Karaoke Forums

For the longest time it seems the majority of legal hosts saw few problems with SC/CB going after pirate hosts and the venues that hired them. After all if you hang the pirates, you would be doing the industry a favor. Even though some cringed at the methods used in the legal process of SC and now CB/WWD/PR/DTE, it was felt it was for the good of the industry as a whole. Some felt it would help their own business's in the long run, and build up the pay rate for the few legal remaining KJ's in the industry. Unfortunately it is proving to be very difficult for manus to make the legal process work well enough to put any real dent in the piracy problem. They have in fact by their own numbers from the summit been losing ground not gaining it on the illegal hosts and venues. Now the legal hosts are having to suffer along with the illegal. Sort of what my high school gym coach used to say "one hang you all hang", at least that way you will get the guilty. It is a terrible thing to watch someone hang, it is even worse if you have a noose around your neck that is being tightened. All hosts are slowly being squeezed and the options are becoming smaller all the time. I was once told I was being paranoid when I felt the manus were trying to corner the market of karaoke music product. Well let's see custom discs seem to be going away, foreign imports are slowly being cut off, and their is the threat at least that the publishers will crack down on the orphan brands as well. Eventually this will leave us with what leasing GEM or subscribing to Cloud, even the disc based hosts might just cave and buy product, or subscribe just to avoid the possibility of a legal suit. So in the end one way or another it appears everyone will be on the same page, or twisting in the wind.

One thing that is just not being made clear in all this is the level of AMBIGUITY in terms of product use here. It is possible that this ambiguity was used by manufacturers in their marketing schemes. However, these same entities seem to be trying to decrease this, of course with their own profits in mind. Some of this can be done in ways that forego and usually violate consumer rights. It is obvious that this situation is in some serious need of third party definition in order to set the parameters going forward. What will it take to get there is yet to be seen. I do not see it occurring in the current litigation models; it might be that those involved may not even want that definition to occur. However, once this ball goes rolling, I am of the opinion that more specific definition will be one of the outcomes...

As far as SC goes, it is not "now" but always, since the beginning. Hence, my "cringing at the methods".
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"No Contests, No Divas, Just A Good Time!"

" Disc based and loving it..."

I guess I should be grateful that I have had no problems with the manus in all these years if all start out as guilty and you have to prove to them your legality. Sometimes I wonder just who are they to set themselves up as the watchdogs of the industry? Why should everyone have the threat of being sued by them, for merely operating their business? The time is long overdue for a central authority to stop this fragmented approach that has been taken in the karaoke industry. That a few companies should not be able to determine the fate of thousands and ownership of the small business's should be restored to the operators of those business's. Maybe then karaoke will be what it should be for the good of the masses and not the piggy bank for the selfish few.

BUT...."Everyone" is not under "the threat of being sued", unless they are stealing music of course.

Direct question "The Lone Ranger": Have you been threatened with a lawsuit?

If you read my posts Bazza I have never been sued by any manu. There would be no reason for SC to sue me since I have not carried their product for years, and CB/WWD/PR/DTE seems to be mired in Tennessee. Then of course there is still that pending joint suit in Arizona with SC that has been dragging on for sometime. I wonder if that will ever be settled? Probably one of those out of court settlements or dismissed case situations, like California. I will only be hosting until Oct 31st of this year so if they are going to file something they better hurry. Even if they were to file today as long as this whole process takes I could be passed away before anything is settled. I just had my 68th birthday Monday. I will have to hold on to all my materials at least for 3 years after I hang up the speakers, like James says statute of limitations requirements.

P.S. Oh by the way Bazza yes everyone is being sued in these mass filed fishing expeditions. A big drag net is laid out and dolphins get caught with the tuna. Even if you are legal you are tied up in court, and you are forced to hire a lawyer to defend yourself against baseless charges. It is hoped that by conducting the legal process in this manner hosts will simply cave in and buy whatever insurance policy the particular man is peddling that day.

Neither have I or 99% of the people on thus forum. Seems your statement that everyone is under "the threat of being sued" is false then hmm?



Happy Birthday!

Thanks Bazza, and yes everyone is under the gun, even Athena was investigated turned in by a jealous legal rival, that is why she is so careful that all the t's are crossed and the i's dotted today. It only takes being named in one of these suits to rock you hosting world. Even if there is no case you are tied up in court and forced to pay thousands of dollars to clear yourself. Welcome to the wonderful world of hosting.

P.S. If 99% of the hosts have never been sued it makes you wonder just how effective this whole legal process is. Rumbolt stated that the hosts and venues named in the Tennessee Tri County suit are still doing business as normal, so what again is the purpose of the legal process. Oh that's right suits drive sales, I forgot.

I do believe the legal process works in some areas. Particularly areas where there is a more dispersed population. But in a major metropolitan areas where there are millions of people and many hundreds of unique KJ's, the legal process just doesn't scale.

There has been no active legal activity in the Seattle area in about 2 years now. It is no longer a topic of conversation. When I mention it (which is rarely now) most people don't know anything ever happened and don't believe anything significant will ever happen. More importantly, the few KJ's I have openly confronted have laughed it off. I totally understand why too. They were never named in the first couple of rounds here and chances are, because there are so many pirates in the area, they will never get sued. There are just too many and odds are, any one host will never get busted.

I recently contacted a 1/2 dozen legal KJ's to try to organize a meetup to discuss how we could combat piracy. None of them wanted anything to do with it. Two of the hosts were hostile about it saying they felt it would damage their own operations to publicly go after pirates. The other 4 were less adamant but still felt there would be nothing to gain by openly pursuing pirate hosts in our area.

