Brooklyn Law Won’t Proactively Rat Out Its Students
Yesterday we reported on this announcement by Brooklyn Law School:
This semester we have received several warnings from our Internet service provider that copyrighted movies and TV shows are being downloaded illegally via our wireless network. The Information Technology office is now ascertaining who is doing this. Once we have names of the individuals involved, we intend to give them to the copyright holders for enforcement purposes.
This stance proved unpopular with BLS students, as well as ATL readers. In a poll, about 75 percent of readers answered “yes” when asked, “Should Brooklyn Law School do more to protect its students from being sued for illegal downloading?”
It seems that Brooklyn Law School has had a change of heart. Check out the email that went out this afternoon, plus selected reader comments, after the jump.
Brooklyn has softened its stance on illegal downloading. It will notify downloaders and tell them to desist from their illegal activity, consistent with the DMCA procedures. Here’s the email:
From: Phil Allred
Sent: Thursday, October 29, 2009 12:08 PM
To: All Users
Subject: [BLS] Update on illegal downloads e-mail noticeYesterday, I sent out an e-mail regarding the recent spate of abuse notices we have received from our Internet service provider. Under our contract, users are prohibited from downloading copyrighted works. If we knowingly allow such activity to continue without taking action, we risk losing access to the Internet.
When we can ascertain the people who are responsible for alleged illegal downloads, we will notify them to cease such activity. We will comply with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Outside of the legal process, we are not obligated to turn over the names of the alleged infringers to copyright holders and will not do so.
And here are some selected comments from the thread. We have focused on the comments addressing the illegal downloading issue, ignoring the “BLS sucks” / “No it doesn’t” debate. (And yes, for the record, Brooklyn is an ABA-accredited law school.)
10 - Go ahead and snitch. It would be hypocritical of BLS to preach an honor code and the tenets of professional responsibility if they turned a blind eye to illegal downloading.
11 - 66 thousand dollars [in tuition and costs]. Per year. For three years. BLS students, you’d better pray for some Tito-style inflation.
15 - 10, It would also be hypocritical for a BLS representative to utter the word “honor” while ruining the lives of hundreds of twenty-somethings per year.
27 - but if you had a reasonable expectation that BLS would not divulge your name without a subpoena when you downloaded the copyrighted pornographic material, and then BLS did not meet these expectations, is there some, i don’t know, restatement section that might give rise to a cause of action?
30 - From the research I’ve done on this topic, I believe that the media ownership companies (Viacom, Universal, etc) are going to begin to sue schools where illegal downloading is rampant under some sort of vicarious/ contributory theory (that doesn’t really exist in the law). Although it probably won’t stand up in court, you’re looking at Universal with its billions of dollars vs. Schlub State University who can barely afford to keep toilet paper in the bathrooms. I think the fear of being buried in legal costs is what prompted Brooklyn Law to be proactive rather than reactive.
31 - Actually, the DMCA provides a safe harbor provision for ISPs. Few if any undergrad institutions actively search for illegal material on the network, but I don’t think there’s anything wrong with a law school doing it. If students want their warez that bad, they can download them at home. Just remember to disable your torrent program when you come to school.
32 - Seriously?!? This is even a debate? The students broke the law. If the school knows who the students are, they ought to tell the proper authorities. Is it really that hard to understand that a law school would take steps to ENFORCE THE LAW? This is common sense folks. Just because you don’t like the law does not make it optional.
34 - This is pretty shitty. They are not just informing, they are investigating and informing. And no warning to students? I’m sure that the student(s) who are doing the downloading (and who are paying buttloads of $$ to BLS) would have appreciated a warning when BLS first got the notices or otherwise in time to stop.
39 - 31… I think BLS, or any school, would have a stone cold defense under the DMCA, but that wouldn’t stop the big media owners from suing. Also, if I recall, the safe harbor is removed once the ISP is notified of the illegal activity. At my law school, they simply revoked the wireless privileges of the student. I went to undergrad during the first heyday of Napster so this was before the media owners figured out who to sue and how.
40 - The notion that BLS’s half-assed IT department could carry this off is laughable.
41 - 39 - While you were an undergrad, I was in charge of network security policy and incident response for a Research-1 university. So long as the universities uphold their responsibilities under the safe harbor (e.g., take down infringing content), the content owners cannot come after them. End of story. [Ed. note: This comment appears to represent the correct statement of the law. See BLS’s email below.]
