University Sponsored Music Services? 276
Amy's Robot writes "The president of Penn State University is urging colleges to start their own digital music services. The schools would pay the licensing fees, and pass the charges on to their students. His logic is that paying for the school's service is an incentive not to use an "illegal" service. Supposedly, there will be some pilot programs this fall, but it seems like there are a lot of obstacles to overcome before then."
God, tuition is high enough (Score:5, Insightful)
Anyone know what percentage of a university tuition actually goes towards eduction (professor salaries, equpment) these days?
Which is higher priced... (Score:3, Insightful)
We pass the savings on to you! (Score:4, Insightful)
Paying (Score:3, Insightful)
And btw, who officially stamped these as illegal? As long as Kazaa has its doors open..
Obstacles? (Score:5, Insightful)
And besides, wasn't this tried before? *cough* mp3.com *cough*
What's next? (Score:2, Insightful)
What about the students that don't use this service? Are they exempt from the charge?
Nice side effect (Score:3, Insightful)
With the possibility of profit, universities may decide to crack down harder on the illegal music trading for their own purposes.
Legal? (Score:5, Insightful)
"I think it's a very good step to try to find new ways to provide music legally to college students"
Oh that right, college students never obtain music legally.
And just what we need. Yet another fee (YAF) tacked onto tuition. It's bad enough students have to pay for a lot of the crap they don't use anyway. My univiersity added "free" parking my last year. It was made up for in tuition fees. That way, everyone had to pay $50 for the best parking you never got.
Way to go parkig services. Go Penn State! Make all the students pay for music they won't know they're getting. Where's the freedom of speech in that?
Pass the buck (Score:5, Insightful)
Need some money? Just go to the ones you have the most power over, and most likely already in overwhelming debt.
The president of Penn State is an idiot. Definitely NOT acting in the best interest of the students.
Paying for entertainment? (Score:5, Insightful)
Last time I heard, it is the students and/or their families who are paying for this via the tuition and related fees, not the other way around. Where is the outrage at universities funneling more and more money into sports teams, choosing childrens games over academics?
Wasted resources. (Score:5, Insightful)
He's exactly right. The idea of the school licensing music for the students is stupid. Either ban p2p on campus networks altogether or make students who want to use campus computing resources attend a brief IP seminar. Squeeze the plagiarism talk in with that and you're all set. If they abuse campus computing resources after having been educated about what they're doing, revoke their priviliges. We're all adults here and don't need any more of this childish handholding.
Welcome to the real word....genius (Score:1, Insightful)
No? Then you should not pay your taxes.
Do your grandparents go to high school?
No? Then they should not pay their taxes.
Have any friends without cars?
Guess what? Their taxes pay for roads.
It is a microcosm of the real world. That is assuming you are a taxpaying member of society and not just leaching off your parents, which it sure sounds like.
Not such a good business model (Score:5, Insightful)
Many colleges also won't have the resources (technical, human, financial, and temporal) to pull this off. It takes a lot of time and effort to negotiate the licenses - more than you'd think. So it'll suck for the students if their college has a poor selection but they have to pay anyway, since it's in tuition.
Also, the idea of charging extra to burn onto CD (read the article) is going to be a big turn off, especially when Apple lets you do it at no extra charge.
Really, the best idea would be for universities to partner with Apple and maybe offer discount rates for Apple Music Store. Like, maybe a student rate that instead of $0.99/song is $10 for 20 songs. Or perhaps offer a 5 day free trial of the Apple Music Store during Orientation week. Or something like that. Out of all the legal music services, Apple is (at the moment) by far the cheapest, and the most permissive when it comes to what you can do with the music (unlimited CD burning). Unless the colleges can offer something of comparable or better quality, no one is going to use it. Given Apple's history of being an educational "partner", I'd say maybe Penn State wants to work something out with Steve Jobs...
As long as it's not a flat rate (Score:4, Insightful)
I thought that university-supplied music was called "radio."
Ha! (Score:3, Insightful)
Ok, so Apple have shown that on-line digital music sales can be successful. (Short-term anyway)
Academia is trying to protect their students while still throwing cash at the RIAA.
Is it any wonder they are unwilling to start any service of their own? I mean, they are soaking up cash for fun now, with people wanting to throw *more* at them?
1. Create cash cow.
2. Milk cash cow.
4. Profit!
What is happening here is: 3. Mangage to get other people to milk cow for you. FOR FREE!
