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Ohio University Leads U.S. Colleges in File Sharing 135

Posted by Zonk from the go-buckeyes dept.
An anonymous reader writes "The Columbus Dispatch is reporting that Ohio University leads the nation in illegal music download notifications, having received 1,287 RIAA complaints since September, with between ten and 15 notices arriving daily. The University is attempting to deflect criticism with a PR piece, saying open networks required for academic freedom make it difficult to stop illegal file sharing. They also point out that the University's architecture makes it much easier to determine who is actually sharing the files. This makes a complaint more likely, as the RIAA knows who to target. "
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Ohio University Leads U.S. Colleges in File Sharing More

Ohio University Leads U.S. Colleges in File Sharing

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    • Re:Ohio U also has the most students in the countr (Score:5, Informative)

      by Undertaker43017 ( 586306 ) on Thursday February 22, 2007 @04:02PM (#18112756)
      Wrong school. The Ohio State University is in Columbus. Ohio University is in Athens (southern Ohio)
    • Scratch that. Ohio State has the most. Ohio only has 25,000 which is about average for a stat university.

      • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

        by mrchaotica ( 681592 ) *

        Ohio only has 25,000 which is about average for a stat university.

        Why is that? Do statisticians prefer large schools so that they can improve their sample sizes?

    • Gimme an O-H-I-O!

      Well you have to be best at something.

    • enough people have covered the error in that, but OU is usually one of the more consistantly ranked schools at the top of the #1 school to party at, get drunk at, and get knocked up on accident at, if I remember correctly.

      • ...but OU is usually one of the more consistantly ranked schools at the top of the #1 school to party at, get drunk at, and get knocked up on accident at, if I remember correctly.

        And now it's the #1 place to get your bootleg "Buffy" collection going... why would you bother with anywhere else?!?

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by den479 ( 947905 )
        When I went to the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown they were in the top ten for beer consumption per person according to High Times magazine. Now you have to register your 6-pack with security before you bring it on campus... Go OU

    • The Boston Herald covered this a few days ago. While the year is only half over, the number of RIAA complaints is already three times what it was last year [slashdot.org]. It looks like the RIAA got smart and narrowed their indiscriminate abuse of 12 year olds and working moms in housing projects. Now they are indiscriminately abusing University students. The problem for them is that there's no good victim for their harassment, especially when they are wrong so often. The reaction from schools like Purdue is what I'd

  • We take the heat for the good of all pirates! OU is also one of the top party schools in the country. Yes it's awesome.
    • Hell yes it's awesome, you $#@*!!#*@*&%! (Can I swear at you even when I agree?)

      I live about 45 minutes away from Athens and I have to say that it is quite the fun little college town, although since I went to WVU I have to give props to Morgantown WV as an equally fun little college town.

  • makes sense (Score:3, Funny)

    by flynt ( 248848 ) on Thursday February 22, 2007 @04:02PM (#18112754)
    So that's what these kids [ohio.edu] are so happy about.

  • Top 25 schools... (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/lifestyle/304595_dow nload22.html [nwsource.com]

    As a student at Northern Illinois, I am pleased to announce that we are number 13 on the list. I also find it very interesting that Purdue takes a "Eh, it's to much work to care" stance: "Some schools aggressively warn students after they receive complaints. Others don't. Purdue, which has received 1,068 complaints so far this year but only 37 in 2006, said it rarely notifies students accused by the RIAA because it's too much trouble to find al

    • Re:Top 25 schools... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by lhbtubajon ( 469284 ) on Thursday February 22, 2007 @04:15PM (#18112956)
      The reality is that it is not the responsibility of universities to enforce privately-held copyrights. If the RIAA wants to enforce their copyrights, then they should do the investigation, collect evidence, and file suit.

      Instead, they are attempting to offload this responsibility to the universities, thereby limiting file sharing AND their own expenses to maximize profit.

