April 14, 2003
More on RIAA v. Students
1. Professor Felten asks “Will the RIAA Sue Google?” My immediate thought was: of course not, because colleges are already associated with piracy, so it’s an easier sell (both to a judge and to the public). The RIAA will only go after the little guys because they don’t have enough money to fight the lawsuit. But, Google didn’t take the Church of Scientology to court – so maybe Google would be worth targeting. Probably, the targeting wouldn’t come through a lawsuit like the one against Darren Peng’s “Wake.” Instead, the RIAA would probably go through the notice-and-takedown procedure, which is really the appropriate procedure for dealing with Wake.
2. To make one thing perfectly clear: disabling Internet access for a year would cripple a student’s ability to do work here at Harvard. Teaching Assistants/Fellows, professors, House Masters and many other administrators have become reliant on email and webpages for getting in touch with students. All students are expected to be able to do research on the Internet. It is an unavoidable, inseparable part of student life.
3. I was having a conversation with one of my roommates the other day about Dean Lewis’ letter. He had gotten the impression that all file-sharing was banned and was reluctant to send important files to someone else in his music group. Some files were business records, but some were music files that the group as a whole is allowed to use. It’s important that we clear up this sort of confusion. Unlike Brown’s IT people, Dean Lewis didn’t mention that certain uses of file-sharing are perfectly legal.
Filed by Derek Slater at 1:36 pm under General news
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