Non RIAA music? J-pop? Eurobeat? (Score:5, Insightful)
Now, I find it highly unlikely that these networks would ever be able to get licenses to most foreign artists' works. Thus, I would continue to use WinMX [winmx.com] to get my music. The RIAA can't touch me (I'm not infringing on -their- copyrights), the University can't touch me (RIT won't act unless on a specific complaint from a copyright holder), and the foreign labels can't/won't touch me (lotsa reasons for that one).
I don't want to generalize, but college studends tend (TEND!) to have more ecclectic tastes than the foaming masses. I highly doubt that they use p2p primarily to get their "Top 40" fix every night.
Re:PSU - smart (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:We pass the savings on to you! (Score:3, Insightful)
Dude, what the heck are you doing? I know I'm showing my age, but we had 1200 baud dialups and had no trouble getting "work" done.
What gets done on campus networks these days that requires more speed than that? I guess if you were saving MS Word docs on a network share, that'd get old.
Re:Welcome to the real word....genius (Score:2, Insightful)
Why students are smarter in California... (Score:5, Insightful)
''I really don't think they understand or believe that illegal file-sharing is the same thing as going into Tower [Records], grabbing a CD off the rack, and running out the door with it,'' said Scott Hervey, chairman of California Bar's cyberspace law committee.
Um, that's because file-sharing isn't shoplifting.
''We have to somehow fix the culture that thinks it's OK to rip off people's intellectual property rights,'' [UC Berkeley' CIO & Assc. Vice Chancellor Jack]McCredie said.
As opposed to fixing the culture that thinks it's OK to rip off the public domain? Which, ultimately, costs the public, society, and culture more: KaZaa, or obscene copyright terms? Why are we in a place now where even university officials are more willing to attack the integrity of their own students than to criticize the practices of a small cartel of international media conglomerates that withhold creative output from the public domain for longer than most of their students will be alive? What is the bigger problem? Why not address that problem, instead of focusing on what is little more than one of it's side-effects?
--Michael
Re:Pot Calling The Kettle Black (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Scams (Score:5, Insightful)
1) The accept un-/under-qualified applicants, which they do because they feel this need to fill seat and grow into a larger school. Over the last 10 years they have almost doubled the size.
2) They expect students to realize how crappy they are doing and GET help. If they were to add more "Freshman advisors" and anyone who get's less then a 2.0 GPA in a semister is REQUIRED to talk to one of these people (who makes sure they get the help)
3) It's a hard school, i personal know 2 people who dropped out because they had nervous breakdowns!
Don't bitch about the uperclassman benifiting from the lower classman's tuition, that happens EVERYWHERE. If those 50% that leave freshman year cared about their 26 grand they would have done what they needed to to pass. As you pointed out, all freshman year is English Comp and Lit, Basic Sciences, a few fine arts, total fitness and the activiteis, and maybe 1 class in your major each quarter! If they can't pass that, they would prolly have flunked out almost anywere they went!
Re:Welcome to the real word....genius (Score:3, Insightful)
I pay for Medicare/Medicaid/Social Security, because (theoretically) others will pay for me when I need it. Maybe I could blow all my Social Security money on the latest pop CD's (by then they will be singing from the cradle), but I'll be more likely to spend it on saltine crackers.
Another poster mentioned the invalidity of the high school argument.
I don't have many friends without cars. Guess it's because they have jobs, and are able to get out of their immediate vicinity.... Plus you're very illogical on this point too. A large amount of road tax comes from GASOLINE. Unless car-less people are really into mowing their lawn or setting brush fires, aren't buying much gas.
Your last comment is the most illogical. An independent, taxpaying member of society (such as yours truly) is going to be more concerned about forced expenditures. If a kid is leaching off their parent, they wouldn't give a crap about a few extra bucks on the bill. So I'm not in college and it won't affect me, but I don't like the precedent. Eventually they take all of our money away, then decide what we should be allowed to have.
Re:$26,000 USD????? (Score:5, Insightful)
PSU Alum Speaks (Score:2, Insightful)
I finished my studies in Industrial Engineering at PSU, worked there for 6 years, and still live and work in the area)
***
I'm almost ashamed to be a Penn State Alumnus. Graham Spanier is most likely the WORST President the university has had in a LONG time. He is hypocritical and so out of touch with the students, the community, and society in general that it defies logic.