51 - Why, in this day and age, would any law school give up their students to face financial penalties. My god, this reduces the amount of potential pools of cash that the schools can steal from their kids.
58 - This is pretty harsh. Way back when I was in law school in the NY area (a whole three years ago) I received notice from the school’s IT that I was accused of downloading Sopranos episodes. I didn’t do it, but I guess the wireless router that I had kept open was being used. I would have been incensed if I had been ratted out over a misunderstanding.
72 - Why should students be allowed to use a law school’s internet to illegally download anything? Why is this even a question? I think quite a few law schools monitor this activity and most I have heard will contact you to inform you that you need to cut it out. It might seem mean to go ahead and turn someone in, but whatever - you’re breaking the law and you’re a law student. Why should the school allow you to use their internet to do it?
76 - Over the 2+ years I have been a student there, the BLS student body has been REPEATEDLY warned about illegal downloading. The administration has been threatening this particular action all year so I’m not really sure why everyone is acting so damn surprised.
77 - I remember my first day at BLS in 2003- Dean Wexler , almost immediately after saying “welcome,” told us that BLS would rat out any students caught downloading music. Very warm welcome.
Earlier: Is Brooklyn Law School Informing On Its Own Students?
(50) Comments
Comments
I'm confused. Is this shift in policy supposed to help them somehow regain ABA accreditation?
first; ttt rules
Mystal is the WALRUS.
they'll take are internets!!!
Joan King lies, graduate cries.
I am looking to get a Partner Emeritus-related character for myself, but I'm too busy working at my high-paying law job to think one up.
I am therefore willing to pay one unemployed lawyer $500 to think up a Partner Emertius-related character in the vein of JaKe Emeritus and to provide at least 10 humorous posts to start off my posting career. This could look very good on your resume as your first law-related job.
E-mail seekingPErelatedshtik@gmail.com for details.
Joan King lies, graduate cries.
BLS IS A TERRIBLE TERRIBLE SCHOOL. IT SHOULD BE RANKED TTTT. PACE IS ABETTER LAW SCHOOL HAHAHAHHA
Around Students stirs the supermarket. Students treads the living muck outside the disturbed name. Students lies across Brooklyn. This fifty headache offends Students beside a tale. The wondering dominant fashions Students with the painted textbook. Brooklyn gains Students next to the tuned surplus. Brooklyn reckons. Brooklyn pulps the divine garage over the drug. Does the kettle consent near Brooklyn? Brooklyn buttons Students. The mass posed the bulk anthology.
BLS is like the bratty little spoiled kid in elementary school that likes to tattle on people and then goes ahead and pulls the same crap. Come back to us and preach ethics after you submit non-distorted statistics to US News.
BLS isn't a school. It's a zoo full of people who've "always wanted to be lawyers" but aren't actually qualified enough to get into a real law school. In medicine, people of such a caliber would be shut out.
9 - Sorry about your stroke. But I do enjoy your posts more now.
Is that wrong?
Partner Emeritus went to BLS, so it must be a great school.
11,
in medicine, people of such caliber would be DOs.
14, I stand corrected. Maybe the ABA should create an equivalent called the FLD or Fake Law Degree for such people.
http://www.brooklaw.edu/news/homepage_news/seltzer_wsjblog.php
BLS needs all the tuition dollars it can get. Ratting out their students doesn't seem like a great way to keep the gravy train rollin'.
And I don't know how BLS can talk about "honor" with a straight face when it jukes its employment stats to lure students into wasting hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Upon further reflection, I do not oppose the free downloading of Tap music by law students. We need any fans we can get at this point. Just please buy tickets for our live shows.
BLS needs to hire a better P.R. department. Showing up on the cover of the WSJ for juicing career stats, pissing off the editors of US News, now this.
Comment removed by moderator.
The internet is a series of tubes...
20: Elie FTW
Kash:
Can you please upload video post of you pleasuring yourself beneath you burqa?
REALLY. Still NOTHING about Steptoe's massacre, huh?
reprinting many, many comments is not a post.
Lat, I know you are gay and hump walruses.
26,
Not that there's anything wrong with that.
