Karaoke Forums

the point was Chip swore up and down that they were digitally watermarked as an argument against Jim saying it is not that easy to protect digital content.
if they are NOT watermarked, then Chip lied and he calls Jim to bat for lying so he should be held to the same standards.
now i don't know how to tell if it is watermarked (which is why i asked Chris above and i believe he will get to me when he is not busy running a stupidly successful karaoke business), if it is, Chris loses a lot of credibility for lying, if it's not, Chip has much explaining to do and loses his credibility for lying.
this is not about the tracks, it is about credibility.

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Paradigm Karaoke, The New Standard.......Shift Happens

I just don't know why anyone would go through the trouble to watermark a karaoke track in the first place. With the technology/software available today; you can remove just about anything you want to remove in a karaoke track. It's very easy to make a Sound Choice track look just like a music Maestro track if you really would want to. I'm sure it would be just as easy to make one of Chips Red Peters tracks look just like a Sound Choice track if you really wanted to. I'm pretty sure that the process would more than likely remove any watermark if there ever was one there to begin with. Everybody lies sometimes. The threat of a water mark might be actually working because no one seems to be sharing them like they share every Sound Choice track ever made. If I could find one; I'd like to see what I could do to make it look like something else but I'm not as technically educated to know what to look for as far as a digital water mark would entail so I wouldn't know if I was successful in removing it anyway.

Okay. I gave this a little more thought and came up with a very simple way to mark a track so you would know how to identify who the original purchaser was. My guess would be that these Red Peters tracks might have sold a few copies when they first became available. I've made quite a few homemade tracks over the years and it would be very easy to add a serial number to a completed track as an additional page of lyrics. Every time someone goes to your web site and pays for the song you open up the software that you use to make the songs and add the serial number to the last page and mark down who has that particular track and serial number. You give a new serial number each time another person purchases a track from your web site. If you see one of these tracks being shared on the internet; you can just download it and look to see what serial number it has. As long as the only way to purchase these tracks is through your own web site; you can keep track of your tracks. If you decide to mass produce these tracks onto a disc and sell a large quantity to a distributor; you lose the ability to monitor the serial numbers. Sound Choice could have used this method if they would have only sold downloads from their own web site but they went with the mass production method and there was no way to know who bought a song and who didn't. they tried using Media Cloq but that turned out to be a disaster. Someone is always smarter than the average bear and Media Cloq was defeated in short order. They thought that the people who paid for the GEM tracks would keep them under lock and key but someone probably hired a KJ to work one of their shows and the horses got out of the barn and now you can download the Gem tracks in many places from many people. Pirates will always figure out a way to be....well pirates.

Plenty of people put up a "BEWARE OF DOG" sign on their houses to keep the thieves at bay. Maybe Chip did the same thing. It's not like he tried to commit a crime even if he did not have a dog protecting his karaoke tracks after all. I don't really care. It's just more FAKE NEWS to me. There aren't a bunch of KJs out there that are being sued by Chip for media shifting their Red Peter's tracks.

That's never actually been 100% verified, to the best of my knowledge no one has MP3 versions that are 320K and have the BLUE pro logo. Every single torrent and site that I have been to claiming to have the GEM have the songs at 128 - 192 K and the RED logo *and usually the graphics are pretty crappy to boot which is double proof because every single GEM track has flawless lyrics swipes*

Of course it is impossible to tell if the GEM series has never been pirated because 100% of those tracks are already available for download thru torrent and mirc, or because of the lease idea.

-James

What's funny, some of the "Red Peters" CDs do have printed warnings about "Watermarks". Then again, some do not. I too was confused about this issue, but I let it go. Too many other things to fret over..

Now, back to our never ending troll story.. :yawn:

The best reason NOT to use torrents: Bad Guys Infect the torrents with malware.

Back when men were men and sheep were nervous, plenty of interesting things were available from different "New" locations and "New" ways of downloading.
I got over it.. many years ago..



The best advice I can give you is to make friends with a wholesaler.
I did, and if it's available, the price is right.
Yes, I still buy my karaoke CDs..

