Challenge: Napster Computer Ethics Project

1/01

Celia Einhorn and Betsy Frederick, NM Technet

Live or die, Napster's wildly popular music-swapping service holds important

lessons for the music industry, and for copyright issues at large. Napster is under duress from musicians and record companies for offering a free, downloadable application that lets users temporarily turn their computers into servers for the purpose of swapping MP3 files.

First, each of us will vote about whether or not it is okay to download music from Napster.

Then each of you will participate in a group of five. Each of you will role play a constituent of this Napster court case. The five constituents are: an industry executive, a young music lover, the CEO of Napster, the judge in the case, and a representative of some popular musicians. You will get a couple minutes to write down some thoughts as that person on your role sheet. Then you will meet as a group of the same constituents and share your great ideas.

Next you will get into a mixed group of five and spend some time trying to convince the others in the group your point of view on the case. Finally, you will vote again and see if you did a convincing job making people realize something they didn’t know about digital music.

Some questions to ponder: Do people over 30 vote differently on this topic? Did you see another point of view in a clearer way? Does greed enter into the equation? How does Napster make money? If you were a new musician, would Napster enhance your career?

Do you know what MP3 means and how it works? Check it out at

http://www.howstuffworks.com/mp3.htm

1. Hank Barry, Attorney turned Napster Interim Chief Executive Officer

• I have two New Year resolutions: cut down on caffeine while making Napster prosper as a real business.

• I am a graduate of Stanford Law School, where I won a national prize for a paper on copyright law.

• I want to build a bridge over to the record companies and to all the other constituencies (the musicians, the managers, the record companies, the music publishers, the people who use Napster on a regular basis) to see if we can find a way to all work together.

• We're going to focus on the potential revenue streams that are appropriate and relate to the needs of the users and the needs of all the other constituencies.

• I do not believe that Napster is irrelevant because of Gnutella, FreeNet, etc.

I just don't think that's true. We've got more than just an application. We've got an index; we've got a great set of users who believe in the community, who believe in the concept of file sharing.

2. Cliff Bernstein, half of the team that runs Q Prime Management, which represents the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Metallica.

• Napster is allowing illegal and unrestricted copying and distribution of

of our client’s songs.

• "Artists should get paid for their work. It's a time-honored notion, but one that seems to be getting lost amid the Napster buzz.

• We send them to Napster and they see all their work being given away for free, and they're stunned and horrified." The fact is, many artists still think of MP3 as a

promotional tool, and assume that if files are being swapped at no cost online, that's only because artists OK'd their release.

• It has been taboo for artists to speak out concerning the business side of their music. The fear has been that the buying public, as well as other artists, would

perceive this concern as greed, and that the artists' sole purpose for creating was the money. This perception has silenced many artists concerning MP3 and Napster. The silence must end.

• What disturbs me the most is that artists' rights are never discussed. Most of the

Napster press coverage has framed the debate as "an argument between Internet groups and record companies. Artists just seem to be a ping-pong ball whacked back and forth.

3. Industry executive for record labels

• I helped the National Music Publishers Association (NMPA) file a petition with the U.S. Copyright Office asking regulators to step in and establish royalty rates for downloading and streaming music online.

• We say, “It's Not the Technology, It's the Theft.”

• The Napster service encourages copyright violation, since Napster allows users to share music files for free.

• We, the entertainment industry, have evidence demonstrating ongoing harm to

CD sales, and harm to the emerging legitimate market for downloading music.

• We also claim that Napster "leads to a devaluing of music, as Napster teaches a

generation of music consumers that artists do not deserve to be paid

for their work, and their creative efforts are free for the taking."

4. 

16 year old music lover, New Mexican, Juanita

· In my room, I have CD’s, disks, 1000 MP3 files on my computer.

· I have downloaded copies of songs from other people’s computer with Napster, the music swapping software.

· I also have CD-R’s, recordable compact disks. I have dozens to burn with songs that are keepers.

· I plan to sell some to my friends.

· I am losing sleep as I work on my new biz!

5. Federal judge Marilyn Hall Patel, chief judge of the U.S. District Court in Northern

California

• I denied Napster's claim that it was a "mere conduit" of

information, and found that Napstar hadn't taken adequate steps to keep

"repeat offenders" from using the site. I judged that Napster's

"mere conduit" claim was an attempt to exempt themselves from being held

responsible for any copyrighted material they might transmit.

• Even though Napster cancels the account of a user found to be passing pirated

material, I noted that it doesn't collect the IP numbers of people it kicks off the site, though doing so would make it easier to keep them off

the system permanently.

• I will be quoted in saying “Napster has created a monster!”

• I have ordered the company to shut down its online song trading service with a preliminary injunction to shut down Napster as part of its lawsuit against the popular Internet song-sharing service. This order was placed on hold.

• “It is pure piracy. The service is closing down big networks like universities.”