Karaoke Forums

Saw this today:

http://www.twincities.com/searchresults/ci_5733257?nclick_check=1

About a Karaoke business busted for selling harddrives full of duplicated Karaoke music..first case ever..5yrs in prison.

In order to get into that source without signing in, a person will need to click the heading which is TwinCities.com.  I think that enables a person to circumvent becoming a member and just entering as a guest.  Click that link, you'll get the sign in screen, and than click the heading in the blue area rather than sign up.

Once you get into the site, just enter Karaoke into search engine, and the headings of "Burnsville woman arrested" will comeup in heading forms.

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Northeast United States runner up for the "Singing Hall of Shame".

Or to make things much easier, here's what it reads:

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Northeast United States runner up for the "Singing Hall of Shame".

She (her business) sold hundreds of thousands of illegal disks full of these on online auctions.  Slightly different than the small business person backing up their copies.   What she did was extreme.  If she gets home release, "supervised home release", seems they aren't really prosecuting that often, and severely at all.  she was selling extremely high volumes of pirated merch.  This likely makes it easier to establish monetary loss to the actual copyright holder too, tangible damages or loss can be calculated based upon the volume of her sale.   Figure the volume she sold or 100K
let's assume she asked only $10 bucks per item.

100,000 @ $10=   $1,000,000

(this is significant theft)  

a couple hundred thousand however ?    She's affecting the market somewhat, and the extent can be proven.   So it's not difficult to charge her with something tangible.


Somewhat different than busting the 7 year old who's downloading Barney shows on Kazaa. IMHO

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Northeast United States runner up for the "Singing Hall of Shame".

Well, hell....... she sold them on Ebay of all the dumb things to do.  
Sounds like the case recently busted here.... average ordinary housewives pimping themselves on Craigslist..... they did a sting and arrested quite a handful of them.

Some people would do anything to turn a dime. And from the sounds of it, she sold a lot of those things.

Maybe this will stop others, cause I'm sure there are others out there doing the same thing.

Wonder if the "buyers" will get in trouble also?
(Nooooo.... I didn't buy any from her.... don't even ask)

.

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♥ Laugh your heart out, dance in the rain. Cherish the memories, ignore the pain. Love and learn, forget and forgive. Because you only have one life to live. ♥

I sit here amazed that you expect the feds to solve your problems  They dont even have the money to fix the pot holes in the road yet they want more money and want to regulate your morals.. Fix self.. I am so tired of  them passing more and more laws and putting  big money ahead of then citezens needs wake up America...

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Join The Karaokle Singers Social Network. Upload Your Music!!

Always good news to see an illegal seller get busted. Might be one out of a thousand, but it still can give a glimmer of hope.

Find it weirdly amazing that the woman was from a town called... "Burnsville". Go figure.

personally, I'm happy to see the ebayer hard drive seller busted. THAT's what they should be working on!

Me too. I hope they come and bust people who were brazen enough to sell their illegal copy of karaoke on a computer here and bragged to everyone about it.

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Seize the day and SING!!!

My first thought when I read how much she was selling was, 'wow that's a lot of illegal host out there running shows' For her to sell, there has to be a buyer, so that also means that there could be easily several thousand host out there running shows with pirated equipment. So what are the odds that someone near you may have bought one. What are the odds that you've lost a gig to someone who paid next to nothing for a 10,000 song collection is out there underbidding your gigs at this very moment. What are the odds that many folks here at this very forum made purchases of said equipment.
My show is only up to 5000 songs, and yes I use backups, but I also have the originals of every single disc that I own. So what do I think about the bootleggers? Fock'em. They're getting what they deserve, bottom line. They can make all the excuses they want for their actions, but it's still wrong and it takes away money from each and every one of of us.(damn,I sound like bigdog don't I? )

James the Lion Hearted
Maninblack
White Trash Philosopher
Humble Karaoke Host

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I serve no man and am loyal to only one God.

