RIAA sues two University students for music piracy

The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has launched yet another round of litigation in its campaign to curb music piracy on college campuses. On Wednesday, it filed copyright infringement lawsuits against 745 individuals allegedly engaging in illegal file-sharing, including two Princeton students.

The latest round of suits involves 14 of the 17 colleges where students were targeted last month.

Known as "John Doe" lawsuits, the RIAA's lawsuits refer to IP addresses rather than the names of the alleged violators. The two holders of the IP addresses in the suits have already been notified, University spokesperson Cass Cliatt '96 said. The RIAA must now wait for the judge assigned to the "John Doe" lawsuits to issue a subpoena before it can approach the University and request information on the implicated students.

Wednesday's litigation brings to 32 the total number of Princeton students targeted for lawsuits by the RIAA. The recording industry group filed a copyright infringement suit against one member of the campus community in September. The RIAA also sued 25 University students last April for allegedly engaging in music piracy on the campus network.

"Theft is theft and should be treated as such," RIAA president Cary Sherman said in a statement Wednesday. "When college students illegally download, they not only put themselves at risk for lawsuits but also put the next generation of music at risk as well. Our ability to invest in new bands and new music is seriously threatened by online theft."

This latest round of lawsuits takes aim at individuals illegally distributing copyrighted music via online peer-to-peer services such as Grokster, Kazaa and Limewire, as well as students using the file-sharing application i2hub to trade music on Internet2, a high-powered research network operated by universities and affiliated institutions nationwide.

In September, both the RIAA and the Motion Picture Association of America joined the Internet2 network, reportedly to research new ways of distributing music and movies online.

Students at 17 colleges, including Columbia, Harvard, MIT and the University of Pennsylvania, were singled out for lawsuits Wednesday, leading some to suspect that the recording industry is deliberately targeting illegal file-sharers at specific institutions. The RIAA filed similar lawsuits in September, against 757 individuals at 17 colleges. Fourteen of those colleges, including Princeton, also appeared on yesterday's list.

Support nonprofit student journalism. Donate to the ‘Prince’. Donate now »

Though the RIAA has not said that it intends to send a message to particular colleges, Sherman did suggest in his statement yesterday that certain universities are more likely to have students targeted than others.

"When college administrators are more proactive in addressing the campus piracy problem, it usually means fewer incidences of illegal downloading on those school networks and less chance that students will get in trouble for breaking the law," he said.

Cliatt said that Sherman's remarks were not directed at Princeton or another college in particular and that the University has taken steps to educate students about the risks of music piracy.

"The RIAA is targeting individuals, not Princeton University, and some of those students happen to be attending Princeton University," Cliatt said in an interview Wednesday. "We understand that this is an issue and we continue to have events on campus to deal with the problem and to inform and remind students of the liability they may face."

Get the best of the ‘Prince’ delivered straight to your inbox. Subscribe now »

Though the University has tried to discourage students from sharing music illegally, it's difficult to gauge the campaign's effectiveness, Cliatt said.

"Unfortunately there is no true way to measure if students are getting the message," she said, adding that the University's legal counsel recently spoke at a freshman seminar and asked students whether they engage in music piracy even with the threat of litigation and, if so, why.

"Most of them said it was a cost issue as far as money savings," Cliatt said. "So if the question is, 'What motivates these students [to illegally share files]?' the motivation is clear. We need to communicate to students, though, that there are consequences so they can make the cost-benefit analysis."

Cliatt also said the University is exploring the option of subscribing to a legal file-swapping service like Ruckus or Napster — a move greatly encouraged by the RIAA — but that, because of a lack of reliable data, it hasn't been able to draw conclusions about the services' ability to curb music piracy.

"We're not going to make a quick decision on a possible remedy without exploring all of the options," Cliatt said.

The recording industry believes that copyright infringement litigation is an effective means of discouraging illegal file-sharing, RIAA spokesperson Jenni Engebretsen said in an interview Wednesday.

"Without question, these lawsuits have helped to arrest the growth of illegal peer-to-peer use, and we will continue to pursue them," she said.