News
Many universities across the nation have recently blocked on-campus use of Napster, Macster, iMesh and other MP3 file indexing and retrieval programs in response to large volumes of usage, which slows down their networks -- and Dartmouth is actively monitoring the situation here.
The University of Texas at Austin, Boston University, the University of Chicago, Northwestern University, Oregon State University and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign are among approximately 70 schools preventing network access to Napster and other similar programs.
Dartmouth Computing Services is currently monitoring the volume of Napster use but has no immediate plans for a ban on its use as of yet, though the possibility looms.
"It's kind of contrary to our attitude toward network use," Director of Computing Larry Levine said of the potential ban, though he made it clear that he has not ruled anything out yet.
"What we've seen is disturbing," he said of the increasing volume of use by Dartmouth students.
Napster and similar programs allow users to quickly search large numbers of servers for MP3s, which are often in violation of copyright laws, and download them onto their PCs.
The problem, Levine said, is that the users also become servers themselves and create large volumes of network traffic both downloading and retrieving.