Karaoke Forums

Actually, the statement regarding liability is incorrect on several levels.

1) First, the practical: As we have seen in the SC suits, presentation of the case- on both sides- plays a huge role in the courts's determination of lliability in each case. It's almost never black & white.

2) OK, a publisher decides to sue a host for improper usage:

A) The Original Mfrs. Disc based host( and the legit PC host) can produce media produced at the factory of the karaoke company and distributed, then paid for in good faith. No manufacturer includes documentation that specifically states that their discs may not be used as the basis of a karaoke show.

Moreover, regarding of SC's GEM series: They are advertised as both MP3 for easy transfer to PCs, AND are sold as packages for Karaoke Hosts ONLY. Such a KJ can make a good case for lack of intent, yet could possiblyshow that liability lay farther up the line.
I am ignoring the media shifting aspect for now due to the gray area, but this COULD work against a PC host- we simply don't know yet.

2) Now, lets take a download based host. While one might have a case for lack of intent due to some of the fuzzy wording in certain site's advertising ( The part about commercial downloads- but not commercial usage), a host without an itemized receipt on a site's letterhead can't prove that the tracks in question were ever paid for at all.
No way to prove that they should be in possession of those downloads at all, much less using them in a show.

As for those sites that produce itemized receipts: Well, maybe the download host can proof purchase in good faith, but the old question arises again- are downloads original factory media or actually files created on the PC by the end user with no Q.C. from the factory.

If, as many believe, these are end user reproductions ( remember, the original file is still on the site, not moved to the PC) then the responsibility for usage is definitely set firmly on the shoulders of the downloader.

However, even if somehow considered factory original, while no download site has the right to grant ( anymore than for discs) the right of usage, many sites DO specify For Home Use Only, as opposed to the discs, on which I have yet to see any such warning. Since the sites do that, liability STILL rests on the downloaders shoulders.

That's the difference in being able to shed some ( but not neccesarily all) liability or not.

More simply put:

1) OMD hosts have the most wriggle room ( could still get a Cease & Desist)

2) PC hosts with a full matching set of OMDs have a little less ( Maybe the C&D, but maybe some other liability for the media shift- as yet unknown.)

3) Download hosts have virtually no room unless a site BOTH supplies an itemized receipt AND claims to have the right to license usage as a basis for [u]a U.S. BASED[/u]show in their advertising-which would be an extremely silly thing for a site to do,

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

" Disc based and loving it..."

I may respond to this in the morning. I may not. I'm not sure if I can make it any clearer. It's like you're purposefully trying not to get it.

You made yourself clear as glass! As the same thing that was told to me BY the publishers (at least the reps I talked to). If a club is paying their PRO fees for karaoke, it covers the music AND the swipes - don't matter the manu.

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No.

I'm not sure what was unclear about "The PRO fees cover all aspects of the music publishers' rights, including the performance of the musical composition and the display of the lyrics."



No. Keep reading below.



Just so we're clear, what I wrote above was intended to apply to the composition copyright. So let's rephrase:

It is probable that a karaoke operator who uses an unlicensed copy to put on a show in which the PRO fees have been paid has not actually committed an act of infringement of the composition copyright.



This ought to be good. Bear in mind that I have numerous law school courses, continuing education hours, and 15 years of experience in determining questions of liability.







Just so I'm clear on this, you're talking about a publisher suing a host for using an unlicensed karaoke track in a show in which the public performance license fees have been paid. Please correct me if I'm wrong.



I'll point out here that no manufacturer includes documentation that specifically states that their discs may not be used to cut the ears off unruly patrons. That provides no comfort to the fed-up karaoke host who does so.



Gee, Wally, do you think we might've thought of that?

The GEM license agreement spells out in no uncertain terms that while the format is easy to transfer, SC does not indemnify the host for making that transfer. Given the language of the agreement, I cannot imagine any judge or jury finding that the host didn't know that making the transfer could expose him to liability. It's in black-and-white and bold type.

But you're missing a key point. In copyright infringement actions, intent is a factor ONLY in determining damages. It is not a factor as to liability.



You're ignoring a lot more than that.



There's always hope.



Irrelevant. Whether the tracks were paid for by the KJ has absolutely nothing to do with anything. That's dispute between the KJ and the distributor, not the KJ and the publisher.



Fortunately, "possession" is not an act of copyright infringement.



I think this assertion will come as a great shock to Vint Cerf and Bob Kahn, designers of TCP/IP, but never mind that.

What I have yet to see is a single thing that matters.



Right result, wrong reason. The responsibility for usage is definitely set firmly on the shoulders of the downloader because the downloader is the person who is using the file.



Have you given any thought as to why pretty much every site that vends licensed downloadable music specifies "for home use only"? I mean, that can't be a coincidence, right?

It turns out that the exclusivity in the performance right in a given work has kind of a big gap in it. You can play your CD or downloaded copy of Teenage Dream at home all day and all night long and there is nothing that Capitol Records (who owns the sound recordings) or Bonnie McKee Music and the other 800 publishers who own a piece of the composition can do about it. But step outside that and make a public performance, and you've implicated the copyright laws.

