The Lawsuits Have Started In Virgina

[bryant]

Originally Posted by Musicman51

I found this on another site, thought i'd just pass one persons thoughts along, what he bases this on, i have no idea. Is he right or way off base?...again, you make up your own mind.


Here are a few more of the myths that exist until this day about pirates:

Pirates charge less
Pirates are bottom feeders
Pirates don't spend money on anything
Pirates don't know what they are doing
Pirates don't keep their libraries up to date
Pirates are not professionals at running karaoke shows and running their businesses

Here are the facts in my area:
The first pirates were people who had established shows and switched from disc to computers
The original pirates here spent a good deal of money on their equipment long before they became a pirate
The original pirates here spent a good deal of money on their libraries before they became a pirate
Some of the pirates are using CAVS systems and don't even realize they are pirates. They run their shows like anyone else and complain about the pirating going on.
The newer pirates can and do purchase better equipment and software than the older shows have because of all their money can be directed to purchasing those things rather than spending $000's on a library. And it is so easy for them to multi-rig; just get more equipment.
One pirate charges more money because he has multiple rigs and has to pay the help!
None of the pirated libraries I am familiar with have any noticeable "flaws"
If there are many dups in their files, so what. A library of 100,000 containing 50% dups still leaves 50,000 unique songs. I have a library of less than 15000 with over 25% dups!
The pirates here know as much about running a show as anyone. Several work everyday of the week.
With the size of their libraries pirates CAN'T print complete books and most don't print any. People have been trained to simply put in their requests because the tracks is there. Hence, the pirate saves even more money by not printing books.
I can only think of 5-6 shows that are run off of discs around here!

So what is the downside for the person who unknowingly hires a pirate? And what is the downside for the person who attends a pirate's show, particularly if they are finding tracks that they can't find elsewhere? And how about singing with some of the best equipment around. For example, are Shure mics and 12" QSC speakers good enough for Karaoke, accompanied by a QSC sub?

And some think SC will help make it go away. Well, IMHO, once SC is done with their audits and out of the picture, the existence of pirated SC tracks will triple..... and the number of pirates will likely increase, as well!

oh,hummmm, well you obviously don't come from Northern New England, because all those "Myths" about pirates are right on the mark, i.e.,none of them have spent hardly any money at any time and they have all undercut all of the legals here, period. and they came ridng on the coat-tails of those who HAVE spent much to get all these shows started in the area in the first place.

[marklwood]

All I can say is, I have spent WAY more than $6,500 on SC disks. If I were starting another system, or just starting out, I would GLADLY pay $6,500 for all of SC's catalog. I paid out more than that for the first 4,000 songs back when I first started.

[ddouglass]

But that is for what they have left after selling the rights to their older songs to someone else.

[RandyMcCharles]

And you don't get the disks. After paying $6500 and pleading guilty in order to avoid losing more that $6500 to win your case, you still don't have the disks. (Pleading guilty assumes you already acquired the files on a hard drive.) Guess your only option is to go beg a copy of an illegal KJ's hard drive

[Musicman51]

all those "Myths" about pirates are right on the mark, i.e.,none of them have spent hardly any money at any time and they have all undercut all of the legals here, period.

I dunno, i think pirating cdg disc or hard drives or whatever, is like real life. Normally, a theif is slick, mixes in with others, looks, acts, like a normal person of his own trade. I bet the average pirate can put on as gooda or better show, and have just as gooda gear as a legal newbie just starting out, with no experience. Maybe if i keep watching out for a bumbling, clumbsy, dude, who has beat up gear, a 13" walmart picture tube singers TV, plastic gemini10" speakers which distort with every sang word. Radio Shack mics. Has a libray which boost 100,000 songs but can't find "Hotel California" and doing his show for $50 i have spotted my first pirate. But ya know..somehow i doubt thats gonna be the case.

