College Buys Free Music for Students
If I were a student and cared a lot about popular music, I'd think this was cool. From the college's perspective, it's a great recruiting tool. But if I can sidestep for the moment the Napster generation's firm belief in the its God-given right to free music, I have to wonder... what is the next illegal activity that colleges will pay to permit their students to do, simply because policing that activity takes too much time and energy?
I presume the college felt it was cheaper, in the long run, to buy free music for the students than to police and prosecute the actions of students who would otherwise download music illegally.
Wired News: Penn State, Napster Ink Pact
As college students sucked up bandwidth using free peer-to-peer services, the entertainment industry stepped up efforts to stop alleged piracy on campuses by mailing notices of copyright infringement to colleges across the country. School administrators were then stuck tracking down alleged violators.
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To me, the word "illegal" seems to go a little too far, at least when you're talking about Napster in its present state. (I still agree with the illegality and yes, immorality of music file sharing for which the artists isn't paid)
As for the next such activity... perhaps a free movie subsription service...?
And two years after that I noticed the time distinction between my post and the original... Darn it, I've probably screwed up history by letting the 2003ers know that Napster is legit by 2006...
Oh and a new vote for the next service: cannabis! It's legal in the US by this time anyway
(shh, don't tell)