I've even bought CDs I never used, due to the price.
Ace held a grand opening celebrations a few years ago, Laker Girls were there, and CDs were on sale for $1.00 each, fresh unwrapped CD+G discs.
I bought one of each title. Why not..

Your mileage will vary..

And he's right: digital content is not "easy" to protect. It's not necessarily impossible.

Sure. Do I get to sue your customers for thousands first? The copy of the "Closing Song" you have Paradigm, is in fact, NOT watermarked. I got special permission to give you that free copy.

From what I recall, Chris used a "free hex editor" and another free comparison program for his scientific research. The only person that says his claim is "100% irrefutable" is Chris himself. He's simply claiming that because he hasn't found anything, there couldn't possibly be anything there.

But none of this really matters in big picture because it's just he way of doing whatever he can to defend Harrington. You'll notice that he has never challenged anything that I've exposed from SC but instead, (and like an infant) throws temper tantrums screaming "poop" at every turn, making his "yeti jokes" which he apologized for, yadda, yadda, yadda.

Let's look at both sides of this (deflection) issue:
#1. If there is a watermark, so what? Does it make a difference? Does it somehow prevent Chris from jumping on a torrent (which he's obviously very familiar with) and sharing it with his friends?

#2. If there is no watermark, so what? Is he simply trying to verify this so that he can upload tracks to his buddies on the torrents? This only hurts Red Peters economically, not me. SC stole and sold several of his songs for 3 years before getting caught and paying a small licensing fee in the first place. Has Chris spent as much time and effort to verify this? Nope. He has a vested (and contractual) interest to not to do so.

#3. Whether there is or is not, it doesn't affect me in the least nor does it affect the honest KJ. It's all just Chris's attempt at attacking credibility - because he has nothing else he can say or do. I don't sue venues or KJ's or license piracy with a convenient monthly payment. I don't make up stuff and I certainly don't play the victim.

In the end, it really doesn't matter whether there is or isn't a watermark. No one has been sued or damaged in any way either way. It's just Chris throwing a tantrum. Again.

I have even done bars that discouraged those particular types of songs. They wanted no swear words of any kind. I completely obliged them. Of course that meant that any hip hop song that I didn't know the lyrics to, I had to research the lyrics on the Web and hope that they were accurate before I allowed them to be sung. Use to just go with not allowing any hip-hop songs altogether.

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

I think that most pirates are perfectly happy using karaoke tracks that are ripped or converted to 128. No karaoke singer will ever notice the difference in a loud karaoke bar. Converting them down to 128 takes up only about one third the space as keeping them at 320. I've sung some of them at a local show and I couldn't tell if they were 320 or 128 rips but they did have the blue logo on the title screen. I didn't know if the KJ actually leased them or downloaded them and I didn't really care either way. I sang my song and went back to my seat to enjoy my food and beer.

no, it would back up your claim, that's all. exactly what you ask everyone else to do.
someone claims it, back it up. and to me that is not an unreasonable expectation from anyone.

no, it woud back up Chris's claim that your claim of digital watermarking was false.


suing venues and asking for monthly payments has nothing to do with this conversation, this is only about the digital watermarking claim. showing that there is actually a digital watermark would make Chris look not only foolish, but look as the actual troll willing to lie about it to look important. but not showing it can have the opposite effect. just like Jim not showing the evidence you demand means it does not exist and he is a liar (you have stated this numerous times) this applies to both Chris and You.


sued was not the claim, you never claimed that as soon as you or Red began suing people you would digitally watermark the tracks.
suits have nothing to do with the claim you made.
if it was Jim who made the claim, you would hold his feet to the fire and berate him until he showed evidence, or admitted it was a lie.

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Paradigm Karaoke, The New Standard.......Shift Happens

And how exactly, would something like this be "backed up?" Share computer source code or markers or a roadmap that detail the process or how to even detect it? As much as Chris would like that, it's not going to happen. Tell me what you think is reasonable that doesn't compromise anything. All Chris has done is proclaimed that because he hasn't found anything, there can't be anything there.

It's nothing more than a stalemate.

Yes, I believe we are in that famous position
you hear about in "B" movies.

"A Mexican Stand Off"