      Note that an increase of over 2,786% year over year is not explainable by any changes in behavior of the population in question. Instead, it is explainable only by changes in the behavior of the RIAA. The likelihood is that, between 2005 and 2006, the RIAA hired a bunch of writers to fire off 30X more letters than in years' past, so as to manufacture a scary-sounding story that a lazy reporter will swallow.
      • Instead, they are attempting to offload this responsibility to the universities, thereby limiting file sharing AND their own expenses to maximize profit.

        Without access to Universities logs, how is RIAA going to do the investigation? Are universities considered common carriers? Otherwise, I guess it would be easier for RIAA to simply sue the University.
        • As soon as a university takes on the responsibility of an ISP, it arguably becomes liable for copyright infringement across its networks. However, universities are not ISPs, nor do they staff their IT departments such that they could ever reasonably investigate every complaint.

          To your question, how was the RIAA able to send their letters? I assume it was based on some initial investigation that they did. However, if they want to go further and actually lodge a legitimate complaint, they should file suit and
          • But ISPs are common carriers, are they not? That means that they are not responsible for the illegal actions of their users (unless I'm badly mistaken, as IANAL).

            I guess, they don't want to follow the legal avenue because they just want to strongarm the users into a "deal" as they usually do.
            • But ISPs are common carriers, are they not?

              They are not. Only Telco's have common carrier status in the USA.
              • But it doesn't matter. No one actually uses the common carrier argument for copyright purposes. Instead the 17 USC 512 safe harbor would be relied upon, and it covers anyone who meets the requirements set forth in the statute, not just telcos or professional ISPs.

                Also many transportation companies, public utilities, some accomodations, etc. are common carriers. The concept predates telecommunications, actually, and really has more to do with moving cargo and people.

    • Re: (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Some schools aggressively warn students after they receive complaints.
      And it gets very agressive in some places. A friend of mine got caught sharing House episodes, and the university charged her an "administrative fee" of $100 for informing her that she had been caught. No legal protection or anything, just payment demanded for services not requested (and does it really cost $100 to forward an email?).

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by InsaneMosquito ( 1067380 )
      I also attend NIU. I'm very surprised that we are so high in the list because our "Abuse Investigator" is pretty proactive about shutting down copyright violators - in some cases even overzealous, shutting down people who's games happen to run on a P2P port or a use bittorrent to download patches.
    • I noticed that one of the linked articles mentioned a policy initiated on Sep. 28 that goes something like this:
      (1) RIAA decides to file a complaint against you
      (2) Ohio yanks your Internet access without warning
      (3) You have to prove your innocence
      (4) If you can't, you have to prove that you have deleted the offending content from your computer.

      The University of Delaware currently runs an identical racket, but what UD does is pretty classic: in order for you to get your computed "checked" after deleting cont
  • Ohio State has by far more file traders than Ohio University, the network just hides identities better, etc. Ohio U is dinky compared to OSU, and having graduated from OSU, I can tell you for a fact that no school has the internet traffic of OSU. I heard as an undergrad that the campus connections alone, not including the dorms,etc. but just the campus buildings, were pulling a constant 50-60 megs.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by krotkruton ( 967718 )
      After a quick search, OSU has roughly 9000 students (2005 estimate) in on-campus housing while OU has 7800 (from their housing page, not sure when it was last updated). I don't know how their networks work, but generally you are only part of the university's network if you are on-campus, so their networks have a pretty similar capacity. It appears that OSU's size isn't really relevant in this article because the number of people are on the network are close to the same. Smaller schools generally have a h
  • Anyone who knows OU's reputation would not find this surprising at all. You have to have good music for all of those parties.