[RIKKI TIKKI]

I was trying to remember what the disc cost was for those early cdg's, but can only vaguely remember what I paid for the early DK's, BMB's, then Music Maestro, Priddus, Sound Choice, Sunfly, American Gold, Dangerous, Hellavadisc, Star Disc, Chartbuster, Etc., Etc., Etc. ( Not to mention the 5 or 6 Manus that I get my Spanish cdg's from.)

I estimated it at $2/song, quite a few years back, and with my meager 13,000 song library ( with about 3500 duplicates ) that would set me back at least $20,000 over the last 17 years, which doesn't seem that bad, until you try to justify starting up in the business today, and wanting to have a huge library to start, and that illegal hardrive with 20,000 songs on it over there on E-Bay for $300.00, and I can see where the nubies would go, before weighing the legalities, or knowing what legal remedies that Sound Choice is now persuing, in order to recap some of their lost revenue.

I can sleep at night knowing that I'm legal, but will jump on anyone's band wagon, that will make it harder for the Pirate's to make a living, by undercutting the legit KJ's. I'll start by showing the club owners/mgmt, what Sound Choice is doing, as it goes after the venue also, if they are knowingly hiring a KJ with an illegal set of discs, or hardrive, and then as a last resort, I would turn in the illegal KJ to the Sound Choice Legal team, and still be able to sleep easily about it. I'll let my hosting skills compete for business against another legit KJ, but I'll also play nasty when it comes to some pirate trying to take the money out of my wallet...

[RandyMcCharles]

Interesting point on new startups. I don't know of any around here. All of the KJs have been around for years or work for "Karaoke World" who owns and maintains a large amount of gear including CDG racks (bought at wholesale as they also own the city's only karaoke retail store). The newest independant KJ I know bought her system from a retiring KJ at a good price. The other independants have been around for decades. If I were to 'start out' from scratch it would take decades just to recoup the initial outlay for a good track selection. I think if producers like Sound Choice 'really' wanted to promote legitimate business they would provide their catalog as 'lease to buy' in order to reduce the initial outlay for a startup.

[muzicman144]

Originally Posted by Musicman51

I dunno, i think pirating cdg disc or hard drives or whatever, is like real life. Normally, a theif is slick, mixes in with others, looks, acts, like a normal person of his own trade. I bet the average pirate can put on as gooda or better show, and have just as gooda gear as a legal newbie just starting out, with no experience. Maybe if i keep watching out for a bumbling, clumbsy, dude, who has beat up gear, a 13" walmart picture tube singers TV, plastic gemini10" speakers which distort with every sang word. Radio Shack mics. Has a libray which boost 100,000 songs but can't find "Hotel California" and doing his show for $50 i have spotted my first pirate. But ya know..somehow i doubt thats gonna be the case.

George, I agree with you totally. I have seen known, confessed pirates doing a first class show, getting top money, and doing it well. Talk all you want to, but, pirate or not, you don't keep doing shows for top money if you can't produce. Accept it, pirates are as skilled as the best of the legals, and in some cases better. If you lump them as second rate entertainers, you certainly misjudge the competition.
muzicman144

[Lonman]

Originally Posted by RandyMcCharles

And you don't get the disks. After paying $6500 and pleading guilty in order to avoid losing more that $6500 to win your case, you still don't have the disks. (Pleading guilty assumes you already acquired the files on a hard drive.) Guess your only option is to go beg a copy of an illegal KJ's hard drive

No you get copies of the discs they still produce, and need to delete anything that is discontinued - and look for a used copy like any other 'legal' kj would.

[Lonman]

Originally Posted by RIKKI TIKKI

I was trying to remember what the disc cost was for those early cdg's, but can only vaguely remember what I paid for the early DK's, BMB's, then Music Maestro, Priddus, Sound Choice, Sunfly, American Gold, Dangerous, Hellavadisc, Star Disc, Chartbuster, Etc., Etc., Etc. ( Not to mention the 5 or 6 Manus that I get my Spanish cdg's from.)

