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The Karaoke Industry Alliance of America is a non-profit trade or-ganization made up of karaoke re-cord labels, dis-tributors,
KJ/DJ hosts, venue own-ers and karaoke enthusiasts.
The KIAA was formed by a group of karaoke profes-sionals looking to find solutions to the many issues and challenges that
are facing the karaoke industry today.
Our goal is to promote and advance all aspects of karaoke be it as an art form, a form of entertainment, a recreational
activity or even just as a casual pastime.
In pursuit of our mission, our pri-mary goal is to foster a favorable business climate that equally sup-ports and promotes
the interests of all its members.
Piracy --- How to protect yourself from illegal karaoke operators.
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You May Be At Risk!
Did you know that the maximum statu-tory damage for a single copyright infringement is $150,000 per song?
Did you know that in-fringement of a feder-ally registered trade-mark is a federal of-fense?
Truth is most clubs, restaurants and lounges are totally un-aware of the severe penalties that ac-company intellectual
property violations and expose themselves on a daily basis to lawsuits of huge consequence.
But I Pay My ASCAP & BMI Fees
Performing Rights Organizations (PRO) such as ASCAP, BMI and SESAC only represent the rights of the musical com-position
owners (song writers/publishers), however these licenses do not cover the karaoke sound recordings themselves.
Tips On Identifying Illegal Karaoke Products
Each karaoke system whether it is hard drive based or CD based must contain a legally purchased copy of each song within
the system.. Illegal operators purchase a single copy of a disc or song and copy it to several hard drives or burn multiple
CD’s. Here are some tips helpful in identifying illegal systems:
Hard Drive Based – Any hard drive based system which includes PC’s, Lap-tops, CAVS & RPG Neo+G Players, etc.
containing more than 20,000 songs are highly suspicious.
CD’s – The easiest way to distinguish a legal karaoke CD is by its label. If the label is a professionally
offset or silk-screened printed label printed directly on the disc, then chances are it is a legiti-mate disc. Any disc which
has been handwritten, or with a paper label is more than likely an illegal copy.
Dwindling Profits
The proliferation of ille-gal karaoke products has resulted in a flooding of the market with illegal KJ’s and hosting
companies who can charge artificially low prices for their services due to their lack of investment in karaoke music.
This has given rise to an oversaturation of venues now featuring karaoke nights with little or no investment themselves
and thus diluting the market for legiti-mate venues willing to make the proper investment necessary to grow their kara-oke
nights.
These illegal operators have managed to artificially drive down the average price of karaoke hosting in any given market,
the end result has also driven down reg-ister receipts disproportionately so that while the venue may be paying less for their
hosting services, they are absorbing
an even greater cost on the back end through lower attendance, smaller regis-ter tallies and diminished profits. Eve-ryone
loses except the illegal karaoke operators.
What Can I Do About It?
The first thing you should do is have an honest discussion with the KJ’s or kara-oke hosting companies that you hire
expressing your concerns with regard to bringing in illegal products into your establishment.
You should also consider becoming a member of the KIAA. As a KIAA venue member you will have access to a number of honest
KJ’s and hosting com-panies who can provide you with high quality and legal hosting services. And should your venue
ever be visited by a KIAA auditor and that auditor discover illegal products being used in your venue, then you can rest assured
that only the host will be charged with an infringement and your business will be excluded from any legal actions taken by
the KIAA or its label members.
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