At 10:43 AM 4/26/00 -0500, william.wells wrote:
>I'll plead ignorance. What is "napster"?
This is littered with a little bit of personal opinion, but here goes:
It's a fantastic little program used to share MP3 files. It works by
contacting a server and transmitting a list of the MP3s you are offering
(legally of course) for distribution. Others who use the software will
simultaneously do the same. You (and others) can then search the server
for an artist, song title, etc, and then retrieve the desired
file(s). Clones like gnutella (and others) have appeared on the Net now.
The big studios whine and complain of lost CD revenues from use of this
"ultra-evil" software, and have launched lawsuits, etc to claim damages. I
personally don't see this software as any more "illegal" than a standard
FTP server: both offer files for download. Napster just makes it easier
to search and locate files by centralizing a database of available
files. Both are very useful, and both can be misused - it all depends on
which set of eyes you choose to use to look at it. From another point of
view, Archie offered searchable lists of files long before Napster ever
appeared on the market, and noone complained.
The big problem with Napster, is clogging of bandwidth due to the ease with
which MP3s can be downloaded. Imagine a university campus connected to the
Net via a T1, with 5000 resident students, half of which are downloading
MP3s all day. It won't take much more than a few downloads to kill that
T1. Regarding the poor studios and their legal "issues", I apply the same
logic to Napster offerings as I do to FTP servers - check what is being
offered (this might involve an inspection of the PC, which can be
stipulated in the network connectivity agreement), and if it's not legal
for distribution, hunt it (the user and the questionable files) down and
kill it. As someone else mentioned here, it's all a matter of "due
diligence". OTOH, if your local security policy dictates that network
access will be cut off and their firstborn sacrificed to the gods if
Napster usage is caught and logged, then you have a solid recourse should
the problem arise, and that is where I'd choose to start.
Cheers!
Jon
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Jon Earle (613) 612-0946 (Cell)
HUB Computer Consulting Inc. (613) 830-1499 (Office)
http://www.hubcc.ca 1-888-353-7272 (Within Canada/US)
"God does not subtract from one's alloted time on Earth,
those hours spent flying." --Unknown
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