Downloading Music and Movies at UGA

Legal Consequences

The most visible problem associated with P2P programs is that the files they share tend to be illegal. The RIAA and MPAA both actively watch these programs for sharing of copyrighted materials. The University of Georgia cooperates with copyright holders who wish to protect their property. We routinely deal with DMCA violations and may be required to send students to the Student Judiciary. Potential punishment for DMCA violations can be as harsh as 5 years in prison, and $150,000 per protected file. While violations at UGA have never been this severe, the possibility still remains. Music United can provide further information on the legality of digital music for those who are interested.

Computer Security Consequences

Another major concern with most P2P programs is that they are often poorly written projects created by individuals, and not registered organizations. In order for them to be free, they are often bundled with spyware or have poorly written code that may interfere with your ability to use your computer. The files shared on these services can easily contain viruses or other malicious code as well. Many of these compromised files work perfectly fine, leaving the user unaware that their system may be tracking personal information. P2P programs are usually the main reason a student's computer grinds to a halt, or can no longer get online. They take tremendous network resources and can cause modems to stop working, and typically suffer from very high congestion and low download rates. Overall, the risks included with installing a P2P program are just not worth it.

Risk-free Solutions

Fortunately, there are legitimate services online that offer students a way to still download the media they want without all the risk, and usually without the cost you might expect. Apple's Itunes is very popular with students and provides a free program to manage your media library. They also allow you to download songs ($1 each), TV shows ($2), Audiobooks ($3), Movies ($5), and podcasts (free) which can then be burned to CD or loaded on your MP3 player. If you know what you want, you can create a custom mix CD for much cheaper than a store bought CD, all while owning a legal license to that media.

Rhapsody offers a similar service where you can pay per song, or you can pay a monthly subscription ($9 for music on your PC, $15 for songs that can be played on your non-Ipod MP3 player) in which case you can search and play unlimited songs, but they cannot be burned to CD and stop working once you are no longer a Rhapsody customer. They also offer a recommendation service that suggests new artists based on previous interests, and tons of radio stations, including on-demand stations you can create.

Another service we suggest, Pandora, takes a different approach from Itunes pay per download strategy. Pandora is completely free and offers many of the services Rhapsody provides, most notably On-demand radio stations. You can create up to 100 custom radio stations based on genre, specific artists, or other key terms associated with music. Pandora then plays music that closely matches your request, often suggesting other artists. You to give the song a "thumbs up" (which uses the terms associated with that music to fine tune future suggestions) or a "thumbs down" (which bans the song and skips to the next). It's basically a large collection of personal radio stations that react to your likes and dislikes.

Many television networks also make their shows available for free, online, for a short time after their air-date. You can often find these on the individual network websites, or on sites like Hulu.