I REFER to last Friday's letter by Ms Barbara Wong of Recording Industry Performance Singapore (Rips), 'Music copyright fees are reasonable', and note the concerns by Rips with regard to Mr Dennis Foo's comments in the article, 'Dennis Foo: Night life', on Jan 3.

The article quoted Mr Foo as saying: 'One example is the payments nightlife operators have to make to copyright bodies such as Composers and Authors Society of Singapore (Compass) and Recording Industry Performance Singapore. The St James Group pays almost $200,000 annually to these bodies.'

Rips may have misconstrued what he said.

What he meant was that many nightlife operators caught in this economic downturn have to manage their costs. The phrase 'these bodies' includes other companies in addition to Rips.

The 'almost $200,000' refers to payment made not just to Rips but to other copyright outfits as well.

Indeed, we paid Rips $23,300, but we also paid Compass $120,000 for our outlets and another $25,000 to InnoForm Entertainment, which handles karaoke royalties for Karaoke on Demand.

Add $78,000 more for our subscription fees for StarHub cable to allow us to show football matches in our outlets, and you can see where we are coming from.

We hope we have clarified what Mr Foo said in the article.

Andrew Ing
Chief Operating Officer
St James Holdings

This article was first published in The Straits Times on January 22, 2009.