The Plebe's Prayer:
Bless us all this day with the courage to take that which is not ours, and to do it with the blessing of law school faculty and staff.
Give us the spirit and the strength to sap the profits from large, bloated companies who oppress us with their vain ambitions of money and greed.
And bless us with the good cheer, for once in a freaking while, to laugh at those fools who think they can make money off of our vanity.
Amen.
I knew BLS wouldn't rat out it's students. I don't understand all the anger towards it anyway. The average salary is 150k, and 97% of the students are employed 9 months after graduation. We have way better stroke with employers then Cardoza.
What what?
.
In the Walrus butt!
.
oooooKAY?
Maybe somebody pointed out that the proposed action is in violation of the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA).
30,
Not that there's anything wrong with that.
31 - Please explain how it violates FERPA. I am familiar with the law, and have seen this argument advanced before, although not convincingly. You need a definition of "educational records" broad enough to include IP information on a computer network; to the best of my knowledge, none exists. But I am honestly curious if you have seen something to the contrary.
The reason that BLS is still ABA accredited is that the ABA's revokation action against it is ongoing. But it is a given that BLS will lose it. At least current students will be granfathered into sitting for the bar or their choice, and BLS is still acredited by the NY State Bar so their future students will be able to sit for the New York Bar exam.
31 & 33: I don't know about FERPA, but the BLs administration and student body routinely offend FUPA.
Real Story: How schools (Including but not limited to BLS and Cardozo) stack sections with students on contingent scholarships.
36 - True dat.
Saw it happen in my class year.
Please elaborate on the stacking of sections with students on contingent scholarships...what's the scam?
Blah blah blah troll troll troll.
I heard that all law schools in New York except for Pace are no longer accredited. Is this true?
40, untrue. The only unaccredited NYC law school is BLS.
38 - a contingent scholarship is one that the student can lose (or have reduced) if he does not maintain a certain gpa or class rank. By placing all the contingent scholarship students into one section, the school is virtually guaranteeing that some of those students will lose their scholarships.
I heard Columbia is no longer accredited.
41 -- I am pretty sure that law schools no longer are accredited. The ABA has decided that if you write a big check and wait three years, you too can have a legal degree. See, silly? The status of accreditation no longer matters.
You are all still losers.
seekerreason001@gmail.com
I don't understand the idiots who keep bringing the argument that students are paying $66,000 in tuition. WTF!!! If you're paying a million dollars in tuition, does this give you the right to break the law!!!! What does paying tuition have to do with this??? Does it say on your bill:
49,000 Tuition
11,000 Housing
6,000 Protection against illegal download
Seriously people, grow up, you are lawyers damn it.
As for BLS, rat on these criminals, that's the only way to teach them and all others. They study copyright and once they're out of class they infringe on these rights? WTF!?
46 -- who the hell actually studies copyright law? What a useless class.
38/42 -- Sections are usually stacked in such a way that it is mathematically impossible (considering the number of students, the percentile required to maintain the scholarship, and the required class curve) for many students to keep their scholarships. As a result you can effectively offer more scholarships to incoming 1Ls than you will actually have to potentially pay; it capping potential payout. Beyond the scholarship issue, the scam also makes it significantly harder to get good grades in the stacked sections, assuming the likely scenario that in general the scholarship students are smarter and harder working than the non-scholarship students. I too heard that that BLS and Cardozo both do this. Its a total scam.
why were half the comments for this story deleted?
46 - Are you kidding me? Have you heard of innocent until proven guilty? The evidence, if you can even call it that, collected by RIAA/MPAA and their subsidiaries has been proven time and again to be useless in pinpointing a specific individual and in confirming that any infringing activity even took place. Most of their evidence is just a collection of IP addresses gleaned from a tracker. In simple English that means you could very easily be accused of copyright infringement for clicking a link to a blank page. That aside, the accusing party is responsible for providing (credible) evidence of guilt. It is not the accused party's responsibility to provide evidence, even though a sufficient amount exists, that the accusation is false. In other words, if the RIAA/MPAA want to sue someone, they ought to do so, not abuse the terms of service of a University's ISP contract with blanket accusations to make the University seem like the accusing party. The University is indeed trying to protect itself, but perhaps they should fix the problem at the source and tell the RIAA/MPAA to do their dirty work themselves.