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[support] Re: Napster, universities sued by Metallica (fwd)



JIm Gogan on Napster & the lawsuits brought by Metallica against
universities

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 03 May 2000 06:42:43 -0400
From: Jim Gogan <gogan@email.unc.edu>
To: The support mailing list <support@listserv.unc.edu>
Cc: The support mailing list <support@listserv.unc.edu>
Subject: [support] Re: Napster, universities sued by Metallica

Well, since I heard my name being called ....

There are two issues associated with this topic: the policy issue and
the technology issue.  Given that the real policy issue here is related
to copyright violation matters (and that's the more significant issue
with Napster and similar programs), I'm going to leave the discussion on
that to Jeanne Smythe, the ATN Director responsible for policy matters
of that nature.  Let me, however, address the technology issues.

First of all, I find it highly ironic that years ago people were touting
the potential of high-speed networking and the Internet as a means of
utilizing untapped and underutilized CPU cycles on desktop machines for
true distributed computing and for developing truly distributed
databases that spanned millions of computers.   Well, guess what -
that's exactly what Napster and other programs of its ilk do.   And now
that the potential is being realized, many of those same people are now
running for the hills.   We live in interesting times :-)

In terms of bandwidth utilization on campus, yes, we have seen increases
in bandwidth usage from not only Napster, but all the other
"Napster-like" programs, as well as from "chat" programs.  Would I call
it a "significant" increase in bandwidth?  No, not really.  Campus
bandwidth accessing www.weather.com on Friday afternoons continues to
exceed almost anything like Napster.  When we have over 7000 live
network connections in residence halls, I would expect to see bandwidth
utilization increases for anything and everything -- these are students'
residences, after all.  I will point out, though, that not all Napster
(from this point on, I'm gonna use "Napster" to refer to the many
programs out there that do similar things) usage comes from residence
halls -- it is not unusual to see Napster traffic coming from faculty
and staff machines on campus (which leads to an "appropriate use" policy
discussion that I'm not going to get into here - I'm the technology guy,
remember :-) ).

In terms of blocking Napster traffic, given the fact that there is so
much more out there than just Napster, this becomes, as a co-worker of
mine once said, "feasless".  With a new application of this type coming
out every week, what are you going to do?   Block a different port every
week?  Within a month, you're going to have so many filters on the
campus Internet router that performance would be miserable from the
filter processing.  And many of the newer applications do "port
adaptation" - where if the application detects a blocked port on the
router, it keeps trying different ports until it gets out.

Also, keep in mind that many of the smaller campuses that are
complaining about Napster stuff the loudest only have T1 (1.5 Mb/sec) or
10 Mb/sec connections to the Internet.  My thoughts there .... if you
invest in putting gigabit Ethernet backbone connections and 100 Mb/sec
to the desktop as most of these schools are doing and don't upgrade your
Internet link to more than 1-10 Mb/sec, well, what did you expect?

The real solution becomes one of user education as to the legal
implications associated with Napster programs from a copyright violation
policy issue and the implications of that.  That education process is
hard work and takes a lot of time.  I fear that many sites are looking
for short cuts so they don't have to do that hard work.  Ultimately,
though, since the technology's always going to stay at least one step
ahead of the short cuts, you gotta do the hard work and that starts with
all of us!

-- Jim Gogan
   Director, ATN Networking and Communications


edmunds@email.unc.edu wrote:
> 
> This NEWS.COM (http://www.news.com/) story has been sent to you from edmunds@email.unc.edu
> 
> Message from sender:
> OK, it had to happen sooner or later, so I'm opening this up for discussion (see related story).  I'm not going to soapbox just yet, but I'd like to to know what, if anything, the University's policy is on Napster.  I'd also be curious to know if Gogan and friends have seen a significant increase in bandwidth usage since Napster has gained in popularity.  And yes, I do think this topic is relevant to this list.
> -------------------------------------------------------
> Napster, universities sued by Metallica
> 
> April 13, 2000, 4:35 p.m. PT
> http://home.cnet.com/category/0-1005-200-1694163.html
> 
>                           Heavy-metal band Metallica sued the Napster MP3-trading software company and a trio of universities today, charging that together they were responsible for massive violations of the band's copyrights.
> 
>   It is the second time the young company  has been brought into court facing charges that its popular music-swapping software is being used illegally. But it's the first time that universities, which have been struggling to manage their own students' use of the service, have been brought into the legal firefight.
> 
>   "Napster has built a business based on large-scale piracy," the band's lawsuit reads. "Facilitating that are hypocritical universities and colleges who could easily block this insidious and ongoing thievery scheme."
> 
>   Today's suit amplifies the legal questions swirling around Napster and its various clones, which in just a few months have created broad new channels for music piracy online.
> 
>     Yesterday, a German judge ruled that America Online and other Internet service providers were liable for pirated music traversing their systems in that country, but to date no U.S. Internet company has borne the same responsibility.
> 
>   Napster's software allows music listeners to open pieces of their personal hard drives to everyone using Napster, sharing whatever MP3 songs they have already downloaded or stored. At any time, thousands of people are online,  sharing hundreds of thousands of songs, many of which are technically illegal to download without the permission of the copyright holders.
> 
>   The Recording Industry Association of America has already sued Napster, contending that the firm allows massive copyright violations by facilitating the easy exchange  of music.
> 
> 
> 
> 
>                     Watch  video                That case was scheduled to reach a possible early conclusion this week, but the federal judge handling the case postponed her decision.
> 
>   Napster has noted that it's not hosting any of the music and says it is protected by federal copyright provisions that shield Internet service providers from being liable for illegal material sent over their services.  The company also has acted to block some individuals from trading large amounts of copyrighted material using the Napster software, its attorneys say.
> 
>   Napster's attorneys had no initial comment on today's suit, other than to say that Metallica had moved to court without first trying to settle the issue.
> 
>   "No one contacted Napster for any discussion before they issued the press release or filed the lawsuit," said Lawrence Pulgrum, a Fenwick & West attorney representing Napster.
> 
>   Metallica's case throws a new twist into the legal wrangling by alleging the complicity of Yale University, the University of Southern California (USC) and Indiana University in music piracy.
> 
>   "The universities have elected not to block access to Napster, commenting that their only problem is a potential drain on their limited bandwidth availability," the lawsuit reads, "no doubt caused by the massive ongoing thefts of musicians' intellectual property."
> 
>   Officials at USC said they had not yet been served with the lawsuit, so they could not comment on its particulars. However, an attorney said that the university acts as an Internet service provider and therefore does not censor the students' use of the Internet.
> 
>   Napster users, some of whom are feeling increasingly beleaguered by the legal suits targeting their activities, defended their use of the service as a way of helping the bands spread their music to new listeners.
> 
>   "Some artists are in it for the pure art of music. Others are in it for the money," said Wayne Chang, a Haverhill, Mass., student who manages Napster's online community bulletin boards. "Metallica just showed which side of the  line they're on."
> 
>   Metallica's attorneys said they believed damages could amount to more than $10 million, based on $100,000 for each pirated song. The case was filed in a federal court in California.
> 
> 
> 
> -------------------------------------------------------
> 
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