Legal or illegal

[muzicman144]

[quote=mindonstrike;96915]The one big difference that causes most of the karaoke problems is that karaoke displays copyrighted lyrics to the public. Bands usually do not display the lyrics. Lyrics and music are 2 totally separate issues.

This is exactly what i'm attempting to stress here. Now i don't offer lyrics to the public, even using a Chartbuster track, or using a homemade track made with my band and KHPro. I am a one man show, no one sees my lyrics or my teleprompter. Unless you get on stage with me, you don't know what i'm using. But that apparently doesn't excuse me like it does a live band, even when they use some tracks to back up their sound, and most road bands do that now.
muzicman144

[Robster]

ok sort of off topic but not.... in the uk we have different laws , there is a licence in place for music called the produb now any dj that has converted music to a format on a computer has to pay for a licence

1st tier ...for 1-5000 tracks its £250 thats UK pounds !

2nd tier....for 5001 - 10000 its £300

there are higher tiers but i will use these first two for examples there is a top up fee if you use karaoke tracks so for the first tier it goes up to £300 and the second tier it goes up by £60 to £360

and each year you pay a top up rate of £100 for music or £120 for karaoke for new tracks you may add up to a 1000 new tracks


That's all very fine and well but the licence people don't represent , or own , or manage the rights to any Karaoke track!

After emailing back and forth i got this answer

Hello Robert

Apologies for the delay in responding to your enquiry, which has only just been passed to me.

No CDG discs are currently registered with PPL and, as you state, this means that the pro-dub licence does not cover any copying or converting of these discs.

You are correct that you would need to contact the manufacturers in order to secure their permission. PPL is beginning the process of contacting the manufacturers ourselves with a view to registering the tracks, but for now permission is still required from the manufacturers directly.

Kind regards

Mark

MARK STEEL
Assistant Rights Negotiation Executive
PPL
1 Upper James Street, London W1F 9DE
T +44 (0)20 7534 1261 / F +44 (0)20 7534 1367
mark.steel@ppluk.com
www.ppluk.com

when a karaoke track is made its in the style of the original the karaoke manufacturers buy a licence to make this track what they then make is there property , they then own the rights the pll dont have any karaoke tracks as far as i am aware .

KJ's already pay over the top prices for specialist discs as it is , CDG discs are not inexpensive and individual tracks in MP3+G format are not inexpensive compared to music tracks either . But stangly enough if you buy the file in MP3+G format and no conversion has taken place you don't need a licence or if you buy a music track on line again you don't need a licence its just for the converting of discs you have already bought!!


now if i was selling something when i didn't own it and never did and was taking money ...giving people the impression that it gave them the right to do something that it doesnt ...that would be considered fraud wouldn't it? but hey im just an individual.

so they don't represent or own the rights for any karaoke track that i know about so i wonder where exactly does the £20-80 depending on the tier top up go?

The UK system is really messed up !

[RIKKI TIKKI]

Robster,

Just curious as to what the penalties/fines are for DJ's/KJ's that are not licensed, or are kinda illegal?

[Robster]

Originally Posted by RIKKI TIKKI

Robster,

Just curious as to what the penalties/fines are for DJ's/KJ's that are not licensed, or are kinda illegal?

The new licence was introduced i believe august 2008 it is only for converted material so if you download a mp3+G as is to your performance drive no licence is needed ..only converstion from cd lp tape to a digital format. so if you still use CDs for music no licence is needed its the conversion the produb is needed. so basically you have to pay twice if you bought the original and now want to use a Computer.

The produb people say they are not out to prosecute but educate so if they find someone they will inform them they need to purchase a licence etc and only after that will they take tougher action

so far as i can tell although it is law NOT ONE SINGLE person has been prosecuted of forced to buy a licence.

I dont know for certain but i believe that less than a 1000 DJ's in the UK have bought this license ! The ones that have are plastering web sites saying that djs without the licence are dodgy illegal ..when they might not be and just using original discs on hardware players.

I Think if a dj was prosecuted and he took it to court and was represented by a good barrister he would probably win as there are so many things that make this unfair.

oh and another thing when you buy a licence you sign away some of your rights as the conditions are that they can have access to your equipment and gear to check your collection but if you dont have a licence they would need a warrant!

I wish to support artists and make sure they get there fair share BUT it grinds my gears when i have paid once for my karaoke and they want me to pay again and i dont think the money will go to the artists at all in the CDG karaoke case.

[RandyMcCharles]

This all stinks of a cash grab. The laws for music have been around for a long time and new laws for downloading music are being driven by the much larger non-karaoke music market. Exceptions, extra fees, circumventing purchaser's rights, etc. all looking looking to legally or frequently just scare more money out of you. I'm glad I'm just a karaoke singer and not a KJ so my exposure to this nonsense is limited. I still do, however, want to buy music for my personally collection legally. All this crap makes it real difficult to determine what is or isn't legal.

[ddouglass]

Careful Randy. My wife, my sister-in-law and I started out as just singers. Next thing I knew I had bought two complete setups and we were doing shows. We are now down to two shows a week and an occasional party which is managable without taking over our lives.

[RandyMcCharles]

Yes, this does worry me Especially as I have not kept all my karaoke purchase receipts.