Rochester U and Jailhouse Rock
What Part of Jailhouse Rock Don’t You Understand?
If you’re dumb, or just plain stumped, and you’re doing Napster 101 at New York State’s University of Rochester – site of the RIAA’s latest marketing triumph – what promises to be an absolutely fascinating discussion slated for February 16 might set you straight.
Called Facing Up to the Digital Dilemma, its lead-in goes like this:
“Confronting the new digital age, the recording industry is trying to clamp down on illegal file-sharing of music and videos. At the same time, colleges and universities – whose students are thought to be among the greatest offenders -are resisting the idea that they should ‘police’ their campus communities.”
[Resist the idea that they should police their campus communities, would they? The beggars!]
“Nationally prominent participants in the resolution of those conflicting viewpoints, and those representing the students’ varying perspectives, will be featured in a panel discussion [snappily] titled What Part of Jailhouse Rock Don’t You Understand? Defining Rights in the Digital Age at the University of Rochester,” it goes on.
Panelists onclude RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) president Cary Sherman; Charles E. Phelps, provost of the University and chair of the Technology Task Force of the national Joint Committee on Peer-to-Peer File Sharing; Marjorie Hodges Shaw, special advisor to the university’s chief information officer, and co-founder and former director of the Cornell Computer Policy and Law Program; David Marvin ?04, director of the Yellowjackets, a student group that performs and records its own arrangements; and Peter Ordal ?04, technical counsel to Student Government.
Moderationg the proceedings will be university president Thomas H. Jackson.
“While the industry fine-tunes its methods for preventing illegal downloading, universities and colleges have been discussing their responsibilities,” says the University of Rochester News here.
Getting America’s teaching institutions involved at the sharp end of selling Big Music’s otherwise unsellable product, might be a better way of phrasing it.
And, “Many of us in academe strongly take the position that while we’ll educate our students about copyright, we are not in the business of prosecuting infringement, especially if that means that we are asked to start looking at the content of e-mail or other Internet communications of our students and faculty,” Phelps said.
But fear not. There is a way because, “we’re willing to work with the recording industry,” he added, although ‘”work for” would be more accurate.
In the meantime, MusicMatch, Rhapsody, Apple iTunes, and Napster II “are among those services that have been created to provide legal downloads”.
February 10th, 2004 at 1:39 pm
Too bad you didn’t have the intellectual honesty to post the WHOLE comment from Charles Phelps, whom you quoted.
The whole quote is this:
While the industry fine-tunes its methods for preventing illegal downloading, universities and colleges have been discussing their responsibilities. âMany of us in academe strongly take the position that while weâll educate our students about copyright, we are not in the business of prosecuting infringement, especially if that means that we are asked to start looking at the content of e-mail or other Internet communications of our students and faculty,â Phelps said.
âBut weâre willing to work with the recording industry,â he added. âA core mission of a university is to create intellectual property, and we are very conscious of the need to respect the ownership of what we create and invent on our campuses. We respect the ownership of artistsâ âcreative propertyâ as well.â
Universities understand that personal property rights are one of the bedrock principles of advanced human societies. You don’t. That’s the problem.
I should also point out an item found later in the article:
The Feb. 16 event will include discussion of some of those ideas, challenging disgruntled file-swappers to help changeârather than violateâexisting statutes and regulations.
This points out another bedrock principle of advanced human societies: the rule of law. If a law is unjust, you try to change it. You don’t understand that either.
But then, those criminally inclined never do.
February 10th, 2004 at 1:57 pm
I lost count but I have downloaded over 150 albums in the last week. Of those albums were two artists I liked – Autechre and Mum (the Icelandic group) – enough to go to record stores (Tower, Borders, and mail order) to get ALL of their work excepting a couple of RIAA releases. So, I purchased 22 CDs in this last week (also filling in some Amon Tobin CDs I didn’t have).
So…does it follow that this supports the idea that the RIAA is trying to limit WHAT we listen to, and therefore, WHAT we buy? I spent over $300 in a CD-buyiing spree, and none of it on the RIAA.
*****If the RIAA can stop file sharing, they can stop our opportunity to hear tons and tons of non-RIAA products. ****
The more this insanity continues, the more I believe this is their motive. Eliminate the opportunity to hear non-RIAA artists, and Eliminate The Competition for our dollars. In effect they will elimiate the true art of our generation, in the name of protecting their commercial garbage.
I also drift back to the basic idea of why oh why cannot we let others hear the music we have? How else do you discover what it is you like enough to give up your money for? Common sense tells me that the RIAA knows it has an inferior product that will no longer support its posh lifestyle. And, NO, I DO NOT want to spend $.99 for a “tune” I havent heard. The RIAA’s actions are squelching ART in the name of protecting their crappy “tunes.”
I am 50 years old. When I was a teen, we swapped and borrowed vinyl albums. What we “had to have” we bought. The internet has just made that so much easier. Still, what we “have to have” we buy! duh.
Please, you college kids, FIGHT BACK!
I am not affiliated with this site, but use it a LOT:
http://www.magnetbox.com/riaa/
February 10th, 2004 at 6:21 pm
We say, *While the industry fine-tunes its methods for preventing illegal downloading, universities and colleges have been discussing their responsibilities,” says the University of Rochester News here.*
*here* is a highly visible direct link back to the full item. But for those who don’t understand what a link is for, you’ve very kindly posted the whole thing. Many thanks for that : )
February 13th, 2004 at 8:43 am
I agree with you completely. The RIAA is trying to rid the world of competition, just like all the other smart-arse big businesses who want to protect their monopolies. Long Live P2P!