Almost a week after the Recording Industry Association of America released a list of the top 25 universities whose students received warnings for illegally downloading music this past year, the RIAA sent 400 "pre-litigation settlements" to 13 universities on the list, informing schools at least one of their students or faculty will soon face a copyright infringement lawsuit.
The letters, sent Feb. 28, are intended to allow students to settle with the RIAA at a "discounted rate" to avoid lengthy and costly court proceedings, according to a release dated the same day.
No Boston University students or faculty received any letters, but the RIAA said it plans to send out hundreds of more letters each month, according to the release.
Ohio University received the most letters, with 50, and North Carolina State University, Syracuse University and the University of Massachusetts at Amherst - which was ranked sixth on the list released last week - all received 37 letters.
UMass-Amherst spokesman Ed Blaguszewski said he questions the rankings released last week because the RIAA has not disclosed its methods of monitoring illegal downloading.
"Certainly, those numbers are the numbers the RIAA has produced, but whether it's a scientific sampling that you can make an objective ranking about is really hard to tell," he said.
Universities have been quick to cooperate with the RIAA because the actual lawsuits target the schools, because students are downloading music from their servers. In many cases, universities have investigated illegal downloading on their campuses before actually receiving any notices from the RIAA.
"We actually do have a fair amount of [policies to deter students] in place, and we think in many ways, it's working," he added.
UMass-Amherst students who are caught illegally downloading music are stripped of network connections and must sign an acknowledgement of copyright violation before the university's Office of Information Technology allows them back on the school's server. The punishment enforced by the university is separate from any legal action the RIAA or copyright holders may take against the students.
"There's the student discipline track, and there's the legal track, and they can be complimentary, but they are distinct," Blaguszewski said. "We really have no control over what happens in the court."
RIAA spokeswoman Jenni Engebretsen said although the RIAA generally sends warning letters to students who illegally download lesser amounts of music - usually saving lawsuits for "major instances of theft" - this practice is not definite.
"At the end of the day, anyone engaged in music theft on a college campus opens themselves up as subject to a lawsuit," she said.
Jack Flanagan, an attorney for the Boston law firm Torti Flanagan, which recently handled the case of a 15-year-old who was sued by a record company for illegally downloading music, said copyright infringement lawsuits can range from $250 for "innocent infringement" to $250,000 for "willful" violations.
Attorney Emmanuel Torti said record companies and associations like the RIAA focus their efforts on larger universities because it reaches out to a bigger base more inclined to download illegally.
"If they sue a 15-year-old kid from Iowa, they're probably going to come off as a bunch of bullies," Torti said.
"The Internet is very deceptive [because] everything is so readily accessible, people think it's public domain," Torti added. "It's not. It's just easier to steal."
Though RIAA representatives maintain the association has been proactive in involving university administrators and students in the notification process, BU Information Technology Office Consulting Services Director Jim Stone said the RIAA did not contact the school about the top 25 list or about the new settlement offers.
"Other than the notices of copyright infringement, there is very little communication between the RIAA and us," he said.
The university is looking into more effective alternatives to its current policy, which currently involves forwarding letters it receives from the RIAA to offending students and counseling students to stop downloading music illegally, he said.
"Students are not paying attention," he said. "They will wake up when they get hit in the wallet."
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