Being critical of a person's success in any respect speaks volumes about the lack of your own.

Love as though you've never been hurt, Dance as though no one's watching, Sing as though God Himself were listening.

Should they go after E-bay too for aiding and abetting plus taking their 2% from each sale?  LOL

For those of you keeping it legal...I am not sure if anyone has seen this, but it gives new hope to those of us keeping it legal. Go to the web page below and read the whole thing, but ESPECIALLY the letters from Stellar (Top Hits/Pop Hits) Records and Sound Choice that he pasted at the bottom.

http://www.knightshow.com/

ok......................

I'm a bit confused...

1.) how could a newbie have three stars??? unless they never posted here before (and shame on you for staying silent all this time! !)

2.) I'm confused as to what you're giving credit to... my quiting the hosting (KJ) part of karaoke, or just the posted topics from SC and Stellar?

Okay...the three star thing...I have no idea. As for the credit being given, it's to SC and Stellar Records for finally cracking down on illegal hosts. I am sorry it caused you to retire. I am sorry if it causes ANYONE to retire, but there were MANY warnings before now and many people chose not to heed them. The copyright laws were there for the reading and they said no copying for commercial use and no format switching.

You don't HAVE to retire, you know. You can still play gigs with your ORIGINAL discs. Yes, they are cumbersome and yes, they can be damaged, but it's part of doing business. We have been doing shows for 14 years now with three different systems ALL with original discs. Each show is a bear to set up and sometimes table space for the many boxes of discs is limited, but we manage.

We have had discs go missing and our KJ's have broken more than a few that couldn't be replaced. But we manage. And now, thanks to Sound Choice and Stellar records, maybe we can start being paid what we are worth instead of what illegal KJ's are worth.

I HATE lugging all of our discs to shows. I HATE having to apologize to customers because a disc gets scratched and I can't replace it. But I will LOVE it when I am making more than $100 a night and I will LOVE it when I can afford to get all the new stuff BEFORE it's on sale because I couldn't afford the new stuff because I wasn't downloading it or burning it into all three rigs like everyone else. I will still HATE having to budget for replacement discs and I will still fire my KJ's for ruining discs I CAN'T replace, but at least I will be able to pay my bills and I will ALWAYS LOVE that I stayed COMPLETELY LEGAL the entire time when EVERYONE around us was burning and ripping. In our city, there are MAYBE three completely legal karaoke companies. And we are all going to finally get the shows and the pay we deserved all along.

We can't WAIT for Sound Choice and Stellar Records to come HERE and start sending letters and prosecuting. It's a long time coming!

Once again, I AM sorry if you feel you have to retire. If you enjoy karaoke and you are good at it, what does it matter that you have to use discs and not a computer? I am sure your regulars don't care what you are using as long as YOU are there. I am sure you are not the only one in your area who has to go back to discs, so THEY will have the same hurdles you do. Good luck either way.

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Keep it legal!!!

In fairness to hundreds of digital KJ's out there - There is a difference between a KJ who rips their original CDGS to a harddrive and hosts  a show.  AND.......

Someone who takes that same hardrive and copies it multiply times and sells them on Ebay.  YES they are both probably illegal by the letter of the law.

But isn't there a difference when driving a car in a 25mph school zone
between going 27mph and 68mph ? Both are ILLEGAL and breaking the law....But there IS a distinct difference

Thanks for responding.

I thought I made my stance VERY clear. And you made my points FOR me!

You yourself said you HATE the inherant problems of playing originals. (lugging them in, skipping original media, broken <<or stolen!>> discs) To be quite frank, converting to computer SOLVES your problems. If you have done the honorable thing and paid for the music, what does it matter what format it's in? Nobody has been hurt by the actions of converstion - UNLESS you are NOT paying for your original music.

SC and Stellar neither one tell you when stuff is no longer available. I don't have an honest count, but I bet one THIRD of my investment are completely non-replaceable. And I'll go one further on this point... to be told by a manufacturer HOW you will run your business is probably the most insulting thing I've been informed of.