  • Not something to be proud of (Score:5, Insightful)

    by rdwald ( 831442 ) on Thursday February 22, 2007 @04:09PM (#18112876)
    They're not the university with the most file sharers...they're the university with the most file sharers WHO GOT CAUGHT. The smart thing to do is ensure that most file sharing is within the university, not with outside sources, to minimize exposure to the ??AA. If you're getting caught, you're doing it wrong.
    • They're not the university with the most file sharers...they're the university with the most file sharers WHO GOT CAUGHT. The smart thing to do is ensure that most file sharing is within the university, not with outside sources, to minimize exposure to the ??AA. If you're getting caught, you're doing it wrong.

      I think that the key here is that their network is conducive, basically, to getting caught.

      They don't give any details in the PR puff-piece that's linked from the Slashdot blurb, but it sounds like the
      • I would like to remind everyone that OU has been in the Columbus Dispatch recently for other retarded computing mistakes:
        http://irobert.org/2006/05/data-theft-at-ohio-univ ersity-risks-and-preventative-measures/ [irobert.org]

        I believe the director of IT at the school stepped down not long after all of the student data thefts from their networks sometime last year because he was found to have been completely incompetent and unresponsive with regards to the campus' computer security issues. I'm not surprised that during th

      • They don't give any details in the PR puff-piece that's linked from the Slashdot blurb, but it sounds like they must be issuing every client on the network its own externally-addressable IP address. While this is kinda cool, from the perspective of being able to run your own server or something, it also makes it exceptionally easy for the RIAA to home in on you. At other places, where individual PCs are hidden behind NAT, it's more difficult to pick out a particular client and send a subpoena / violation o

  • Information Sharing is part of Learning (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 22, 2007 @04:13PM (#18112918)
    While the MAFIAA would like to rewind time before the Internet, people generally have the desire to share information freely.

    Kid: how come we stopped singing happy birthday?
    Mom: because Time-Warner "owns" the rights to that, and we don't want to get on the MAFIAA hit list. The cost is far greater than a usual birthday celebration. And, whats wrong with "Good birthday to you"?

    Kid: why is the sky blue
    Dad: you know, many natural processes can now be patented, copyrighted and generally "owned". My company, SkyTech is patenting that atmospheric prism effect, so I cannot discuss that without revealing trade secrets, and ongoing patented research. Ask your mother.

  • My alma mater [unl.edu] is third in RIAA notices; after so many years of football dominance, it's nice to be in the top 5 of something again. Like Ohio University, the campus network at UNL makes it relatively easy to associate people with IPs.

    (On a related note, the 100-person computer science/business honors program I was in [unl.edu] was, at one time, using something in the area of 25% of the student housing network bandwidth; note that this particular network has about 5,000 users.)

    • I read about this in the paper [journalstar.com] this morning. Interestingly, in a sidebar they interview a student from Wesleyan (a neighboring school), who came onto campus specifically to download music, because they have all the popular download sites blocked at her school. I wonder if "visiting" student contribute in any meaningful way to UNL's stats?

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by HTH NE1 ( 675604 )
      I know that UNL tracks what MAC addresses use which IP addresses and for how long. They use it to maintain the DHCP server and identify machines that are trying to use the same IP address or using IPs that they aren't allowed to use (anything over 199 in the last octet is reserved in all subnets). Troublemakers get their MAC addresses banned, which works against those who don't know how to change them. (They've had students buying new network cards to get past the blocks.) I'd expect they've enhanced it

  • Open Networks for Academic Freedom? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by susano_otter ( 123650 ) on Thursday February 22, 2007 @04:20PM (#18113030) Homepage
    So... with OU students benefiting so much from all this Academic Freedom, they must lead U.S. Colleges in academic excellence too, right?
    • Well, off the top of my head, their Journalism department is very well known and their CS dept is pretty well known. I believe they're also fairly well known for their Chem dept as well.

      Disclaimer: I'm an alumnus.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by TheLink ( 130905 )
        I see some synergies. If the 3 depts are working together it'll be no surprise they are well known for their parties ;).
  • Cuz im going back to college !!!

