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Harvard prof says Internet poses legal conundrums
Friday, April 21, 2000 By Bob Starzynski, Post-Gazette Staff Writer
Yale University's decision to ban access to a popular online music-swapping service adds to a growing legal tangle being posed by the Web: the freedom for consumers to share versus the protection of intellectual property, Internet regulation expert Jonathan Zittrain told University of Pittsburgh law school students and faculty yesterday.
Wednesday's decision by Yale comes in response to a lawsuit, filed a week ago in Los Angeles by rock group Metallica, against Yale, the University of Southern California, Indiana University, and the Web service Napster.
Speaking to the Pitt group, Zittrain cautioned that Napster banning by universities opens a can of worms. "When Yale caved to Metallica, it was like a library caving to an author who doesn't want a book to be lent out," he said. While libraries are protected by law in lending books to the public, the Internet is not protected in a similar way when consumers lend music or other intellectual property, he added.
Zittrain is the executive director of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School.
Metallica's suit contends that Napster's service allows for "gross violations of copyright laws and the protection of intellectual property," as university students and other consumers are able to trade and copy music for free. By blocking access to Napster, Yale was dropped from the suit.
Yale joins a growing number of other colleges, including West Virginia University, Brown University and San Diego State, which earlier banned access to the Napster Web site because the music downloads by students were tying up as much as 80 percent or more of university network capacity each night.
Zittrain's lecture explored other Internet legal issues as well, such as the First Amendment right to send unwanted, unsolicited e-mail, or spam, and the taxation of goods purchased electronically across state lines.
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