I estimated it at $2/song, quite a few years back, and with my meager 13,000 song library ( with about 3500 duplicates ) that would set me back at least $20,000 over the last 17 years, which doesn't seem that bad, until you try to justify starting up in the business today, and wanting to have a huge library to start, and that illegal hardrive with 20,000 songs on it over there on E-Bay for $300.00, and I can see where the nubies would go, before weighing the legalities, or knowing what legal remedies that Sound Choice is now persuing, in order to recap some of their lost revenue.

I can sleep at night knowing that I'm legal, but will jump on anyone's band wagon, that will make it harder for the Pirate's to make a living, by undercutting the legit KJ's. I'll start by showing the club owners/mgmt, what Sound Choice is doing, as it goes after the venue also, if they are knowingly hiring a KJ with an illegal set of discs, or hardrive, and then as a last resort, I would turn in the illegal KJ to the Sound Choice Legal team, and still be able to sleep easily about it. I'll let my hosting skills compete for business against another legit KJ, but I'll also play nasty when it comes to some pirate trying to take the money out of my wallet...

When I started buying music, cdg's weren't prevelant up here yet, still laserdiscs - those ran 120-150 PER disc for 28 songs.
DK, SC, MM were the first ones in this are and those discs ran approx $45-50 per disc for 15-18 songs - depending on brand. Even the 'cheaper' brands of today ran around $30 each disc. This was back in 93-95.

[Musicman51]

No you get copies of the discs they still produce, and need to delete anything that is discontinued - and look for a used copy like any other 'legal' kj would.

used disc? ummmm...yeah

[Musicman51]

You see folks....this is the exact thing i was talking about. If this happened to me and my club. I would run to my lawyers office. And this can happen to you. I just posted about a persons reputation. The lawyers of sound choice made a statement? Where are the sleps during this? This is the perception i was talking about. You will see much much more of this. This is a case of where the "investigators" never...never even stepped foot into this establishment. Whose the crooks here? I am actually starting to be ashamed of even associating myself with the karaoke industry because of the bad shoddy practices of a select few. The more i read about this mess the more it's starting to....

http://m.wbir.com/detail.jsp?key=113776&rc=ne&full=1

[RandyMcCharles]

No you get copies of the discs they still produce

So you do get the discs. For .75 a song. I would have loved to have paid .75 per song for the discs I bought. So what SC is telling me is that if I had stolen their music first then they would then sell it to me at a huge discount, but if I wanted to come by it honestly I have to pay retail like everyone else.
This reminds me of when I (a Canadian) gratuated from a US university and applied for a work visa and was told I could not get one unless I worked illegally in the US for 2 years first (and not paid taxes).
This sounds like another example of where the honest guy gets the shaft while the pirate gets the soft touch.

[Lonman]

Originally Posted by Musicman51

used disc? ummmm...yeah

The discs that are offered in the settlement are new.
Anything else that is discontinued, they need to delete & if they want that disc must search high & low like any other kj - chances are finding a 'used' disc that has been discontinued. I buy used discs all the time off of customers that no longer want them for their own library. Nothing wrong with that.

[Lonman]

Originally Posted by RandyMcCharles

So you do get the discs. For .75 a song. I would have loved to have paid .75 per song for the discs I bought. So what SC is telling me is that if I had stolen their music first then they would then sell it to me at a huge discount, but if I wanted to come by it honestly I have to pay retail like everyone else.

But again the kicker is, they must delete & not use anything there is no original disc for. Plus the fact that many discs are not produced anymore, - so they must drop their copy of 8125 & 8148 & anything with Pearl Jam & anything with Soundgarden, etc.... so a pirates 100K library is going to drop to a more level playing field with many other kj's with approx 10K (or less) songs and probably less desireable as many kj's that have been at it a while still have these discs and the more desireable songs people want. So this host had better have been good to begin with rather than relying on his huge illegal library, because they no longer have that to fall back on as a lure.

