedia set - the one my father bought before *I* was born. My kids consider it to be somewhat of an archaeological type item.

Deeper perspective.....

Developing countries are skipping entire groups of technology. In India, Africa, and China, they are not even bothering to string cable for TV and copper wire for phones because it costs too much to implement. It is a lot cheaper for the companies and the consumer to just drop in a satellite dish or a cell tower.

How this pertains to karaoke....

We use to be on cassette tapes. We have been on CD's for 15 years now. CD technology is being obsoleted in every other industry very quickly. The karaoke manufacturers know this and some have implemented “ripped” digital formats (GEM Series, CB Drives and SD Cards, PHM shipping MP3+G even though they ship it out on CD discs, and of course the digital downloads that we aren't always quite sure if we can use commercially or not).

The capability to play from MP3+G is here today. CD's are dying. So why would a host just coming into the industry want to be disc-based?

Some will argue that is the only way to prevent a lawsuit. Some will argue even disc-based won't prevent a lawsuit (well...it seems to protect 99% of the hosts). But the fact remains that the world is moving on and MP3+G is the preferred format for most karaoke hosts. Discs are only required for legacy compliance.

New hosts can buy all “ripped” digital from the "Big 3" and never be subject to an audit (actually.....this may not apply to PHM, but since they don't seem to actively participate in anti-piracy measures I am not sure it really matters as long as you are doing the right thing).

I hesitate to include online download sites only there still seems to be active debate about their legality. But it is just a matter of time before that is an undeniably legal alternative to buying discs.

To the manufacturers –

Help us KJ’s be more efficient and streamlined, not to mention reduce our costs. We have already modernized and we are waiting on you. SD Cards/Hard Drives/MP3+G shipped on CD/DVD are a great first start. Streaming and downloading via the Internet are here today and that is the way the majority of us would like to obtain your material.

To the Hosts –

If you are disc only based, I can absolutely understand the barrier of ripping down thousands of discs in high quality because I have done it myself. But the fact is, you are a minority and 10 years from now, you will be all but extinct. I just can’t imagine that in 2022 we will still be waiting anxiously every month for the monthly CD’s to arrive. If you plan on still being a host 10 years from now, you will at best be a hybrid of legacy discs and modern digital MP3+G (or whatever the new standard may become). If you plan on still doing this for the next decade, it just makes sense start the move to MP3+G now.

To Everyone –

I want to be clear – I am not saying that running a disc based show is silly. I have nothing against disc based hosts. Indeed, I have much respect for those that run that way.

I do find it nostalgic and quaint though….and I have come to the conclusion that for my business, “ripped” or MP3+G is the way I will be running things.

I buy a lot of discs myself, but I do it to meet current compliancy standards. But I would rather not buy any discs at all. In fact, with the exception of obtaining OOP print material, my future acquisitions are going to involve only MP3+G formats from SC (Gem Series) and CB (Drives/SD Cards) and download services that are recognized by the community and the industry as being legitimate for commercial use.

I look forward to the day I can obtain ALL of my music online easily and cost effectively without concern for my business or venues coming under fire. Until then, I support the way things are now, I am playing by the rules, and my business is growing.

-Chris


[edited to correct some spelling, punctuation, grammar, and complete some thoughts. Edits in italics]
[edited again to remove “digital” vs “MP3+G” confusion]

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-Chris

To paraphrase the Wizard of Oz, "CD's are not only merely dead, they're really most sincerely dead."

But, like Elvis, some people refuse to believe it and will cling to their belief for another few years or so.



Fear. I have a friend who clings to his ancient flip-phone claiming "I don't WANT all that app gobbledygook! I just want to make phone calls!".

Truth be told, technology confuses him and thus he fears it.



And IMO ten years is being extremely generous. Just look at how technology has changed in under ten years. A decade ago on-line shopping was something only the nerdy trailblazers did and "You've Got Mail!" was still coming out of peoples speakers via AOL.

Chris Said:
New hosts can buy all digital from the "Big 3"

Really??? SC is doing digital??? or are you just saying that their stuff out on the gems are MP3???

To me digital means "NO MEDIA"

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I like everyone when I first meet them. If you don't like me that's not my problem it's YOURS!
A stranger is a friend you haven't met yet

Not to mention that you have to buy huge libraries with the GEM series. CB's way is better. You only buy what you need. That is where SC is going wrong.


What I find awesome is the sheer amounts of portable media. I remember carrying around a box of tapes, just to have variety of music in my car. Now I keep a 1gb shuffle with me, at all times, and it hold 25 CDs worth of music. If I get bored with that, I connect to my computer, and load a whole bunch of other music. I have draws of music CDs, that I have been collecting since I got my first CD player in 1991. All of that music is on one hard drive. Technology is wonderful.

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I am the ONLY SANE 1 HERE

The delivery method is moot, it's all "digital". With the GEM set, it isn't realistic to expect someone to download thousands of songs en-masse when they could be easily delivered via a CD-ROM/Hard Drive/Memory Card. Even CB sends their KJ-Pro files on a hard drive for later unlocking.

The "CD Audio Redbook Standard" is dead. Better?

I thought mp3 was digital To me digital means digital and that includes a cd, hard drive or any other devices... The info stored on a cd is digital just like in your hard drive

I wish the manu would offer their tracks non-compressed in wave to maintain it's original sound, that is why I still prefer extracting the digital data stored on cd as opposed to buying an mp3 file for my own recording

Can you do WAV+G?? I have seen issues with regular music WAVs where they won't tag.

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I am the ONLY SANE 1 HERE

wav doesn't tag, that is the downside. all of my ripped discs are wav+g. instead of having your program read mp3 tags, just have it read the file name and adjust the parsing rule to fit.

while we are on the digital discussion.....isn't all cd information digital, not just mp3?
it is all 0's and 1's, just binary information.

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Paradigm Karaoke, The New Standard.......Shift Happens

Correct.

Yes you can, I'm assuming that every pro karaoke player can play it? I know Siglos does... I even have 24bit wave files that I play with Karawin Pro, amazing how good a karaoke track can sound

The point has already been made in later points that technically it is all digital.

I will update my OP to reflect "pre-ripped".

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-Chris

Wow, so my award winning response post didn't take. Bummer.


Anyway,,,,,,, For once I agree with Chris wholeheartedly. For those that want to stay disc based, so be it, that's ok and keep going. I'm a techie and I am always slobbering at the latest and greatest! (Hear that Verizion, GET THE NOTE!) I wish SC and PHM would go the KJMP route. I'm tired of waiting and I don't want to go back to ripping CDGs or even the case of MP3 discs of copying to my system.

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