***warning*** long post ahead ***warning***
For those that don't know about Penn State, Let me give some background. Penn State is the largest university in Pennsylvania (~45,000 students total). It is located in the geographical center of PA, 3hrs from the closest major city (Pittsburgh,Philadelphia), and at least 90 minutes from the closest minor cities (Johnstown, Harrisburg). There are more cows than people in the 50 mile radius around campus, you cannot get to campus without driving at least 10 miles on 2-lane hiway, and the bar to church ratio here is roughly 30:4. We have the largest single student dorm complex (East Halls)in the nation (2nd largest in the world) and the largest Greek system in the country.
With all that in mind, there is a lot of drinking and partying that occurs here. This year, we were voted the #1 and #3 party school by CNN and Playboy respectively. 40% of students ADMIT to binge drinking 4 or more drinks when they drink (though, I bet that number is actually much higher). In my 9 years in the town (I work locally now), there have been at least 8 riots I can remember (3 serious, 6 not) for things such as "We're #1 in the nation at football!" (x2), "Our basketball team does suck this year!" (x1), "There's art all over our streets!" (x4). We're a fun loving (and sometimes destructive) crowd.
With all that in mind, we do do some things involving alcohol for good causes. The most noted is the "Rathskeller Case Race." In the Case Race, the 'Skeller sells cases of Rolling Rock pony (7oz) bottles to patrons who, as longa s they're drinking, can stay. Soon as they stop, they have to leave and more are let in. All proceeds benefit the American Red Cross. The line will extend out the door, around the block, down to the next block, around the corner, DOWN the third block, and halfway down the side of another block. It is one of the top things on the "100 things a true PSU student does."
This year in his infinite wisdom, Graham decided that it would be better for the students (and alumni and faculty) to binge drink on their own, rather than support a cause. He had the race cancelled. He has also tried to make campus dry (except for home football games, of course. Can't stop the rich alumni from tailgating. that my hit into the donations.) In the ime he was fighting to make campus dry (which he accomplished at his last university) he had a fully stocked liquor cabinet installed in his, and all the other higher-ups, offices.
The student activity fee is another great fiasco of his tenure. Every student is charged a $50 "activity fee" that is supposed to go towards the clubs you join and other campus supported stuff that you go to. The original point of this was to help provide activities other than drinking. The majority of mine when I was in school was used to renevate our Student Uunion Building (the HUB) which most students were fine with, but then they added a multi-million dollar cultural center on (which, if you go up at any random time, has 10 people in it, most of which got lost trying to find their way out of the HUB's east wing). A large portion of this center was paid from donations and the Student Activity Fee. The funds were so mismanaged that even some of the oldest, most populous, and most active clubs on campus were unable to collect their stipends from the campus cause the funds had run out.
Now he wants to charge for using music? The students already pay a rather substantial "computer lab" fee and they're reward? Having on campus bandwidth throttled at 56K in the dorms. Th
colleges and digital music services (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:PSU Alum Speaks (Score:2, Insightful)
Now he wants to charge for using music? The students already pay a rather substantial "computer lab" fee and they're reward? Having on campus bandwidth throttled at 56K in the dorms.
That 56K is result of a bandwith restriction, which are placed on students if they download too much stuff in a certain period of time. Anyone using the internet for research, like they should be, will not be going over their bandwith restriction. Of I probably only used my computer for research 10% of the time.
I'd have to agree with you about Graham Spanier and his insane goal of stopping drinking, its really not going to work, all it does is push people off campus to drink, where most of it happens already. After all 30% of Penn Staters party stupid. I would proudly classify myself in that 30%.
start listening to those taht actually know and finding out what they want and are willing to pay for
Yeah, maybe he should take a poll of students to find that out. Depending on how much it was, I would pay for that.
I think this is a gutsy but good move by Grahamn Spanier. He is thinking either his University and its students are either 1 - going to have to work with the RIAA or 2 - going to continue to ignore the RIAA and possibly end up in court for a huge lawsuit. Obviously, if you can have happy students and happy RIAA, that is the goal. If PSU just tries to block all P2P applications its not going to be that easy, as we know there's always a way around things. Students will not be happy. Also, sending RIAA letters to students is not ideal either.
I think that most students would embrace this idea, its legal, nearly free, and provides high quality songs. Perhaps students can "choose" to pay for the service instead of charging all students, just provide access based on User name/password.
The real problem I see is Movies. DVD rips are becoming increasingly common on P2P. Noone is doing anything to address this issue. I believe soon it will become just a bad a problem as pirating music.
Look for the 6'4" 280
I also frequent the Skeller on Fridays, I must have confused you with all the bouncers there.
Make it optional... (Score:2, Insightful)