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Tuesday, September 17, 2002

Music, File-Sharing, and the Bastards at USC

iTunes Publisher is a neat little Mac program that puts out an HTML index of all the music on one's computer.

Here are my MP3s. Imagine if everyone at Dartmouth did this; it would be almost as good as having Napster back.

As Dartmouth has done its best to "throttle" file-sharing programs and severely slow down music trading, USC has banned it altogether. Though Kazaa (or Gnutella, Soulseek, etc.) may be effectively crippled on both networks, the two strategies underscore a big difference: Dartmouth recognizes that most file-sharing is secondary to its academic mission, gives file-sharing traffic a reduced priority on the network, and respects the privacy of its students by not prying into their data. USC, on the other hand, a priori considers its students to be petty crooks and proceeds logically from there to investigation and disciplinary threats.

Of course, there are unintended consequences of USC's policy (beyond angry students). First off, file-sharing is actually a pretty hot research topic right now. It's called P2P, and even IBM and Microsoft are taking stabs at it. Networks like Gnutella are useful in researching topics like scalability and network architecture. Apparently, USC isn't too involved in this sort of thing.

So, perhaps another consequence is more relevent: file-sharing need not be copyright infringement, and such legal use is indiscriminately blocked at USC. Then again, USC (especially the law school) is known for its close relationship with the entertainment industry, and so this may not be entirely unintended. RIAA considers every file sent over the Internet to be a tiny bit of lost revenue, whether the file was illegally copied or not. Unfortunately, the USC policy does decrease the University's exposure to lawsuits that might be filed by the record labels and other content owners.

When will Dartmouth's risk-averting tendencies overcome its concern for student freedom? Pretty soon, if recent administrative decisions (e.g., dorm locks, keg jump, etc.) are any indication. On the other hand, I get the impression that those managing Dartmouth's computer network are basically techno-libertarians and that College administrators, generally clueless about technogy, aren't even aware that there's much to administrate online. (perhaps a reason why Dartmouth is the most tech-intensive colleges around without really trying) At best, this just means that Dartmouth won't be proactive in restricting its students' online activities. But when RIAA starts directing serious legal threats at other schools, Risk Management will get the message.

And that will be that. Back to cassette tapes.

Hmmm, for some reason no Nina Nastasia tracks made it into my music index. Must be a bug.

Full post and comments below the fold.

Posted by Andrew Grossman at 10:56 PM (0 comments)

More on Press Bias

CNS News is featuring a story on Dartmouth Professor Jim A. Kuypers' forthcoming book, "Press Bias and Politics: How the Media Frame Controversial Issues." You can read it here.

Full post and comments below the fold.

Posted by Emmett at 1:35 PM (0 comments)

Monday, September 16, 2002

Get Shorty

From Taegan Goddard's Political Wire:
The Hotline reports a new Boston Herald poll shows Robert Reich [Dartmouth '68] fading dramatically in the last few days before Tuesday's Democratic gubernatorial primary in Massachusetts. The results: Shannon O'Brien now leads with 34 percent, compared to Reich's 16 percent. Warren Tolman has moved into second place with 21 percent and Thomas Birmingham is at 17 percent.

Full post and comments below the fold.

Posted by Andrew Grossman at 10:12 PM (0 comments)

U.S. News Rankings

Yes, we know Dartmouth has been ranked #9 by the magazine this year. No, it's not news, which is why word of it wasn't posted here. (When's the last time you saw a TV station announce that regularly scheduled programming has not been preempted?) And, yes, we do know that Dartmouth would be #1 were it in the "Liberal Arts" category and competing against schools that consider the implementation of gender-neutral third-person singular pronouns to be a major campus issue.

Since that's clear, you can stop emailing us about it. Deal?

Full post and comments below the fold.

Posted by Andrew Grossman at 9:13 PM (0 comments)

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