When the RIAA comes a-knocking …
p2pnet news view | RIAA News:- Duke University VP for student affairs Larry Moneta (right) has told Vivendi Universal, EMI, Warner Music and Sony BMG’s RIAA the school won’t be sending any further RIAA extortion letters, disingenuously called “pre-litigation notices,” to students unless evidence of actual evidence of copyright infringement is provided.
It’s a step forward, certainly, but is it enough?
Harvard University has been unequivocal in its refusal to co-operate with the labels and movie studios as they continue to terrorise students at universities across America — with the notable exception of Harvard.
“While it is good news that a university is requiring the RIAA to put up or shut up, the forwarding — or not forwarding — of letters is pretty insignificant,” says Recording Industry vs The People’s Ray Beckerman.
“What I want to know is: When the RIAA comes knocking with its Star Chamber, ex parte, ‘John Doe’ litigation to get the students’ identities, is the University going to go to bat for the students and fight the litigation on the ground that it’s based on zero evidence, and on the ground that the students weren’t given prior notice and an opportunity to be heard?”
If and when that happens, what will be the university’s stance? – I asked Moneta.
“I really have nothing more to add at this point,” he told me.
But people at large have a few thoughts on the subject.
‘Students pay the tuition, not the *AA’s’
“The question is, why the hell didn’t universities see the RIAA’s challenges for what they were (bullshit) and begin to fight against the RIAA for their students much sooner?” – asks Ethanol-fueled in Slashdot.
“Last I checked, students pay the tuition, not the *AA’s.”
He includes an [engadget.com] list of the Top 25 universities which’ve, “handed out copyright infringement notices during the 2006 – 2007 academic year,” noting the geographic locations of the majority of the list.
1. Ohio University – 1,287
2. Purdue University – 1,068
3. University of Nebraska at Lincoln – 1,002
4. University of Tennessee at Knoxville – 959
5. University of South Carolina – 914
6. University of Massachusetts at Amherst – 897
7. Michigan State University – 753
8. Howard University – 572
9. North Carolina State University – 550
10. University of Wisconsin at Madison – 513
11. University of South Florida – 490
12. Syracuse University – 488
13. Northern Illinois University – 487
14. University of Wisconsin at Eau Claire – 473
15. Boston University – 470
16. Northern Michigan University – 457
17. Kent State University – 424
18. University of Michigan at Ann Arbor – 400
19. University of Texas at Austin – 371
20. North Dakota State University – 360
21. Indiana University – 353
22. Western Kentucky University – 353
23. Seton Hall University – 338
24. Arizona State University – 336
25. Marshall University – 331
‘Stop keeping server logs’
Meanwhile, Eddie on Fark forums posts »»»
One of my good friends from college never left, he stayed on with the college as a system admin. He was telling me how they got a list of IPs that the RIAA wanted info on. He reassigned those IPs to the pool used by ROTC and an Army weapons research product, then called up the government and said “Hey we got some people asking about the ROTC and classified stuff.” The government’s reponse was “We’ll take care of it.” He has yet to hear from the RIAA again.
Says Epsilon »»»
If the RIAA can’t prove that actual illegal behavior occurred, then we’re not going to comply.”
I applaud their effort, but I don’t know how far it will get. Sounds like Duke is trying to take the role of the police by determining whether or not behavior is illegal. Maybe next they’ll pretend to be the court and determine guilt?
I’m not bashing Duke, I hate the aggression of the RIAA as much as anyone. I just don’t see the legal justification for what they’re trying to do. If you really want to protect your students, just stop keeping server logs.
“Got my internet deactivated by my uni earlier this year for a song I never heard of (wasn’t downloading anything anyway) so I’m getting a kick out of these replies,” says another Fark post.
“The second we started to ask ‘Um…what proof do you have?’ the tech guys started offering ways someone else could have done it and it just looked like me …”
And in p2pnet, “I was falsely accused by these turkey’s of sharing a specific movie from one of my computers,” says IT professional, adding »»»
His accusation obviously happened solely because I was running a P2P software program. The movie I was accused of sharing was not on any computer in my possession. Also the hard drive of the P2P sharing computer had been purged using Acronis shortly before the accusation was made; so there was no chance of there being any residual image of the movie in question.
I wrote to my ISP, the Producers of the movie, and the so called investigators, pointing out the facts and their error; demanding an apology.
I received NO RESPONSE.
The humorous part of this episode is that I didn’t even know the movie they accused me of sharing existed; until I was accused of sharing it.
By the way I also tested all files on the P2P computer (there were not that many) and none of them where mislabeled or corrupted. So now that I know one person was falsely accused; how many others are being falsely accused, but do not have the skill or the good luck to be able to prove it!
Stay tuned.
Jon Newton – p2pnet
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November 17th, 2008 at 1:11 pm
“When the RIAA comes a-knocking …:
I go on hunting the RIAA parasites.
November 17th, 2008 at 9:33 pm
It really looks like the RIAA mafia and their hired goons MediaSentry are above the law. (angry)
You posted article after article about how MediaSentry were on the ropes for illegal activity. It was even picked up by other news sites and the mainstream press and the law in certain states *ordered* them to stop their activities (I can’t remember the specifics now).
Yet they carry on as if nothing had happened!! How the fuck do they continue to do this? Any normal organization would have been stopped dead in their tracks by now. Dubya must be directly in their pocket, perhaps? I can’t think of anything else that makes sense.
I really hope Obama brings these scumbags to book, but I wouldn’t hold my breath on it. Biden’s on the team…