p2pnet - rss feed: Ohio U No 1 on RIAA p2p chart
p2pnet.net news:- Ohio University says it’s had more RIAA p2p file sharing notices than any other college in the US this academic year.
Software companies and the MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America) also send notices, “which averaged a total of 10 to 15 per day during Fall Quarter,” says The Post Online, the student-run daily newspaper.
But university officials have serious concerns about the validity of RIAA data.
“The RIAA sent OU 1,287 notices of copyright infringement this academic year, up from 232 last year,” says the story. But the amount of bandwidth, which determines how much students can download, isn’t limited for p2p programs at OU, cio Shawn Ostermann is quoted as saying.
“A large number of students living on campus and the ease of Internet access also contribute to the high number of notifications,” says David Hendricks, quoting dean of students Terry Hogan.
“They’ve never said anything about why they looked, where they looked,” says Hogan. “The list of notifications doesn’t indicate how much music is being pirated or that the amount has increased from last year. The only thing that the RIAA’s information shows is that they sent more notices.
“If there’d been a tenfold increase in students downloading, we’d have noticed. The university monitors network traffic and bandwidth use, which would have dramatically increased if that had occurred.”
Hendricks also has Ostermann declaring, “Just because these things, peer-to-peer programs, can be used for stealing music, that’s not necessarily what they’re for and that’s not the only thing they’re valuable for. By policy, I’ve tried to do as little as possible to get in the way of students.”
Only one of the so-called Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) owners can be said to be American, and even that, Warner Music, is run by a Canadian. The others are EMI (Britain), Vivendi Universal (France) and Sony BMG (Japan and Germany).
“The RIAA identifies file-sharers by their Internet provider addresses and sends notification letters to the university detailing what files were shared and when,” says The Post Online. “The university blocks Internet access to students accused of file sharing until they remove the offending file or dispute the notice.”
Guilty until proven innocent, in other words.
The Big 4 thought they had the answer: Cdigix, a music service which touts their low-quality, over-priced ‘product’ to US schools. For a price.
But OU students aren’t as stupid as the Big 4 Organized Music cartel had planned on. They weren’t buying and, “Cdigix will discontinue its music service at the end of this month, and no longer employs its two student representatives, according to Lindsay Arnett, an OU senior and former Cdigix campus marketing manager,” says the story, adding:
“Cidigix representatives couldn’t be reached for comment.”
Also See:
The Post Online - University questions RIAA data, February 23, 2007
had the answer - Mindawn vs Cdigix at UCal, July 19, 2005
If your Net access is blocked by government restrictions, try Psiphon from the Citizen Lab at thIs the end (of the Net) nigh?zze University of Toronto’s Munk Centre for International Studies. Go here for the official download, here for the p2pnet download, and here for details. And if you’re Chinese and you’re looking for a way to access independent Internet news sources, try Freegate, the DIT program written to help Chinese citizens circumvent web site blocking outside of China. Download it here.
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Tired of being treated like a criminal? They depend on you, not the other way around. Don’t buy their ‘product’. Do bug your local politicians. Use emails, snail-mail, phone calls, faxes, IM, stop them in the street, blog. And if you’re into organizing, organize petitions, organize demonstrations and then turn up on your local political rep’s doorstep, making sure you’ve contacted your local tv/radio station/newspaper in advance. Don’t just complain. Do something!
February 23rd, 2007 at 1:07 pm
“[…]and no longer employs its two student representatives[…]”
any word from RIAA yet if these 2 will be counted also in their next round of press propaganda about “thousands of lay-offs due to piracy”?
February 23rd, 2007 at 5:26 pm
well keeping in the spirit of their wonderfu math (i.e- 1 16x burner = 16 burners).
1 RIAA student rep can do the work of 1000 RIAA employees, (unfortunatly it’s not that hard to screw other people), therefore they represent 2000 layoffs.
February 23rd, 2007 at 7:00 pm
A terrible idea just came to mind; what if the RIAA simply assumes students downloading *anything*, en masse, are downloading illegally, for large part.
Innocence would not matter to RIAA; it’s the quantity of downloading which presumes guilt, in their eyes. Unmonitored contents? “They’re students; of course what they are downloading is illegal.” (this writer’s opinion of [the] RIAA mind).
February 24th, 2007 at 8:02 am
Cdigix was free to Ohio U?
July 25th, 2007 at 5:48 am
i think students need to organize and petition the university to fight this blanket subpoena. the RIAA is going about this in an illegal manner. also if the university wants to stop it they have the technology and resources to prevent it (like OSU does). their incompetence in IT matters is evidenced by the fact that their network has been hacked more than once with vital data being stolen. OU is negligent in the fact that they do not counsel students in the ” do’s and don’ts” of downloading, they just give them a computer and access to a fast network and let tham run free. students pay thousands of dollars to attend their college (along with our tax dollars), the least they can do is educate them as to how to use the computers properly and legally.