Karaoke Forums

A friend and I are private room karaoke mega-fans and we're interested in opening our own location up. We're babes in the woods here, so any and all info or advice is appreciated. Any pitfalls or unintended expenses to think about? How large of a staff do you need with 8-12 rooms? Is there software that will pull songs from the Internet as opposed to hard installs on servers? Thanks everyone

It would not be legal to pull songs from internet unless it is a legal service to begin with like the Cloud from Digitrax.
Also I do not believe it is legal to use 1 server to supply multiple rooms, there were discussions here in the past on that subject. You would need to supply an independant library or subscription for each room.

Are the karaoke boxes big in your area? The ones here are geared more Asian community and have very limited (outdated) selections and very cheap sound system that most people could acheive better quality in their own living room.

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

Give Kroaky's Karaoke in Sarasota, Fla. a call. The owner used to stop in now and then and he was always willing to answer questions about how it all works. He uses Unify software and has 8 rooms and 1 lounge area where anyone can sing. I think it has worked quite well for him.

Also I do not believe it is legal to use 1 server to supply multiple rooms, there were discussions here in the past on that subject.

not true as long as the same song is not being played in more then 1 room at any time its fine
and if some one qs a song being played it well load after the song is done in other room
thats what I heard from some one who does karaoke in a box

I am not sure, but I think that because the server is in the same building and it will allow only one room to play a song at a time, that it is allowable and does not give them advantage by sharing a CD. In their scenario they could run a CD from room to room, where as a server across town could not reasonably share a CD because of distance and time. It is "advantage" that was ruled unallowable in a recent case.

This is IMHO. Give Mark & Mary Devlin at Kroakys a call (941) 926-3434, or visit their site:

http://www.kroakys.com/

This Is wrong. with a server situation there is no way to keep 2 computers from using the same song at the same time. karaoke hosting software copies the song it has cued up to a Temp directory on the C drive and plays it from there. so a multiple stage situation could conceivably play the same song on all the stages without a problem.

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Sal "Kjmann" Esquivel
Karaoke With Sal - Website

@ KJMann: SC swept the Sarasota area in early 2011, and Kroakys is a 6 days a week venue that advertises every where. Do you think they were lucky or legal? I personally think both, but more on the side of legal.

Actually, this is wrong. Every modern day operating system has the core capability of putting file locks in place that prevent access/modification/copying/deletion of a file or group of files. Applications can be written to take advantage of and extend this functionality even further. It is absolutely possible to have a server based application that plays a song in one room while preventing it from being played anywhere else.

-Chris

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-Chris

Has the ability, but needs to be used that way..

Like I said earlier:


Thanks Chris & JD

I guess My Point is that there is no piece of hosting software available at this time that can do that.

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Sal "Kjmann" Esquivel
Karaoke With Sal - Website

HOWEVER, it seems that there could be software out there outside of a hoster program that can block a file in use from being used by another source...

This company has what is needed for hosting a karaoke box.
http://www.unifykaraoke.com/business-ka ... ke-box.htm

Here is an old thread about Unify Karaoke:
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=16948&hilit

Also search Sparkzilla (owner of Kroakys)

I'll look into the legality of using multiple servers vs a single server. I've used Unify machines before and they're pretty good, but so complicated. I always wanted to find a simpler, more straightforward system that behaves more like an Apple product - visual, idiot proof - than a Windows product - heavy, complicated, powerful.

The area I'm thinking of has no established karaoke box scene, nor does it have a large Korean population. But it's an area that's very open to new ways to have fun so Im not worried about customers.

Some other questions if anyone is feeling generous...
- Is there some sort of monthly fee for new songs or does that come with the hardware? If there is a monthly fee, about how much is it usually?
- Does anyone know of some common problems one might come up against?
- What do you all think of not having the main bar/public karaoke stage? Once I started going to real boxes that didn't have the main room, I didn't miss it at all.
- (for owners) Where do you make most of your money? Is it on room rentals, parties, walk-ins, main bar, drink orders, food orders?
- (also for owners) What costs you the most? Staff? Food and drink? Cleanup?

Sorry for the barrage of questions, but hopefully a few of you guys are feeling generous with your knowledge.

Have a friend who knows a guy in Seattle (lol doesn't this sound like a rumor?) who indeed does run a karaoke box and according to my friend does indeed have all the rooms running off one server which DOES have the software capability to ensure that a particular song is never played simultaneously in more than one room.