"Oh, thanks for buying our discs. However, despite all you've given us, you may ONLY use the original discs in your show. Thanks for playing!"

While I'm being quite sarcastic in that statement, I think you can see that's EXACTLY their stance.

To be lumped in with blatant thieves when I've invested over thirty thousand just in my songs alone was insulting. They're addressing ALL computer folks with this one swipe of the sythe, and it frankly P I S S E D me off!

When I spoke with SC about this from the very beginning, they accused me of being a thief. It took months and months of arguing back and forth for a represenative of SC to FINALLY admit that I wasn't a thief, but instead, a violator of copyright. Once I understood the terminology and was shown the laws I was accused of breaking, I understood, but still tried to convince them that we folks that merely use the computer for playing the files (after buying the discs and converting them) are NOT their enemies... but instead are their allies. Even better, BC the studio producer even stated (paraphrasing here) that the folks that do 1:1 conversions while breaking the law ARE the low violators and that the ones that they want to stop ARE the blatant thieves... those that are seriously profiting off the illegal sales or running multi rigs.

WE KNOW the illegal shows as much as the regular disc users. And nothing pleases me more than the Ebay hard drive seller that got busted. I personally feel they should have stood by even more of the lpunishment that could have been handed out to her. But instead, they're giving her a very reduced sentence as long as she cooperates in the investigation. While I can see both sides, nothing would have made me happier than seeing a SERIOUS conviction that would have scared the illegals into quitting.

THEY are your $50 a night guys that are the bane of your existance, not folks like me.

The people that should be holding hands and taking the charge together are those that are not out to rip off the karaoke manus. They should be working hand and fist with the karaoke manus.

Kjs that are using today's technology to be better kjs are NOT the enemy.

I think people are trying so hard to justify breaking the law that they are overlooking the REASON the law exists in the first place. The law is specific: You CANNOT, for commercial use (which means for anything that makes money - such as a karaoke show or DJ service), burn copies or rip them into your hard drive - even to protect your investment - no matter what, for any reason, PERIOD. The REASON this is the law is so that the people who produced the product can benefit from it and can, if they choose, afford to produce more of the product. And, something to remember, when you buy a karaoke disc (or any music disc, for that matter) you own a round, flat piece of plastic with a hole in the middle. You do not own the music on it. You can use the disc as a Frisbee or make art with it in your microwave, but you cannot do anything with the music on it because YOU DO NOT OWN THE MUSIC.

Now, here is why I agree that  ANY ripping is illegal (even a 1:1 ratio).
If you rip your Sound Choice disc into your computer, although it IS breaking the law, I can understand the protection issue. However, if that hard drive crashes or gets wiped or whatever and that particular copy is unusable, the NEXT time you rip your disc to computer, YOU ARE STEALING FROM THE MANUFACTURER. The 1:1 ratio argument only works the FIRST time you rip the disc to your drive. The second time, you have , essentially copied the disc AGAIN and, depending on how long your drive lasts, it eventually becomes a 1:whatever ratio. AND, if you get a new computer for your shows and you rip the disc into THAT computer, you are again blowing the 1:1 ratio. Even if you are only using ONE computer for your shows, if you made a second copy of the disc, then you made a second copy of the disc. PERIOD. This also goes for burning the music to another disc. If you do it once, shame on you. If you break or otherwise ruin your burned copy and you make ANOTHER backup disc, YOU ARE STEALING FROM THE MANUFACTURER. (And, a note on a point you, Knightshow, made about replacements: You said that many of your discs cannot be replaced because the manufacturers no longer make those discs or no longer hold the rights to make the discs, right? So, if your drive crashes, what gives YOU the right to re-copy the disc if Sound Choice isn't even allowed to re-copy the disc?)

Bottom line: If you are taking something that doesn't belong to you, it IS stealing.
And copyright infringement IS taking something that doesn't belong to you.

