Insitutions Offering Music Download Services are the Minority

Back in Summer I 2008, the Housing Services Committee took a look at Ruckus and the possibility of bringing a legal music download service to campus. The result of our work was the well-researched Sense of the General Council of the Resident Student Association Regarding the Ruckus Music Download Service. During our research, we were told by the people at Ruckus that a large number of schools already offered services to students and more were going to be doing so. We were also told that Congress was going to mandate that Universities sign up for a service. While this is something that companies like Ruckus and groups like the Recording Industry Association of America are lobbying for, it really was not true.

Last week, a report was issued by EDUCAUSE, a non-profit group with a mission of advancing higher education by promoting the intelligent use of information technology, that provided hard numbers based off a survey of 994 colleges and universities. We saw that in reality, the number of institutions that have bought into a music download service is only 15 percent. The number of institutions considering the option is 17 percent. While these numbers are increases over the prior year, it shows that colleges and universities offering music download services to students is a minority.

While a music download service could be of use to students, it does have a cost, as as the General Council stated, no music download service will be acceptable to residents until it meets several conditions, including:

• Supporting all modern Windows and Mac operating systems
• Allowing music to be transferred to all types of portable music players
• Allowing music to be burned to compact disc.