Karaoke Forums

@HarringtonLaw - It was in fact possible to run a karaoke show from a hard dive in 1998, it just wasn't as widespread as it is today.

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-Chris

I don't recall computers really hitting the scene until after 2000. However, I do know a couple kj's in the mid-late 90's that DID trade libraries, had a stand alone burner under his station at his shows & used it on every customer disc which would then be added to their collection the next night.
They wanted to trade with me, I asked them WHY would I want you (my competition) to HAVE what I offer. I still stand with this. Had a kj come in last night asking if I could give him some music.

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Between the small size of the hard drives and the comparatively low speed of the processors, I believe that it would have been functionally impossible in 1998 to run a commercial show with a significant number of karaoke tracks from a hard drive, at least in the sense that we think of it today. But I could be wrong.

About the only software out there at the time was tricerasoft's products and they were sluggish at best. I toyed with it and just said forget it in 2000. Until Sax & dotty's cameout in 2002 did I really think about getting back into computerized karaoke.

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The Line Array Experiment is over. Nothing to see here. Move along.

READ IT AGAIN: it says B-A-C-K-U-P C-O-P-Y not excluding "hard drive", flash drive, CDR, Zipdrive, or even backup TAPE. It was perfectly possible to make a "backup copy" on ALL these methods in 1998. Lovely twist you'd like to restrict here however, they didn't have a problem with this method for the following YEARS when playback became possible:
2000, 2001, 2002 ,2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008




Don't think so. The real bluff would be anyone actually thinking they would produce anything.
Funny how they were not available when counsel for CAVS flew into NC for a deposition of Mr. Slep when they had already agreed to produce them -- then refused on arrival. The nutshell games continue --- business as usual I see. (You should read up on the case.... it's quite a soap opera.)


And I'm sure that filing a suit against those "actual customers" is certainly going to win over their hearts and minds to continue being a customer? Seriously?





Of course it's not "worthless" to you. They were defendants who PURCHASED PRODUCT...


Pirates suing pirates to fight piracy?

See above. or below:

"backup copy" does not limit the media to CDR discs.[/quote]


It wasn't "all that was available at the time." It might be all that YOU were aware of though.


You act like you're the victim here! There were always avenues to prevent and limit piracy while increasing sales however, manufacturers like SC and CB never bothered to explore them. Primarily because they were too involved in their own "pirate race" against other manufacturers. Life is tough, stop whining about it because there are thousands of KJ's who purchased their products (with cash) trusting that they were legal to start with only to find that these manufacturers pirated the very material they are now suing KJ's over.



You aren't the least bit interested in any other methods - they would not be as profitable.


The reason for not using the music is the lawsuit(s) - period. I protect myself AND all of my clubs by simply eliminating this cancerous brand.


Let me start holding my breath.....

...[/quote]

Oh please. I have offered an easy solution to SC's problems without having to resort to the current witch hunts. One word- "INVESTIGATE" SC has not done so, and will not do so, because they will not ( or cannot afford to). Instead, they are basing their income on media shifters who may well have spent hard earned dollars on SC product, in hopes of scaring the uneducated into paying settlements at no cost to SC. A business plan that seems to be working for them, and that they are happy with despite the lack of ethics or morals involved.

The good news is that since SC no longer produces new tracks, their popularity will hopefully fade away as they become obsolete, allowing even the most library dependent KJ to eliminate them with abandon.

Since I am also of the belief that several suits may well be pending in regard to SCs unethical methodology, they may fade rather more quickly than some may believe.

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

" Disc based and loving it..."

As most hosts keep their originals at home or other secure place, are you suggesting that to invesstigate to see the host is 1:1, that the investigator should commit a B&E to insure that the originals exist? I don't think so. There are only two ways to legally see the discs, and those are voluntarily showing discs or ordered to produce them in a Discovery.

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You can be strange but not a stranger

You're missing the point timberlea.
And you should know better that you can't break the law (commit B&E) to enforce the law. (well, maybe you can in Canada - I wouldn't presume to know.)

Let me ask you this:
If I used discs at my shows -- and a JVC-800 cartridge player where you can't see the discs anyway -- is that anyone's business? You can't tell whether I'm using originals or burns. Or am I still suspect simply because you can't see them and what grounds do you have to file a suit and demand discovery?

How much further down this road do you think is legal?

In watching all of the bickering going back and forth, I have tried to stay out of most of it because I doubt I can add anything of true value. But here I go anyway....

To me it seems as if Sound Choice (SC) is taking a shotgun approach. Fire off a bunch of lawsuits, see who responds, attempt to appear at as many as possible, collect what they can, the others slip through the cracks. What SC is doing also seems to be mirroring what we in the software industry call "patent trolls". For those unfamiliar, a patent troll produces no saleable merchandise. The trolls buy up the assets, including intellectual property, of companies, many of which have failed or are failing, sell off the physical assets, and then file patent lawsuits against alleged infringers. They usually work towards settlements and they make a sizeable amount of money in many cases. It is generally recognized that they use the threat of lawsuits, fear, and intimidation as the primary method of coming to a settlement. They are also loathed by the industry and serve no true useful purpose. Sound Choice appears to be on this same track.

