We already know about the RIAA’s list of shame for top piracy schools, but it looks like the MPAA is following right along with their own list, naming the top 25 schools where students are violating copyright laws. The RIAA is trying to earn quick money by telling the students they can pay $3,000 to settle, but whether or not the MPAA follows along and goes after the students is another question.
The top five schools and the number of students identified as violating copyrighted material are:
- Columbia University – 1,198
- University of Pennsylvania – 934
- Boston University – 891
- University of California at Los Angeles – 889
- Purdue University – 873
And as Ars Technica points out, there are 10 schools that have the honor of appearing on both the RIAA, and the MPAA’s list with Purdue having the highest ranking for both schools at #2 for the RIAA, and #5 with the MPAA. Nice work.
What’s interesting to me is that my alma mater, Iowa State is on that list (not surprising), ranked at number 15 with 586 students identified. This number is extremely surprising, only because I know many, many people who are probably guilty of this. With 25,000+ students attending, I thought for sure that number would be much higher than 2% of the student population.
So far the MPAA hasn’t been too aggressive going after piraters, so my guess is that they won’t make a public spectacle of this either by sending college students options to settle, or face a lawsuit like the RIAA has done.
Thanks for the tip Curtiss!
I can’t believe they are only catching 2% of ISU. That shows that they are not good at what they are doing. But then again, how good can they be if their business strategy involves suing teenagers? How about you just put those lawyer’s fees into getting some real music on the radios?
You’re probably one of the 586 that they accounted for?
*Alittle off topic*
I don’t try and justify the fact that i download every movie i see, i know its illegal.
But frankly, if i couldn’t get the movies for free than I’m pretty sure i wouldn’t be interested in renting them, or going to the theaters. In truth, the people that are downloading the movies probably would never actually see the movie in the first place if they had to pay for it.
Like i said, I’m not trying to justify it, but i do see it has a way of “giving to the poor”.
I definitely see where you’re coming from Daniel and I’m sure a lot of people would agree with you. It is just one of those “luxuries” that people like to have but don’t think it is worth purchasing.