[RandyMcCharles]

Discontinued discs is a problem outside of piracy. You have a good point that a pirate who missed the opportunity to buy a disc before it was discontinued cannot go legit and keep the bootlegged tracks. But even legit buyers cannot get a disc once it is no longer available. I mentioned in another thread that all Canadian manufacturers are now out of business (not due to piracy but due to rising license fees). I would love to buy the Karaokemakers Trooper CDG but cannot even find a used disc for love or money. Very little Canadian music that did not top US charts was ever produced as karaoke and currently exactly zero is.

[Lonman]

Not sure if the PM worked or not, but sent you a link where you can get that Trooper disc.

[RIKKI TIKKI]

Originally Posted by Lonman

When I started buying music, cdg's weren't prevelant up here yet, still laserdiscs - those ran 120-150 PER disc for 28 songs.
DK, SC, MM were the first ones in this are and those discs ran approx $45-50 per disc for 15-18 songs - depending on brand. Even the 'cheaper' brands of today ran around $30 each disc. This was back in 93-95.

I came into the industry a couple of years after the laserdiscs, but the first karaoke shows I saw ( too shy to try in those days ) used them, and I can remember all the background video, and remembered commenting to my girlfriend that the video made it distracting from the lyrics for the singer, but entertained the rest of the audience (especially those that weren't singing).

I ran a bowling center in a small town on the Arizona/Mexico border, that needed some entertainment in a small underused lounge, and remembered Karaoke that I had seen a couple of years earlier, and checked into several formats for Karaoke entertainment for this small venue... I do remember the cost of a Karaoke jukebox that included 25 laserdiscs, directly from Japan, that could be leased or bought. If you bought the turn key version the retail price was a cool $20,000 smackers... my owner didn't go for it...lol. So I hired a KJ from a nearby town, and paid him $200 / night... more than I should have paid( but still made a meager profit in the beginning ), but he was good ( and the profit margin increased quite a bit ), and tought me alot about the business, indirectly, as I am a quick study, and loved to sing... he left for a town farther away, after a couple of months, and I decided that maybe I could KJ, along with the other 3 or 4 hats I wore at this bowling alley (sic), and convinced the owner to lend me $2000 and I would purchase the Karaoke equipment, and do the shows for free for two years, in order to pay off the loan... I'm still Hosting after 15 years, and still have the original gear in storage, including the JVC cdg player that I originally bought, and also a Hitachi player that I bought as a backup, since JVC discontinued their cdg player, and I needed a backup, for my home studio, and show, in case the JVC died...

I have some original receipts for the DK, and Sound choice discs I purchased ( on sale ) for $32.95 in 1996. My original cdg start up set in 1995 was included in the purchase of a turnkey setup, that included a new player(JVC), new mixing amp, and 4 used Pioneer speakers and stands, and 3 corded mics, and cables for every piece of gear. Plus 25 various cdg's of my choosing, and I think they retailed at $39.95 for the ones that I selected... All for the cool price of $1,850.00 delivered from Chicago...

I didn't quite know what I was getting into, once all the new manufacturers started producing the same songs, so I experimented with different manus, and after a lot of trial and error, and duplication, I eventually stuck with Sound Choice as my manu of preference, and didn't deviate, until Pop Hits Monthly started producing new songs faster than Sound Choice, and I bought quite a lot of new songs that my clients were requesting, even though I would have rather waited for the Sound Choice cdg, the timeliness of their releasing new music, was putting me in a bind with my regulars, that started wondering why they could sing those new songs, on their visits to Karaoke shows in the bigger towns, but I was always waiting to purchase the Sound Choice version... it was because I could count on the quality, and not duplicate too many songs in the process.

Ah! The good ol' days...

[Lonman]

[edited] Deleted a link.

[RandyMcCharles]

Not sure if the PM worked or not, but sent you a link where you can get that Trooper disc.

Thanks Lonman. I got the link and am following up. I called every place I could find that listed it a couple of years ago and they were out, but i don't think I saw this place.