City tackles karaoke IPR disputes

A city in east China has found a way to tackle violation of intellectual property rights (IPR) in karaoke bars: via group purchases.

Of the 214 karaoke bars in Jiaxing City, Zhejiang Province, 200 have signed group purchase contracts with the Music Copyright Society of China (MCSC), allowing the bar owners to use registered songs and music videos cheaply, Gu Jinliang, spokesman with Jiaxing Intermediate People's Court, told Xinhua on Wednesday.

Local courts came up with the idea after handling 1,433 similar IPR disputes involving karaoke bars and MCSC in the past four years, which was time-consuming and required too many resources.

"In the past, if a karaoke bar was found illegally using music for commercial purposes, the owner would have to pay about one yuan (0.16 U.S. dollars) a day for each karaoke room. The yearly amount could be quite high," Gu said.

Now with the group-buying offer, an owner pays a little over 1,000 yuan a year for the whole karaoke bar, an acceptable price for most bosses in entertainment venues, Gu added.

He said the novel way not only saved resources, but largely enhanced IPR protection.

Karaoke bars, or KTV, are a popular hangouts for Chinese people, with many host birthday parties or reunions. However, venues have often been accused of illegally using copyrighted music.

On Monday, three KTV bars in central China's Henan Province were ordered to delete several music videos from their KTV systems and pay 500 yuan for each song used illegally.