And if you pull out your Teenage Dream CD and, while thinking about Katy Perry's lovely...singing voice, read the fine print, you'll see the following legend, among others, on the back of the liner: "Unauthorized copying, public performance, broadcasting, hiring or rental of this recording prohibited." And that same language, or something like it, is on pretty much every last mass-market CD that has ever been released. It's also on cassette tapes. And 8-tracks. And vinyl. Maybe not on the physical media themselves, but certainly on the back cover or in the liner notes.

In fact, I'm surprised you could possibly have missed it. That warning is everywhere.

(For the record, I do not own a copy of Teenage Dream, but Google has some images of it, which you can use to verify.)

And here's one more secret: The warning doesn't mean anything. It simply doesn't matter to liability. You're supposed to find out for yourself if playing a song will infringe someone's copyright. And it's actually easier to do that today than at any point in the history of copyright. But warnings aren't required to establish liability. Even if they omitted it, you could still be liable.

They don't even have to put a copyright notice on it. Notice has been optional since March 15, 1987, the date on which the Berne Convention came into force in the U.S.

But they want to put that warning on there, because (a) it removes the innocent infringement argument (if they warn you, you can't be innocent, at least in theory), and (b) it reminds people that, hey, there are rules that need to be followed, which results in higher voluntary compliance.

Now, with all of that in mind, where in the heck do they put the warning on an MP3 file? There's nothing physical that you can see, so they can't put it on anything like the front of a CD or in the liner notes.

So they put it where you can see it: In the Terms of Service.



Do you think that the "Cease and Desist" letter has some special legal force?

(Hint: It doesn't, except that it helps establish willful infringement if you continue after receiving the C&D. Its main purpose is to scare people into compliance.)

OMD hosts have no more wiggle room than anyone else.




PC hosts may indeed have theoretical liability for an unauthorized media-shift, but no one with the authority to sue them for infringement of the composition copyright has or can reasonably get sufficient information to sue such a host, and those who do have the authority would much rather go after distributors than people who simply possess unauthorized copies. Even the RIAA suits were predicated on distribution through torrents, not possession.


*sigh*

Download hosts and even outright pirate hosts, who stole every bit of music on their systems (but in the process didn't seed torrents), have nothing to fear from publishers, as long as the PRO fees are paid.

The origin of the material used in the public performance DOES NOT MATTER.

No.

I'm not sure what was unclear about "The PRO fees cover all aspects of the music publishers' rights, including the performance of the musical composition and the display of the lyrics."

Um, reminder: The lyric swipes include the SC logo.....



As stated WAY above ( I hate quoting within qhotes), you last statement is either a claim to psychic ability or a guess based on lack of publisher input SO FAR.. You have absolutely know way of knowing what every publisher cares about, what they might do IF they care, or how successful they would be.

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

" Disc based and loving it..."

Just a disclaimer: All kinds of strange things were happening online while posting the above, which resulted in some damage to the post, including color and bold signs showing up as well as spacing problems. I can't seem to get in to edit the post. Hope my points get across anyway....

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

" Disc based and loving it..."

Just speaking for myself, when the posts start getting too long with too many colors answering back and forth, I just skip them rather than try to figure out who is answering who.

Not only that, but when someone takes a quote within a quote, and then puts a response to that series of quotes within that same series of quotes, it makes it even harder to read. It would be easier to read a response to a quote when it is separated from (not part of) the quote/s in question. And, when it's a very long post, it would be neater to read if the portion of the quote being responded to was separated as its own quote, rather than taking a page long quote, and then responding to all points of it at the end (the reader would then have to keep scrolling up and down to figure out what point of the quote was being responded to). Some long posts are just that... long. Whether one chooses to read it or not is an individual choice.

Agreed, which is why I, and many OLD TIME posters, think posting within quotes is rude. We pick our points, number them, and answer below. However, since I mentioned this to Jim, he makes a point of answering within a quote with enough length to make the above impossible- I suppose it's a way of hiding the inequities within his posts, or maybe a debate distraction from weak points.

Unfortunately, he does what he does. Apparently it works for him, per Mimi and Cue, because he was able to hide. Good job.

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

" Disc based and loving it..."

QUOTE FROM HARRINGTONLAW:

"Fortunately, "possession" is not an act of copyright infringement."


Using the same logic, is it possible that "possession" is also not an act of trademark infringement?

I would guess the act of public display/use and/or distribution, particularly for profit, is where infringement gets scrutiny.

-Chris

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-Chris

"Possession" isn't an act of trademark infringement.

Use is required. Making something available in a karaoke show is a use, whether the track is played or not. But possession without commercial use isn't trademark infringement.

Your inability to use and understand BBCode is mystifying, but ultimately not my concern.

Your belief that I use the quote feature to obfuscate anything is simply bizarre.

Well, Jim, I'd argue that, but I think all of the good colors have already been used....

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

" Disc based and loving it..."

Thank you for your opinion...I am sure it is much appreciated...

While Jim may have obfuscated and hidden his weak replies, my hope is that folks have read and evaluated this thread in hopes of finding the best way to protect their businesses from liability.

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

" Disc based and loving it..."

I've already talked with publishers, I think i'm fine!

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