Karaoke Forums

OK! Here we go!



And so you resort to thinly veiled ad hominem attacks when you have no intelligent response. The level of my so called "business education" has absolutely no bearing on whether or not the GEM set is an actual product or not...which it is. In fact I said "No matter ones opinion as to it's price/value/etc, it IS a product they offer" but you chose do go down the low road anyway. Bravo.

But fine, I'll take your bait yet again. I chose to have the best base set in the karaoke world. A set from which the majority of my songs are requested. A set for which I paid thousands LESS than those who bought the quarter century old technology you so worship. I was even offered to have my obsolete, used & scratched discs bought BACK for full retail price! I paid far less for them per cut then YOU and that evidently angers you. CD's are dead. They have been dead for over 10 years. They are not coming back.



And why exactly is this worse? I do not need multiple copies of my music. I was offered, and paid, full retail price for my antiques. Much MORE than I paid for them in fact. Not only did I receive the exact same songs back on the GEM set in pristine 320kbps, I MADE MONEY on the used Bricks & Foundations I had purchased on eBay. I do not believe that making a profit and getting a great deal on music is a bad thing.

Often I hear "You paid TWICE for the same songs!" I suppose that is technically true. But if you buy a hammer at home depot, return it for a full refund, then later buy it again for less when on sale, have you actually "paid twice" or worse?



Why does anyone sell anything? Because I sold old technology at a profit and STILL received the same songs in crystal clear 320kbps MP3+G format. I do not prefer a decades old, dying technology, over the industry standard that sounds exactly the same in a karaoke bar. I do not wish to carry around massive piles of plastic. Your CD's are not going up in value. They are only slowly rotting away until one day very soon they will be in a box in your basement next to the old LP's and VHS tapes and worth pennies.

Really Joe. Your yelling at the kids on your lawn is getting old.

the problem is, why would anyone turn their disc's in for a credit toward a "leased" gem set. once you stop paying SC (or lease expires) then your not legal and have nothing left to show you really own them.

that's why i would never get rid of my disc's.....

_________________
It's all good!

First, I explained why. I made money. Do you not like to make money?

Second, you are misinformed on practically all counts.

It is a license agreement, not a true lease as so many like to characterize it. A "Lease" implies "Rent" of which there is NONE. It is a license that has been paid in full for over a year and a half. I have no payments and will not see any. Yes, there is a very slim chance I will have to pay $33 at the five year mark, but this "Peppercorn Clause" is most often waived. If not, I will gladly pay $33 (20 minutes work at my rate).

A "Lease" implies a finite end date on which you must move or give back the car. I do not have to do either as this is not a "closed end lease". Although they appear similar, they are not the same. The "nothing to show for it" argument is empty as I do not, EVER, have to give them back unless I break the agreement by pirating them. Legitimate businesses enter into these kind of agreements every day. I do not fear them.

Nearly three years with GEM. No audits, no visits, no calls, no letters and certainly no "Rent".

but if your not paying then you can't continue to use in a commercial performance can ya!

i still own my disc's and i can! and i don't have to pay any liscensing fee. and yes when your paying your liscensing fee, your leasing them for commercial use!

it's just a play on words, state it anyway you want, to continue to using them in a live show where your getting paid, you have to pay to keep your liscense current.

no you don't have to give them back for personal use, i get it!!!

_________________
It's all good!

I have no idea what this means. I specifically CAN use them in commercial performance, in perpetuity.



I have possession of my music forever and I can too! I paid less for my licensing than you did to own them.



No. I have licensed them for commercial use. A license that is paid in full and has no fees.




I don't have to give them back at all. Ever. And I don't plan to.



I may have to pay $33 a year at year five. I do not believe I will (Google "Peppercorn Clause"). BUT, even if I do, if Ipaid $33 a year for twenty years, it would STILL be less than paying triple to "own" them.

You are absolutely correct. It's a word game.

The fact is that you and I both have use of our music for as long as we like. You laid down a bunch of cash for your music, and so did I. Neither of us have to pay anything later. Both of us can sell/transfer to other people if we wish, for whatever price we choose.