    Seriously though, must be a nice, liberty-loving place.
    • Now we know that liberty can be quantified by RIAA notices, and tallying the drunken shouts of WOOO down the avenues!

      Course if R.K.L. Collins and D.M. Skover are correct on that front, then this IS a useful measure =)
  • The article is talking about Ohio University, not Ohio State University. I'm a student at OU and it's amazing how lax the network security is here. Absolutely nothing is blocked here, file sharing or otherwise. I know quite a few people that have gotten in trouble for file sharing but they've only gotten referred to the university officials, not the RIAA. Not that computer security is highly regarded here at all, considering that hackers recently got their hands on a list of the entire student body's socia [com.com]
    • At least Copeland is fairly well managed from a tech standpoint. (That's the College of Business for non-OU readers.)

  • RIAA actions remind me of a quote (Score:5, Funny)

    by Sponge Bath ( 413667 ) on Thursday February 22, 2007 @04:27PM (#18113130)

    The quote from Ferris Bueller's Day Off:

    Something is going on, and I'm going to find out what it is.
    I'm going to catch this kid and put a dent in his future.
    Years from now, when he looks back
    on the ruin his life has become...
    he will remember Edward Rooney (err, RIAA).

  • List (Score:5, Informative)

    by theheff ( 894014 ) on Thursday February 22, 2007 @04:31PM (#18113178)
    Here's the complete list of colleges receiving RIAA notices-

    http://www.eschoolnews.com/news/showStoryts.cfm?Ar ticleID=6876 [eschoolnews.com]

    • It is not a complete list... I know this because my school is missing and we have had some and people have gotten in trouble by the school. They think it is a no-no...
  • that my Alma Mater was #3 on the list and that my local university is #10 on the list.

    Perhaps there's still hope in the American university system after all..

    • Mine just barely made it on the list. I'm ashamed since we usually make it to the top of partying school list. Too drunk to download?
  • Ohio University leads U.S. colleges in complaints of file sharing by the RIAA.

    This is not a measurement of who's actually file shareing most, as an activity people don't like to advertise, it's very difficult to say who's engaging in it most.
  • There's nothing to do in Athens, Ohio except drink and screw (and apparently download every byte on the Net). It's a liberal arts school whose student body is at best of modest means. Most of the OU grads I've known have been office assistants, who no doubt have transported their surfing skills to the workplace. Mark me down for flamebait if you must, but this headline should be filed with other 'stunning' headlines like "GW Bush dumb", "Britney Spears flakes out again", and "Vista unsecure after all".
    • You fogot this alumnus, Kamil Idris, current Director General of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO). You think he tipped off the RIAA?
      • Your parent is exhibiting what seems to be the sterotypical whining of an OSU person. OSU has this hate thing for OU and just can't seem to get past it. The same can be said for Miami Oxford.

        There are a whole lot of people who went to OU that did not simply get a job as an office assistant afterward. The grandparent needs to pull his head out of his rear.

        We're actually well known for journalism, pretty well known for CS (and CMU hates us becuase we give them a serious run for their money in competitions)
        • What do my parents have to do with anything? They didn't even go to college. Hell, my dad didn't even finish high school.

          Everything I need to know I learned by killing smart people and eating their brains.


          Sylar, is that you?

          • I'm an OU graduate and current graduate student.

            Maybe if you used some of your superior OSU intellect you could figure out that when the poster above you was using the word parent in the snese of thread hierarchy.

            I don't see where this superiority complex of OSU students comes from, like it matters that the school is bigger, or is in a bigger athletic conference. We're still both public schools in the state of Ohio.