If I don't want to mess up my favorite blue blouse, I cannot just go to the store and TAKE another without paying so I can leave my original blue blouse at home. I would be prosecuted for shoplifting. And, imagine if, the first time I wear my backup blue blouse, I spill coffee on it. Can I then go back to the store and STEAL another? All the while keeping my precious original safe at home? Sound Choice, Stellar Records and ALL of the other manufacturers deserve to be paid for EVERY copy of their music being used commercially. Maybe, if people weren't ripping them off right and left, they would be able to afford to keep some of the songs they've lost in their selections for us to purchase when discs in our selections get ruined or lost.

Also, it would be easy for the manufacturers to walk into a show and determine if a disc being used is an original or not. It is infinitely more difficult for a company to know if this is the FIRST or HUNDREDTH time a disc has been ripped into a computer. And, are they supposed to take your WORD for the fact that the computer you have at THAT particular show is the ONLY computer you have the disc ripped into? No, they would have to get a warrant and search your home. The ONLY way the manufacturers have to police the industry is to keep it "prehistoric" and ONLY allow original discs to be used. I wish it was different, but it isn't.  

It would cost too much for the manufacturers to serve warrants on EVERY karaoke company using computers. In our area, everyone SWEARS they are only doing the 1:1 ratio thing, but, funny thing, until ripping and burning became an option, they were only running up to seven shows a week with ONE rig and, all of a sudden, EVERY computer karaoke company has at least five rigs with equally impressive selections in all of their systems and companies swearing they are using 1:1 burned discs are also running several rigs a night. Interesting, huh? But, I will just bet, if SC or Stellar Records walked into one of their shows, the KJ would give their WORD that they only copied on a 1:1 ratio.

THAT is why they have to stop EVERYONE from ripping their discs into computers and burning copies. Unfortunately, honest people are an endangered species and if they trust YOU then they have to trust EVERYONE and you KNOW there are illegal companies out there. EVERYONE who bought one of that eBay woman's hard drives is running an illegal show. How many did the article say she sold?? Do you think those people will admit to ANYONE that THEY don't have the originals in their trunk, house, safety deposit box or whatever? Of course not. They will tell anyone who asks (without a warrant) that they have the originals.

Knightshow - instead of retiring, run your shows with your originals and, when the proper technology exists and is condoned by the manufacturers, then you can go back to using a computer. Eventually, there will be a LEGAL way to use up to date technology. Or maybe someone will come up with a licensing system for karaoke operators with checks and balances to make sure everyone is doing ONLY the 1:1 thing if the manufacturers eventually allow it. If you quit now, then the people who were BLATANTLY breaking the copyright laws - the ones who charge $50 for a show and run several illegal rigs - win. I will GLADLY lug all of our discs to every show for the rest of my career if it means even ONE illegal company in our area gets busted and put out of business. Don't you feel the same way? Haven't you been underbid by someone you KNEW was illegal but you couldn't do anything about it? Well, now you can!

Once again, whatever you decide, I wish you luck.

There are enough manus both software & hardware AND retailers that have made the claims that it's ok for a kj to use the computer provided they rip from their own 'purchased' discs that it's ok for commercial use.  I know for myself i've saved each & every wording, website, email & forum post from each and any manu (including VocoPro) that has made this claim - basically stating that the pro user no longer has to carry discs from show to show - that if I were taken to court there would be enough doubt, because of all these statements, that a computer user (that was truly using a computer on a 1:1 ratio) would not be prosecuted & if they were I believe that each and EVERY one of these companies should go down with them!