The only difference is that I paid less initially.

I think the gem set is a great product with many advantages.
A good base selection of popular music-
Very good renditions on most tracks-
6000 songs transfered to hard drive in an afternoon as opposed to a couple of months of ripping in all of your spare time.

It's the way it is being marketed that tarnishes it in my veiw.
And since it was created solely with the marketing method in mind, they did a sloppy job of choosing the tracks, naming the tracks, and packaging the product. I believe, this is mostly because in their eyes, their target market is undeserving of the respect and care one would normally put into the creation of such a package.
And since their expected customers are criminal types in their minds, they are treated like the untrustworthy scallywags they are in the entirely lopsided license agreement where all protections are given to soundchoice and none to the customer.


Or leave United States territory (item 4B),
Or improperly display your license identification sticker (item 4G),
Or miss the one week notice for an audit demand (item 4J),
Or list the songs in a book or kiosk without identifying them as soundchoice versions (item 5),
The list goes on, but here's my favorite:
Or publicly speak or write anything negative about soundchoice (item 5)

And if you find yourself needing to defend against any of it, you get to travel to Mecklenburg County, North Carolina to litigate (item 10).

_________________
KNOW THYSELF

Agree 100%



Your prerogative to have this opinion of course. I would disagree. I liked the songs & packaging. The naming was a bit odd, but easy to remedy. I was going to have to rename them anyway.



Well, this is all opinion based upon your view of SC as a company and has nothing to do with the GEM product, it's licensing or quality. I do not see how a poor naming convention equals treating people as "untrustworthy scallywags".



Not planning to.



I display it proudly.



Only Audited if I break the agreement. I wont. Almost three years. No audit.



Not quite. It says "the truthful identification of karaoke tracks as being SOUND CHOICE® tracks in an accompanying song listing".
I take this as calling SC tracks by some other manufacture name.

Either way...why would I do this? I like my SC songs.



I see no reference to this whatsoever unless you are talking about the word "disparage" with regard to the MARK. Again, I don't care. I like SC and have no plans to "disparage the mark" or "brings the Marks or US into disrepute" anyway.


Common terms in any legal agreement. That's where they are based.

I think Eartling means listing your songs in the books in this fashion:
21A-1 Peaceful Easy Feeling --- The Eagles
21A-2 One of These Nights --- The Eagles
21A-3 The Long Run --- The Eagles
21A-4 Desperado --- The Eagles
21A-5 Lyin' Eyes --- The Eagles
21B-1 I Don't Wanna Go On With You Like That --- Elton John
21B-2 Club at the End of the Street --- Elton John
21B-3 Tiny Dancer --- Elton John
21B-4 Levon --- Elton John
21B-5 Daniel --- Elton John

where 21 is the page in your case logic disc holder, and A and B are the positions in that page (out of A, B, C, D), instead of listing them as SC8125 and SC8134. By listing your discs without your own made up code, and no indication of a Manufacturer code, if I were to look through your song listings in a book or kiosk, I would have no idea if those were SC tracks or MM.

Yes, I suppose if you wanted to hide who the manu was. I do not. I guess that clause is up for interpretation. Harrington?

Regardless...I list my manu's proudly so its of no consequence to me.

It's not necessarily meant to be so sinister as to hide the Manufacturer's name.

Many have set up their codes to reflect the order they bought the disc, or the page the disc is stored in their cases. They have stated that this was easier than either grouping all SC discs in one section, and all MM in another, and all PS in another, etc..., and then having to move those discs around to keep them in numerical disc number order. Let's say I have SC 8101, 8115, 8134, 8500, 8532 in my library, and now I purchase 8117. Do I put it at the end, or shuffle the discs around, so that 8117 follows 8115? And the more I buy, the more shuffling I have to do. If I keep putting newer purchases at the end, the numbers are now all mixed up, and it gets harder and harder to find them.

