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TOP STORIES FOR WEDNESDAY, MARCH 10, 2004 IBM and Napster Work to Preserve Bandwidth Setback for RIAA Lawsuits New EU Antipiracy Law ICANN Okays Wait List New Information Services for Federal Grants IBM AND NAPSTER WORK TO PRESERVE BANDWIDTH Recently relaunched music service Napster and IBM this week announced a new "Super Peer" application designed to keep peer-to-peer file trading from eating up huge portions of a network's bandwidth. Napster has several university customers, including the University of Rochester and Penn State University, and the new application stores the most frequently traded tracks on servers at those locations. The application runs on IBM's eServer BladeCenter systems. Users who download those tracks get them from the local server rather than from the Internet, saving the network's bandwidth for applications that depend on it. According to Bill Pence, Napster's chief technology officer, the new system would keep about 90 percent of the roughly 100,000 daily downloads at Penn State from using up valuable Internet bandwidth, saving the university about $50,000 in access fees annually. Reuters, 10 March 2004 http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?storyID=4535158 SETBACK FOR RIAA LAWSUITS A federal judge has ruled that the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) may not file single "John Doe" lawsuits that cover more than one defendant but must file all suits individually. A court ruling from last year prohibits the RIAA from obtaining the identities of alleged copyright infringers without filing a lawsuit, each of which costs about $150 to file. In response, the RIAA began filing single "John Doe" lawsuits against groups of users who are all customers of the same ISP. The new ruling means that the RIAA would be required to file separate lawsuits against each of the roughly 200 defendants named in the suit at issue, costing the group about $30,000 in filing fees. The RIAA said it would consider its options but did not say what it planned to do. Wired News, 8 March 2004 http://www.wired.com/news/digiwood/0,1412,62576,00.html NEW EU ANTIPIRACY LAW The European Parliament has passed a new antipiracy law after changes were made to appease critics. The new law covers all sorts of counterfeit items, from luggage and clothing to jewelry and CDs. Early drafts of the legislation included civil and criminal penalties for those found guilty of piracy, and the law could have been applied to consumers--including people trading copyrighted music or movie files over peer-to-peer networks--as well as to professional counterfeiters. Civil liberties groups protested the scope of the law, and at least one critic compared it to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which has been used to prosecute hundreds of individuals for illegal file sharing in the United States. As it was ultimately passed, however, the new law only includes civil penalties, and it includes an exemption for individuals who download music "in good faith." BBC, 9 March 2004 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3545839.stm ICANN OKAYS WAIT LIST The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) has given preliminary approval to a new Wait Listing Service from VeriSign, which manages the .com and .net Internet domains. Under the new service, domain name registrars could place their customers' names on a wait list for expiring .com or .net addresses. If current owners of those addresses fail to renew them, the individual on the wait list could then become the new owner. The new service must still be approved by the U.S. Department of Commerce before it can be put in place, but some registrars have voiced strong criticism of the service. Several registrars have filed a lawsuit against ICANN and VeriSign to prevent the Wait Listing Service from taking effect, saying VeriSign is abusing its monopoly status as the organization with oversight of the two most popular Internet domains. CNET, 9 March 2004 http://news.com.com/2100-1038-5171809.html NEW INFORMATION SERVICES FOR FEDERAL GRANTS Research firm Input said it will begin offering information on $54 billion in annual federal grants, including $11 billion specifically available for higher education. As part of the Bush administration's E-Government Strategy, federal officials are developing a Web site, grants.gov, to act as a clearinghouse for information about all federal grant programs. Officials from Input said, however, that even when finished, the grant.gov site will leave certain gaps that the company will try to fill. Information Input expects to provide includes data concerning the connection of grant funding and overall federal program funding; a tracking tool to follow funds as they work through the various steps in a grant program; and detailed contact information for federal grant programs. Federal Computer Week, 8 March 2004 http://www.fcw.com/geb/articles/2004/0308/geb-input-03-08-04.asp ***************************************************** EDUPAGE INFORMATION To subscribe, unsubscribe, or change your settings, visit http://www.educause.edu/pub/edupage/ Or, you can subscribe or unsubscribe by sending e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To SUBSCRIBE, in the body of the message type: SUBSCRIBE Edupage YourFirstName YourLastName To UNSUBSCRIBE, in the body of the message type: SIGNOFF Edupage If you have subscription problems, send e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For past issues of Edupage or information about translations of Edupage into other languages, visit http://www.educause.edu/pub/edupage/ ***************************************************** OTHER EDUCAUSE PUBLICATIONS EDUCAUSE publishes periodicals, including "EQ" and "EDUCAUSE Review," books, and other materials dealing with the impacts and implications of information technology in higher education. 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