The manufacturers have every right to defend their interests and I support that they should pursue that to the fullest extent of the law. (How they do so impacts how they are perceived in the industry and of course, their reputation). Because online piracy is notoriously difficult and costly to prosecute, It is also in their best interests to go for the low hanging fruit. That of course is the pirate DJ. The media-shifting piece of it seems a bit shaky to me and further pursuing it via trademark infringement seems like a rather desperate attempt to make money without producing anything of value. But the law is the law and we are subject to it.

It seems to me that even though the low hanging fruit is the media shifting DJ, if they (SC and the rest of the industry) truly wanted to get back in the business of creating and selling content for a profit, they would go after what is actually killing the industry which is the online pirates. As long as they are out they downloading 250,000 tracks in a matter of days and then replicating that to hard drives and then selling to the market for the cost of the drive + $50 to $100, then of course people will be tempted and actually fall prey to a pirate sale.

Another remedy would be to simply produce content in a manner that makes it much more difficult for a pirate to actually pirate. From a tehnological perspective this introduces some costs and reduces ease of use, but it also provides much better protection for the manufacturer and stability of rthe industry.

Digital Watermarking, Encryption, Custom encoding requiring custom CODECs, Hardware, or software are just some of the things that could be implemented to produce content that is easier to protect from piracy. Chartbuster has made some attemps via streaming, the locked hard drive format and digital distribution to try to keep pace, but as long as they still release on easily copyable CD format, the issue will continue to exist.

Just like the floppy disk is obsolete in the PC industry (CD's and DVD's are not to far behind), the karaoke industry should consider new formats and distribution methods and eliminate the CD+G all together. I believe most DJ's will be happy to invest in a new technology to run their business as long as there is a means of amicably retaining the ability to continue to use the old format (or shift the old content to the new format.

As noted, give us a roadmap so we can plan. Develop a new format, security, means of distribution, tell us when theings will take place, give us a grace period to adopt, then kill the old format. Then immediately start working on updates or a new format because the baf guys will already be working on a way to get around things.

THAT is the cost of doing business in the age of technology.

much longer than I expected.....maybe I should rewrite this as a blog post....

-Chris

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-Chris

The restrictions using technology would be great but the manufacturers have to sell product to the general public to stay viable - KJs are a small piece of market share.

As usual Chip reads and repeats only the things he wants to and omits important sections such as "I Don't think so". And exactly how many discs can be placed in a JVC? Six I believe so it has to be loaded and unloaded during a show and unless the host is completely hidden, the discs couls be seen.

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You can be strange but not a stranger

You're actually correct. There were PC->CDG programs, but nothing for live playing until 2000.

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[color=#ffff55]Mickey J.[/color]
Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

One difference between SC and a "patent troll," as you refer to them, is that SC does actually produce a marketable product, and if 95 out of every 100 users of that product didn't steal it, we'd all have nothing to talk about.

A second difference is that the "patent troll" relies on the expense of discovery in very complicated patent cases to extract settlements for less than the cost of that discovery. Discovery in these cases is minimal; it involves examining hard drives, discs, and records, and SC bears most of that expense itself.



I'm not sure why you think the product that SC makes and sells is not a "thing of value."



The process for going after online pirates is slower and, for various reasons, has to be undertaken under seal. Sometimes it requires the involvement of law enforcement, which further limits our ability to discuss it.

"patent troll" is not how *I* refer to them, it is how the tech industry has refered to them for over a decade -

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patent_troll

At this point, SC is not so much producing a marketable product as much as they are re-producing a product that was marketable a few years ago. They are effectively just copying the old stuff over and over again expecting it to be as valuable as it was the day they initially released it.



See above.

At this point, SC makes and sells discs. They haven't made anything else for a couple years now.

Value is also relative. Some may be willing to pay full retail price for Sound Choice product that is 2-15 years old. I think that is silly. eBay and Craigslist are your friends for used (and sometimes new) original Sound Choice discs.

The value of existing SC content diminishes everyday they do not produce new content. SC may have set the bar back in the day, but they are rapidly losing relevancy.

-Chris

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-Chris

Wrong again. I have a JVC800 and no, you can NOT see the discs. EVER. The only disc you can see is if a customer brings one in, there is a separate, single tray to play from.

Otherwise, all you see is cartridges....

Nice try though.

1) I HAVE given you a solution, REPETITIVELY- PROFESSIONAL investigation- which SC won't do, because I don't believe they think it's profitable. So they refuse, and go after everyone they can in the hopes of the highest income that they can intimidate.

2) Interesting, simply because SC or any other karaoke production company has absolutely no right to grant permission to media shift track content, and state this on their sites.- which effectively kills the case right there.

3) Sorry, but there is no other way to put this- an out and out lie. Piracy is THEFT. Media shifting does not fall into this catagory. Media shifting bought and paid for discs may or may not be legal- and has yet to be tried in court by those who CAN ( the music owners/publishers), but it is not theft, which it would have to be to fit the definition of piracy.

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

" Disc based and loving it..."