RIAA issues 750 more writs to University users

By Steve Malone

Posted on 3 Oct 2005 at 11:18

The US music industry pressure group the RIAA (Record Industry Association of America) has fired off over 750 lawsuits against students and others who have been downloading music for free from P2P networks.

The suits accuse 757 individuals of engaging in copyright infringement, including computer network users at 17 different colleges throughout the US. RIAA says that the people concerned not only used P2P networks such as Grokster, Kazaa and eDonkey but also used the student run i2hub p2p network to distribute music.

'The authority of the Supreme Court's unanimous ruling in the Grokster case should not be ignored by students returning to campus this fall with sights set on free music,' thunders the RIAA President Cary Sherman. However, the Grokster ruling was on a narrow point on whether a specific company encouraged the illegal use of technology not about whether individuals download music they should be paying for.

The RIAA says this is the third time the music industry has taken action to combat copyright infringement via the Internet2's high-speed university computer network, for a total of 560 lawsuits at 39 campuses this year.

Recently both the RIAA and the movie industry's MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America) joined Internet2. At the time Mr Sherman called it 'an incredibly exciting tool for researchers, technologists and many others interested in developing new technologies, policies and business models for the next generation. Its value now and potential in the future are extraordinary, and we are very pleased to join this diverse community.'

Among the colleges targeted by RIAA's lawyers are famous names like Boston University, Carnegie Mellon University, Columbia University, Georgia Institute of Technology, Harvard University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, New York University, Princeton University and the University of California campuses at Berkeley, Los Angeles and San Diego.