The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA)’s onslaught continues.  It has fired its fourth salvo. 

In its monthly batch of pre-litigation settlement messages, the RIAA has this time demanded that its notices be passed along to 402 song-swapping suspects at 13 universities. 

These universities include Northern Illinois University, the University of Southern California, the University of South Florida, and the University of Tennessee, all of which received 50 letters each.  Other institutions involved include Brandeis, Duke, Iowa State, Syracuse, Tufts, the University of Georgia, the University of Iowa, the University of Texas at Austin, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The RIAA, in a bid to arrest illegal downloading on college campuses, sent pre-litigation settlement letters to the colleges on February 28.  This move was part of the trade group’s announcement of increased enforcement early in February.  The RIAA’s notices ask the students to go to a website or call a particular telephone hotline through which they can settle their copyright-infringement claims with the RIAA out of court.  The notices give the recipients 20 days to contact the trade group, failing which it will subpoena their schools to obtain their IP addresses and file lawsuits against them.

Meanwhile, headaches for the accused students are increasing--not merely because of approaching finals but also because of the RIAA’s notices.  As many as 50 University of Tennessee (UT) students are on the RIAA’s hit list and charged with allegedly downloading/sharing music while using the campus computer network.

The university, under the threat of subpoenas, has passed the buck to students, who will now face the music by either paying up or fighting it out in court.  Officials have stated that the university’s decision to pass on the letters is justified as it is tantamount to “alerting the students.”  Therefore, they feel they are giving each student an opportunity to make an “informed decision.”

The university will not provide the group with any personal student information but has advised students to “let their parents know or seek the advice of counsel.”  It will, however, refrain from advising the students directly.

In another move, the RIAA has filed 18 “John Doe” lawsuits against Vanderbilt University network users.  These 18 users earlier failed to respond to pre-litigation settlement letters. 

In the wake of these “waves” of notices from the RIAA, the university, along with many others is “almost ready to announce an agreement with a company to provide free music and video to students beginning with the fall semester.”  This was disclosed by Michael Schoenfeld, Vanderbilt’s vice chancellor for public affairs.  However, the “third wave” did not name any Tennessee colleges, said RIAA spokeswoman Jenni Engebretsen.

Charles R. Nesson, professor of law at Harvard Law School and founder and faculty co-director of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society, and Wendy M. Seltzer, fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society, in their article state, “Intellectual property can be efficient when its boundaries are relatively self-evident.” 

They add, “[M]ere understanding is no reason for a university to voluntarily assist the RIAA with its threatening and abusive tactics.”  They urge the university to assist students “both by explaining the law and by resisting the subpoenas that the RIAA serves” upon them.  They also advise lobbying “Congress for a roll back of the draconian copyright law that the copyright industry has forced” U.S. citizens to follow and urge the deployment of “clinical legal student training programs to defend these targeted students.”

This issue has been challenged time and again.  In 2004, Verizon dragged the controversy all the way to the Supreme Court when it objected to the “RIAA’s demands to release names of alleged pirates.”  The Supreme Court, upholding a Court of Appeals decision, declined to hear the case.  It stated that only a subpoena can force a company to release such information.