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

interesting thoughts... however, you don't know the original wording behind the thoughts of those that petitioned the government to create the specific wording. AND if all the karaoke songs I had were still produced by the same manus, this entire conversation would be a moot point. Again, I reiterate that fully 1/3 of my library is irreplaceable!! To play off originals would be song suicide. I'd have the garbled graphics, and eventually have to retire them. PROTECTING my investment has ALWAYS been a number one priority.the 1:1 ratio is for commercial means meaning IN USE. A reproduction without being used still falls under "fair use" in my opinion, as until it's being used, it's not commercial. So if I made a backup copy of my hard drive (and what fool wouldn't???!!!), all it really is is a hard drive on a shelf. No manu is ripped off as the library in USE is still a 1:1. NOWHERE is there a theft involved. And I daresay that when you go from one computer to the other, you'll take the hard drive from the first computer! ! apples and oranges, dude. You're bringing up issues that aren't even true. in my case, the store is already in my house. the "copy" is now bad and is thrown away or discarded, so the original is reproduced for the show... protected originals that are ARCHIVED and not in use! Again, we're talking ease of use for the manus... hey if I have a question about ANY commercial thing, and I want to bring the law into place, I have to go thru the courts to do so. Sure I could do the easy application and just ASK the owner of the store "can I see your receipts... I think this is a non-original SHIRT (to use your examples above)"... and they have the right to tell me to flake off and get a court order, or do it. MY stance has always been if a manu wanted to see if I owned the discs, come to my home and I'll SHOW them!So because of the dishonest people, we just put the lid on technology??!! Yeah, prehistoric is right! Frankly, I'd rather treat each case individually... It doesn't take a genius to see seven gigs running at the SAME time means seven libraries!! you go for the big fish, and go after the others that are trying to stay below the radar as time permits.I won't have my business model dictated to me by anybody. The moment this became too much of a hassle, I swore I'd get out. And I dd. Because I ran my commercial business honorably. I won't bow to the petty whims of the fear-based disc folks. Quite frankly, cdg players are getting harder and harder to find. We're still a niche-market, and are not supported well by the hardware folks. My way works, it's convienient, and I stand by my word. If others have a problem with that, then I can't help them.

But I still stand by my statement if the manus wanted to work with the computer folks (the good ones that are trying to honor the spirit of the law), we as legal disc owners could work hand in hand with the manus, shutting down the multiriggers and illegal sellers. But they want to do it their way, and isolate those of us that supported them from the beginning (I've been in this business since 1996).

Quite frankly, I could give a dam what they think of me now. They decided to do this with one swipe of the sword. I hope it bites them in the butt! Thanks, and the same back to you and all the industry. I just know I won't be supporting it myself as long as the disc owners treat all computer users as the enemy... united we win, divided we fall.

I think that what is being said here is that when you buy the music, you aren't buying the music itself, but the right to play the music.  So, if you have already paid for the right to use the music, then why should you have to pay for it again?  That seems to contradict the "stealing" claim.

As has been argued so many times, there has been NO court decision as to the right of Karaoke operators to copy their purchased disks as a means of archiving and protecting their investment.  The lawyers for the manufacturers will argue the interpretation that Revenge Entertainment has indicated.  The lawyers at IPJustice.org will present a totally different argument as can be seen on their website, which is based on case law and interpretations.  As per just about any case, a court decision will probably come down to who's lawyer can provide the most convincing argument.  

IPJustice makes some pretty valid points, all backed up by decisions from closely related cases.

As for the "Fair Use Act" and how it relates to 'personal' and 'commercial' use.  One could argue that 'commercial' use would mean a direct financial gain is made from the copying of the music (eg, copying the disc and selling it).  If the purpose of making the copy is purely to protect the personal investment the KJ has made in purchasing his library of disks, then it would seem to fit more into the "personal use" category.  IE, the KJ is not making the copy to give out or sell for financial/commercial gain, he/she is making it for their own personal use... to protect their personal investment.

Now, I am not saying that this is right or wrong, just that it is an example of a possible compelling argument that could be presented.

As an aside, what would happen if a KJ was registered as a "library" whereby he 'loaned' the music by playing it for each singer that requested a song.  The "Fair Use Act" clearly states that copying is legal for librarys, doesn't it?    :D