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TOP STORIES FOR FRIDAY, OCTOBER 01, 2004 Core Data Results Released RIAA Adds More Lawsuits to the Tally Students Defeat Diebold in Court Sun and UT Enter the Supercomputing Fray Head of U.S. Cybersecurity Quits PeopleSoft Board Ousts Conway CORE DATA RESULTS RELEASED EDUCAUSE has released a summary report of its core data survey, which aims to track trends and developments in the area of higher education IT. The "EDUCAUSE Core Data Service 2003 Summary Report" covers data collected in 2004 for fiscal year 2002-2003 and represents the responses of 832 colleges and universities. Among the report's notable findings are significant increases in student computer ownership; a rise in the percentage of institutions that track and manage bandwidth usage to address issues of P2P activity on campus networks; and greater prevalence of voice over Internet protocol phone services and wireless networks on campuses. The publicly available summary report is a companion to a Web-enabled database, which serves as the centerpiece of the organization's Core Data Service. Access to the database is limited to those institutions that complete the survey. Database tools offer the ability to create custom aggregations, generate data summaries for each of the survey's questions, and view raw data identifiable by institution. EDUCAUSE, 1 October 2004 http://www.educause.edu/apps/coredata/reports/2003/ RIAA ADDS MORE LAWSUITS TO THE TALLY The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) has filed another round of lawsuits, this time targeting 762 individuals suspected of illegally trading files on the Internet. The group's lawsuits over the summer months focused on users of commercial networks, but with the return of thousands of students to colleges and universities, the RIAA is once again targeting some college students in its lawsuits. The latest round of lawsuits includes 32 students, and the RIAA named 26 colleges and universities on whose networks the alleged copyright infringement is said to have taken place. The new round of suits also goes beyond the major P2P providers, such as Kazaa, and now includes services with far fewer users, such as eDonkey. According to the RIAA, more than 1,000 of those charged so far have settled with the group, at an average of $3,000 per settlement. Chronicle of Higher Education, 1 October 2004 (sub. req'd) http://chronicle.com/prm/daily/2004/10/2004100108n.htm STUDENTS DEFEAT DIEBOLD IN COURT A California district court has ruled in favor of two students and a nonprofit Internet service provider (ISP) in finding that Diebold Election Systems violated a section of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) that prohibits using false claims of copyright violation. Last fall, Diebold threatened the students, who had posted copies of leaked Diebold memos online, and the ISP, which hosted a Web page with a link to the memos, saying that the postings violated the company's copyright. The memos suggested that the company was aware of flaws in its electronic voting systems even when it sold those systems to several states, including California. Diebold backed down from its threats to take the students and the ISP to court but said at the time that the decision should not be interpreted as an admission that Diebold's copyright had not been violated. The judge in the case ruled, however, that Diebold "knowingly materially misrepresented" that its copyright had been violated, saying that "no reasonable copyright holder" would see the postings as violations of copyright. The judge ordered Diebold to pay attorney fees, court costs, and other damages. Wendy Seltzer of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which took up the case, said the goal was not to put Diebold out of business but to embolden those falsely accused of copyright violations and to set an important precedent--a goal that Seltzer believes was accomplished. Wired News, 30 September 2004 http://www.wired.com/news/evote/0,2645,65173,00.html SUN AND UT ENTER THE SUPERCOMPUTING FRAY The University of Texas at Austin (UT) this week will unveil a new supercomputer built on hardware and software from Sun Microsystems. UT's new supercomputer, called Maverick, uses the company's Sun Fire E25K server, along with 64 of Sun's UltraSparc 4 microprocessors running the Solaris operating system. According to Jay Boisseau, the computing center's director, Maverick can analyze enormous amounts of data generated by terascale computing systems. Maverick will be used at UT's Texas Advanced Computing Center to study weather events, including floods and earthquakes, as well as to aid in research supporting domestic security in areas including biohazards. Reuters, 30 September 2004 http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?storyID=6384686 HEAD OF U.S. CYBERSECURITY QUITS Amit Yoran, head of the National Cyber Security Division of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), has resigned his post, effective immediately, after just one year in the position. Although Yoran's notice of resignation did not say so, many observers believe his decision was based on what he perceived to be a lack of support for him and for his division. Yoran reportedly expressed to colleagues ongoing frustration with the job. Members of the technology industry and some lawmakers had tried in vain to have Yoran's position elevated to that of assistant secretary in the DHS, which would likely have resulted in broader authority and a larger budget for cybersecurity projects. It was not clear who would replace Yoran as head of U.S. cybersecurity, a role formerly held by Richard Clarke and, for a short time, by Howard Schmidt. Washington Post, 1 October 2004 http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A64915-2004Oct1.html PEOPLESOFT BOARD OUSTS CONWAY In a surprise move, the PeopleSoft Board of Directors has fired CEO Craig Conway, citing a loss of confidence in Conway to lead the company. According to board member A. George "Skip" Battle, there were no "smoking guns, no accounting irregularities" that led to Conway's dismissal, and the board reportedly remains committed to fighting Oracle's takeover bid. "The very simple plain reason is that over time the board has become increasingly concerned with Craig's leadership and essentially lost confidence," said Battle in a conference call. Dave Duffield, the founder and chairman of PeopleSoft, will take over as CEO. Separately, the U.S. Justice Department announced this week it will not pursue an appeal to a court ruling last month that allows Oracle's takeover bid to proceed. Wall Street Journal, 1 October 2004 (sub. req'd) http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB109663337576933730,00.html ***************************************************** 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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