            Yeah, plenty of OU grads I know work at libraries and are office assistants, but at the same
            • Fuck off, it was a joke. I knew what he meant. We actually respond to each quite often on here and get along fine. Btw, I never said anything disparaging about OU or OSU. I also didn't go to either school, I went to UA. Maybe you assumed that I'm the OSU idiot who started this thread. I've known several people who've gone to OU, it's just like any other school. Some graduates are intelligent and educated, some aren't.
              • Don't give him such a hard time. He's just standing up for another OU person. =]

                We do get a lot of grief from people who go to OSU, Miami, and CMU (the last of those because of our CS dept). It gets kind of old after a while, so some OU people are a bit quick to defend.
            • He really was just kidding. We go back and forth in a good-natured manner fairly often.

              I appreciate the assist, though. What program are you in?

    • There's nothing to do in Athens, Ohio except drink and screw

      ... which is much less fun than rioting [memorywiki.org], getting murdered execution-style [thelantern.com], or burning to death as a result of arson [findarticles.com].

      Most of the OU grads I've known have been office assistants, who no doubt have transported their surfing skills to the workplace.

      Funny, most of the OU grads I know have very successful careers. About every OSU grad I know has a communications degree and would have been better off saving their money, time, and safety (from living in a high-crime area right next to the ghetto).

      Generalizations are fun, aren't they?

  • Here on my campus, in Ohio but not OU or OSU for those who can't read, we have a movie channel. On the movie channel it sounded like a documentary on downloading files illegally so I was interested. It turned out to be a school made video of how illegal downloading can get you kicked out of school... I still have nightmares of the stupidity of the film. They student who got kicked out had his computer basically stolen from him. He was not present when it was taken and someone came and took it while he was o
  • I am an Ohio University student and incidentally, my internet was shut off YESTERDAY for seeding Adobe Creative Suite 2 and a couple movies. They told me I needed to delete the files, and then call them back. I called them back and they basically told me that I might get in trouble if I get caught again and gave me my internet back.

    Turns out PeerGuardian 2 never started up. Oops.
  • If OU actually offered something other than CDigix , then we students wouldn't have to resort to other means. Now, being an OU Computer Science student, I myself don't participate in rampant file sharing with everyone. But a number of friends of mine, all who own iPods, neither know anything nor care about DRM. All they know is that the music on the their little box works and they like to get music from their friend's little boxes. I've tried explaining to some that it's technically illegal to do that, b
    • Looking for music at OU? Forget Walmart. Go to Haffa's. The store is just off the corner of Court and Union, the discs are in great shape and the prices tend to be pretty good.

      Sheesh. Underclassmen these days :P
  • (Ohio University sophmore here.)

    As many have said before, this is just the number of people getting caught. Seriously, most of the kids here are not the brightest bulbs when it comes to not getting caught downloading music.

    I run a basic computer services business here for experience and some income. I'd say 90% of the people I help have limewire installed and when I ask them a few questions, few to none understand how the university can track what they're doing. The ones that do simply don't care. Ignorance
  • The Columbus Dispatch is reporting that Ohio University leads the nation in illegal music download notifications, having received 1,287 RIAA complaints since September, with between ten and 15 notices arriving daily.

    Gives me kind of a warm, fuzzy feeling about Ohio U.
  • When I was an undergrad at RIT two years ago, they would regularly send the names of the top 10 or 20 uploaders to RIAA for investigation. With the speed of their networks, the "Top 10" class meant gigs per month. I was in a philosophy class with one guy who had been fined around $40,000 by RIAA. He had to sell his car and drop out of school for a year. He said that he still shares music and movies, after all, "They took my car and a year of my college education. Now I feel like I DESERVE the music!"

    • With the speed of their networks, the "Top 10" class meant gigs per month.

      Hmm that doesn't seem very top 10 at all. I would have thought top ten meant gigs per day.
    • The RIAA can't impose a FINE. It only means that this guy settled with RIAA.
      Iam not condoning illegal sharing, but instead of paying 40K to RIAA, he could have hired a good lawyer and dragged RIAA to court making them drop the case.
      • Yes but the cost of lawyer and court fees are numerous to a student. It is possible that the 40k and selling his car was cheaper than being in court and risk loosing.

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