Syracuse University may soon offer an optional legal file sharing service to students in an effort to reduce illegal file sharing, according to university officials.

In September, Vice-Chancellor and Provost Deborah A. Freund formed a committee comprised of both students and faculty members to determine if SU should facilitate access to online file sharing services.

The committee completed their report in January, recommending the university offer a legal, low-cost online multimedia service by negotiating a preferred vendor agreement with a file sharing service, said Paul Gandel, chief information officer of Computing and Media Services and chairman of the committee.

‘I started the committee because other universities had gone to preferred vendors and I wanted to find out if it was a good idea for us,’ Freund said in an e-mail.

Chancellor Nancy Cantor and Freund want to go forward with the committee’s recommendation, Gandel said.

‘We looked at the points that were made that we felt were great ideas for the training organization here in Computing and Media Services and we’re running with those,’ said Deborah Nosky, manager of Information Technology Communications and Professional Development for CMS.

The committee did not decide on a specific file sharing service to negotiate a preferred vendor agreement with, nor did Gandel set a timetable to make that decision. The committee has not decided whether the service will be available to both on and off-campus students.

‘We’ll be talking to vendors to see what kinds of services they’d be willing to offer to Syracuse University,’ Gandel said. ‘We’re just starting to work on exploring that – certainly students will be involved in that process.’

One file sharing company that will be considered is Cdigix, according to Tony Bartocci, a senior in the College of Information Studies, a member of the file sharing committee and president of the Residence Hall Association.

‘Ideally we want to be able to give the students on campus a chance to experience (legal file sharing) before we make a decision,’ Bartocci said. ‘We want to have it in some form by the end of the semester.’

Since the committee does not yet know what service will be used, the size of the music library is currently unknown.

‘The vendor will have to sign agreements with the music companies, and most often there won’t be a full library,’ said Jorge Gonzalez, co-founder of zeropaid.com, a San Diego-based file sharing portal. ‘These companies will not be able to outperform what the world and what peer-to-peer will be able to offer.’

Gonzalez said he is also skeptical of the quality of commercial file sharing services.

‘They’re going to push music on them,’ Gonzalez said. ‘It’s just corporate America infiltrating the college campus music scene.’

The committee made its recommendation after examining the different file sharing options available. The committee’s decision was unanimous, Bartocci said.

‘Most university committees – and this was no exception – essentially operated by consensus,’ Gandel said.

The committee decided to make the file sharing service optional, according to Gandel, because they wanted to leave students the choice of subscribing to another file sharing service without being required to pay for the university’s preferred vendor.

‘Some universities have done it as a fee where everyone has to pay the fee – so basically you’re going to subscribe to that service whether you want to or not,’ Gandel said.

The file sharing committee also recommended the university educate students of copyright laws and the digital security risks of illegally downloading copyrighted material.

‘Sometimes when you go to sites of questionable reputation or content you could download more than what you bargained for,’ Gandel said. ‘Sometimes you can get programs that can run in the background and turn your computer into a file sharing service without you even knowing.’

Gandel plans to work with Student Affairs to provide information about the risks of illegal file sharing to students.

The committee also recommended that the university reconsider its enforcement regarding illegal file sharing by students.

‘The consequences go beyond the university – there’s a personal and legal risk,’ Gandel said. ‘The university can’t protect students if they choose to take that risk.’

CMS hopes that a low-cost file sharing service and increased education will help reduce the frequency of illegal file sharing.

‘We feel that students will respond to reasonably priced, campus-based alternatives to other downloading practices,’ Gandel said. ‘The more we make those services available, the more students will take advantage of such services.’

Published on February 8, 2005 at 12:00 pm