I great way to look at it is like this -

One pirate I confronted several months ago, told me he has been downloading from iRC for 10 years now. He told me outright he has never paid for a single track. He has 500,000+ tracks (he collects foreign language tracks). He told me that if Sound Choice were to sue him he would settle, pay for the GEM, and be out a few thousand dollars. Not a bad deal for 10 years of karaoke. He said he would continue to pirate because no other company was suing so why stop.

I have to admit, when I looked at it that way, it made me wonder how much money I could have saved in the last 3 years and why I have spent so much to stay legal when there is actually very little risk of ever being sued.

Athena likes to bring up the "acceptable" risk argument.

I have mitigated my risk with Sound Choice, Chartbuster/DTE, and Stellar. I now have my GEM, my Chartbuster drives, and a Stellar CAP. Since none of the other companies are suing or even seem to care, why should I buy any more music at all? I have eliminated all risk that exists at this point.

-Chris

Edit:

PS......please don't read into this that I am considering piracy. I am not. I am just venting and noting the reality of karaoke in my area. I am still very actively buying karaoke discs. I am watching over 100 eBay auctions on any given day.

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-Chris

It does make you wonder Chris just what is the most cost effective way to deal with all of this. Since only SC and CB seem to be on the warpath then just pay them off. This is what the Romans did with the Barbarians until they ran out of money. When faced with a suit like in California many defendants decided it was cheaper to pay off SC than go through the trial. The problem is they paid and the money never reached SC. The one's that didn't pay just walked and that was it. It really is a crazy system, if you can even call it a system.

Selective, out of context quoting. Don't play dirty.

I said "99% of the people on this forum...."



This is like saying police in general are not needed because some criminals go back to crime after being caught. Flawed logic.

Isn't this forum a microcosm of the hosts out here in the karaoke industry? Shouldn't it reflect the industry as a whole? If you use James's numbers over 100 suits have been filed and about 1,000 host and venues have been put out of business or made legal. The number of hosts and venues with karaoke according to the summit is now around 48,000. So roughly one in 48 hosts have been sued, so that leaves what 96% that have not been sued, of which 90 to 95% according to SC and CB are illegal. Still pretty pathetic numbers for four years work. Especially since there has been a 10% total increase in the number of hosts according to the summit. I know they are winning, them and Charlie Sheen. You really can't use a police analogy Bazza because the police deal with criminal activity, this is not criminal it is civil completely different court with different rules. It is possible to win the case and the defendant is still in business, so what has been achieved?

Millions of people break the law speeding or running stop lights...you see them everyday. A tiny percentage are caught nationwide. Should they just stop trying? Let everyone break the law? What exactly constitutes a good number in your eyes?



Sure I can. That's why they call it an "analogy". But I will acquiesce if that makes you happy.

Should ASCAP and BMI stop going to bars and venues that pay no royalties and cease threatening them to join? After all there are thousands of "public performances" that take place every day and pay no performance rights whatsoever. I am sure the percentage of people they catch isn't very high.

How about movie companies? There are torrents available for every movie that exists the minute they hit DVD. Should they just give up? Stop trying to catch the criminals that give away their product for free? They catch one in a million....literally.

Should Nike, Apple, Prada & Rolex stop going after the people making knockoffs of their products? By your logic nobody is getting hurt...hey it isn't a REAL Rolex. So we should just let these thieves make copies of everything, right?

Bazza, the minute a movie hits DVD? Try when the movie comes out in a theatre and in some cases before it's released.

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You can be strange but not a stranger

your right, but look at it in the context of how the Manus are doing it.
now the police will pull YOU over because you are driving a car and MAY have been speeding SOMETIME in the ast so they take you to impound and dump your cars ECM to check if you went over the limit. if you did, pay a big fine, if you did not, just pay the impound fees and go on about your life.

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

Um, no.

The "police" are beset with a rash of stolen cars. They can't tell which cars are stolen without checking the registration. They know a lot of the cars that are speeding are stolen, and that's something they can see. So they pull you over because you were seen speeding. The "police" don't care as much about the speeding as they do about making sure your car wasn't stolen. They ask to see your license and registration, and if the registration you produce matches your car, you pay your speeding ticket (which might be waived) and move along.

So how many police officers out there in relation to the population, not to mention they have officers in every state and territory? Compare that to two companies going against how many? They can't do it all but they will get what they can. Something is better than nothing.

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You can be strange but not a stranger

You mean my RoNex isn't real??????????????

So that's why my $20 Rolux I got in Times Square broke on me.

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You can be strange but not a stranger

YES-THEY ARE!

Original manufacturer Disc based hosts have been sued, PC hosts with all of the discs have been sued- you are wrong.

The above have been sued, without investigation, several times- as have hosts that haven't worked in named venues.

Yup, EVERYONE can ( and has) been sued- whether they have stolen music or not, because SC sues for media shift, not piracy.

I guess I can tell a story here, now that it's a done deal. SC did a mass suit here in NJ- which crapped out after they allegedly screwed those who were handling it.

One of those named ( friends).....reported themselves! That's right, a disc based host reported themselves to SC to see what would happen, and in hopes of their own gain.. You guessed it- They got sued ( no PC on the entire premises- EVER), and couldn't wait to counter-sue. SC saved their butts by getting into a problem with those they were supposed to oversee but allegedly never did.

So, to re-iterate: Stealing music has nothing to do with whether one gets sued- only the internet advertising and chance control how SC ( and maybe PR) will throw stuff against the wall in hopes of stickage....

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

" Disc based and loving it..."