Videoke machine is highly popular in business establishments such as bars, restaurants, beach clubs, and even in malls. These machines contain thousands of song databases. It works by dropping a coin or a token before a user can sing any selected songs in the database.
This post would take a look at licensing music for videoke machine business. The objective is to educate videoke business owners, creators or manufacturers of DVD video disc. But before we start, take note of the following definition:
Video CD/DVD/chip supplier/producer – they are involved in producing midi music/videoke music to be included with the machine. The disc also contains video content along with the music. These producers only create the discs or chips NOT the actual videoke machine itself.
Manufacturer/maker = this refers to the creator or supplier of the videoke machine. They order some discs or chips to be included in their machine.
Owner = this refers to the operator of the videoke machine. This is most likely the owner of the business establishments where the videoke machine is operated. To make the videoke machine functional, it needs to have those discs or chips containing a wide playlist of songs.
videoke machine
Music Rights Used and the Royalties Involved
Implementation of videoke machine in commercial establishments requires a music license. This is secured from the music publishers or public performance societies they are represented. The rights used in the videoke music licensing seem complex at first, let’s break down these rights in the manner that they appear or used throughout the process.
1.) Mechanical rights – this is the right to use and embed music in physical media (discs or chips). The payment is per copies distributed or sold. The one that will be paying the license is the DVD videoke disc creator. The license will be paid either to the music publisher or the mechanical rights representative such as Harry Fox agency.
The amount of licensing cost depends on the number of copies sold or distributed. For example if the manufacturer 1000 copies of videoke machine DVD’s containing copyrighted songs, then the manufacturer would need to pay:
Mechanical royalties = 1000 copies x mechanical licensing rates
These licensing rates vary depending on the application and country of operations. In United States, this is set by the US Congress; you can get some information here.
Read this article on what is a mechanical license agreement for details.
2.) Synchronization rights – this is the right to use copyrighted music along with videos such as DVD videoke project. Use of synchronization rights are common in film, video production and videoke machine.
The creator/producer of the DVD/VCD discs or music chips will be the one to get this license and pay the associating licensing fees. To ask for permission to use these rights, you would be contacting the music publisher of the song. In case you do not know the music publishers involved start with knowing how to perform a song copyright search.
But with thousands of songs in the videoke machine, this process can take some time. One tip is to license music from big music publishers (Warner music, Sony, etc.) first because they cover a lot of hit songs in the catalog. They make it easy for you to license several songs from a few music publisher.
3.) Sound recording (master recording) – this is the right to use the original sound recording copyright of the song. Most videoke disc projects do use the original minus one soundtrack produced/released by the major label and not by them. So in this case, the videoke disc producer/creator should pay the associating licensing fees to the recording label or the owner of the sound recording copyright.
However if the video disc producer is not planning to use original recordings but instead produce MIDI version of the minus-one (which is very common). Then there is no need to secure sound recording copyright license.
You also noticed that these projects do use original soundtracks and videos, so the producers should pay the associating licensing fees to the label.
4.) Print rights – this is the right to use the lyrics and printed to a hard copy format. Not all videoke projects includes the printed copy of the lyrics so this is not required.
5.) Public performance rights – finally when the videoke machine is shipped to the customer(the owner of the business establishments where the videoke machine will be used), it will be used by the public. Public performance is the right to publicly perform the music. The music played by the videoke machine are copyrighted therefore the owner of the business establishment should secure public performance license.
It is important that you read this post on public performance music license important information so that you will know this right in detail.
The licensing cost depends on your country public performance society. For details about the computation, you can contact the public performance organization in your country. This is FilScap in Philippines or ASCAP, BMI, SESAC in the US. For other foreign nations, you can refer to this list here.
If you are an owner of videoke machine and you are not paying public performance license fee to these organizations, then you are illegally operating the videoke machine in your business. Contact the public performance society in your country and secure proper public performance license.
Summary
All in all, there are 5 music rights that are involved in the videoke music business. As you have noticed:
a.) The videoke machine business owner or operator – would be responsible for paying the public performance license fee to the public performance right societies. There are some blankets licensing fee program wherein you only pay a single amount to use the entire song represented by the society (as opposed to paying per song). I cannot provide much details on this, please contact the society.
b.) The manufacturer of the videoke machine – should be responsible that any copyrighted music used in the machine should be properly licensed. For example, if the manufacturer decides to provide some VCD/DVD or discs to the videoke operator, then the manufacturer should ensure that their supplier (e.g. DVD videoke creator) is licensing the material properly from the music publishers. In some cases, the manufacturer may want the DVD creator to show some proof of license to make sure the music is licensed legally.
c.) The producer of the video CD, DVD Discs used in the videoke machine – needs to pay mechanical, master recording, sync and print right licensing fees to the music publisher of the songs. If you are a supplier of DVD used in videoke machine and you are not doing any of these licensing activities, then you are illegally operating your business.
Disclaimer: I’m not an entertainment lawyer and cannot provide legal advice to you. If you think you have some issues pertaining to these things. Then better contact an entertainment lawyer to answer your needs. The information in this article does not constitute legal advice.
Content last updated on July 24, 2012