In response to the notification, Bridegam, who is the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DCMA) officer in charge of notifying students when they do not comply with copyright laws, contacted both students, informing them of their rights in regards to the RIAA's request that they eliminate the files and filesharing programs from their computers. The DCMA, passed in 1998, was created to provide "protection to colleges and
universities as 'online service providers,'" according to the College library website. The first student agreed to remove the files and the peer-to-peer program on her computer. The second student had not yet responded to Bridegam's email as of yesterday.
In the letters of notification sent to the College, the RIAA suggests that it has been targeting peer-to-peer software, particularly KaZaA, Morpheus and Gnutella.
"You should understand that this letter constitutes notice to you that this network user may be liable for the infringing activity occurring on your network," the letter stated. The letter also states that the College could be liable for this illegal activity if it ignores the warning and that the warning does not constitute a waiver of the right to recover damages incurred by unauthorized activity.
Neither of the students were issued subpoenas, which serve as the precursor to a lawsuit, a fact which Bridegam thinks is the result of the College's prompt reply to the letter of notification.
Although the school is unaware of exactly how many students participate in filesharing, during this year's freshman orientation, students in attendance were asked to raise their hands if they had ever participated in filesharing. Over 60 percent admitted to having done so. The act of sharing files is prohibited because it provides illegal access to songs that are protected by copyright laws.
The number of songs one downloads is irrelevant to prosecution. The first student identified by the RIAA had over 1,000 files; the second student had only about 300 files.
The action taken against these two students has elicited worry around campus, but it has not led to a halt in the practice. Some students were reluctant to have their names published for fear that acknowledging that they share files would result in action by the RIAA. Students did admit, however, that the threat of being contacted by the RIAA would not stop them from continuing to participate in filesharing.
Although the RIAA's letters to the College suggest that it may take further legal action against students, Amherst has decided to maintain its policy of not monitoring peer-to-peer action on students' network accounts. Dean of Students Ben Lieber promises that the Information Technology (IT) department will uphold a strict policy of not policing the actual content of people's files. Lieber also said that members of the administration met over the summer to discuss a policy in anticipation of the RIAA's actions. "If there's a subpoena that's legally issued, we'd comply with it," said Lieber. That was pretty much a consensus among all of the parties involved." He added that the College would need to consult its lawyers before it could determine what would constitute a legally issued subpoena.
According to a Sept. 8 article in The New York Times, the RIAA is pursuing people who actively share songs, as opposed to those who have downloaded files onto their computers. Bridegam said he expects that the College will receive notification of other instances of file sharing.
Other colleges and universities nationwide are also faced with the task of handling the filesharing epidemic. The RIAA has sent hundreds of subpoenas to colleges and various Internet service providers demanding information about specific users who share music files. The RIAA can determine users' Internet protocol addresses, but it needs cooperation from Internet providers to access personal information.
The RIAA claims that declines in CD sales in recent years are due to online piracy. Some colleges have complied with the subpoenas while other institutions have gone to court to appeal the subpoenas.
According to The Wall Street Journal, Boston College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology won their legal battles against the RIAA. Both were served with subpoenas seeking information on students who shared music files. The colleges filed appeals claiming that the subpoenas were not valid in Massachusetts, since they were served by a court in Washington, D.C.
At other colleges throughout the country, the problem of students' filesharing is a serious one for which they are seeking an appropriate solution. According to The Chronicle of Higher Education, The Joint Committee on Higher Education and Entertainment Communities is considering a program that would assist schools in cutting down on the amount of filesharing.
Penn State University is considering adopting a program in which the school pays for a subscription to a music download service for its students, according to The Chronicle. "We'll consider it if and when such services turn out to exist," said Lieber. "We would have to talk about it with the student government and see who legitimately would cover the cost."
The RIAA's threats of legal action against colleges and students have both groups worried. But the real deterrent for many is the RIAA's right to sue individuals caught with illegally downloaded songs for anywhere from $750 to $150,000 per song.
Another possibility of great concern to colleges is that the RIAA could decide to sue them after or in lieu of their students. "You would find out in court [what the outcome of that would be]," said Lieber. "I don't think that's been tested." He added that the ruling would probably depend on whether the college in question had taken any measures to stop filesharing once it was alerted by the RIAA.
The letters the College has already received are two of what is expected to be a growing number of warnings. Phil Fitz, Director of IT at the College, and Bridegam said that the only way to minimize one's risk of prosecution is to uninstall downloading programs like KaZaA and to remove illegally obtained files from computers.