There are also the KJs here, who have stated they DON'T use Manufacturer codes because they are tired of people always coming up and asking what this means, and why do you have that listed as SC, PS, and MM, etc... And some here have also stated that they just didn't have room for a Manufacturer code, so they just listed the Song Title and Artist.

And as for those who converted everything over from CDG to HD, well, they may have just created a listing as simple as possible (meaning no codes, and probably just Titles and Artists) for the General Public to see.

I hear ya. It comes down to exact intent of "truthful identification". I do not take that as listing "the songs in a book or kiosk without identifying them as soundchoice versions".

Call me crazy, but to me "truthful identification" means telling the truth. IE: Not calling SC tracks by some other manus name in an attempt to obfuscate.

The clause in question:



Part (a) means that you are authorized to display the Marks on your monitor(s) when they come up in the graphics portion of the tracks.

Part (b) means that you are also authorized to use the Marks to identify SOUND CHOICE® tracks in your book or kiosk. You do not have to do so. All this means is that you can if you want to (it's an authorized use of the Marks).

Oh, and since everyone is big on "proof" of stuff--which I support--I will say that the proof that mine is the correct interpretation is...that I wrote it, and that's what I meant.

I think most of todays new songs for karaoke, really don't have any STARTING power. Nothing can stay if it hasn't started. I have bought most of the All Star discs, Pop Hits through the year and various customs with some new songs I THINK might work. Probably over 400 'new' songs. I probably have enough fingers and toes to count how many have actually been done. Most of the songs sung and requested are from the back catalog selections.

_________________
LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

The average karaoke singer has between 5 and 10 songs in their repertoire. New songs mean nothing to them because they have already found their comfort zone with the 10 songs that they have confidence in singing. Then there are the more courageous karaoke singers who can't wait to try out something new and different. If you don't get many of them at your shows; then you probably don't need much in the way of new music to keep your regulars happy.. If you're doing a show at the local VFW hall; you can probably get buy with just your original DK 1-99 and satisfy everyone there.

I have do have those courageous singers that do try new and different stuff all the time (have 1 singer that has never done anything twice - going on 450 individual songs in his list alone) - but again it's usually 70's-early/mid 2000's (ya know the stuff that is old and obsolete and nobody would buy - oh like the stuff that's on that GEM set). Out of anything new, country is the most widely sung for 'new' songs.

_________________
LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

When I first got interested in karaoke; I never would have thought that I'd be buying anything by a Country Music artist....BUT..... many years have passed and I never seem to find any songs on the pop hits mothly discs that interest me. I used to look forward to the newest Matchbox 20 songs and the new Creed songs and the like. Now I listen to CMT more often than not and I find myself searching for Country songs way more often than any other genre of music. I've made hundreds of homemade tracks at this point and most of them are country songs. The new pop and rock songs just don't seem to get my attention any more.

Bazza,

Can you name a single (or even a handful) of "gem customers" that were treated the same as you? Can you name a few that got "full retail" on a trade-in?

I don't think so. You were the "first to buy" and no disrespect intended, you were the poster-child for their "new product." And as expected (again with no disrespect), you've defended your purchase, lease, or whatever you want to call it nice and loudly. And if I were as proud of the purchase as you obviously are, I'd probably do the same.

But the gem series is not the end-all, be-all of karaoke libraries. There's nothing new in it and it doesn't evolve on it's own. As a matter of fact, I don't see where -since it's inception- that the manufacturer has offered even a single "update disc" with a few more songs you can lease to augment the system if you already have the full set... It's a "one shot deal" that so far, hasn't provided a second shot... It's as stagnant and dead as the CD's you claim are useless.

And now, the same manufacturer appears to have stopped "supporting" this product entirely and has focused on "the cloud."

What does that tell you?

And what evidence do you have that they are not supporting the Gem series or their customers? Or are you just speculating again.

_________________
You can be strange but not a stranger

Show me the support.... "lack of harassment" doesn't equate to "support."

Any updated product?

Nope.

From: viewtopic.php?f=1&t=25181&start=20

Six months and not listed.
I recall the listing to be one of their selling points.
Yep, that's support!

_________________
KNOW THYSELF