USD to offer Ruckus digital media entertainment service
With Ruckus, USD students can legally download and share music, create playlists, send personal media recommendations to friends and neighbors, browse classmates’ profiles and media libraries, and meet new friends. Students can also build their personal music libraries from Ruckus’ collection of more than three million high-fidelity, virus-free songs. Ruckus eliminates copyright infringement through its licensing agreements with all of the major international record labels, as well as thousands of independent labels and artists. Faculty and staff at The U can also take advantage of the full-featured music service for a low monthly fee.
“USD is offering the service to students as a legal alternative to illegal file sharing and music downloading,” said Kirsten Compary, acting dean of students.
According to Compary, the Recording Industry Association of America has targeted violators of copyright laws prohibiting the illegal activity of downloading music. She explained that campus networks and university students are being singled out.
“Working in conjunction with USD’s Information Technology Services Department, we felt that a Ruckus partnership would be a win-win for our campus community and for the university,” Compary added.
Ruckus has already proven successful at nearly 200 colleges and universities across the country, including Brown University, Duke University, Indiana University, North Carolina State, Princeton University, University of California-Berkeley, Penn State University and the University of Pennsylvania. USD is the first university in South Dakota to contract with Ruckus. USD was selected to participate based on the school’s robust networking infrastructure and a demonstrable commitment to supporting legal digital media services through on-campus marketing. USD and Ruckus will collaborate to reduce campus network infrastructure costs and enhance the user experience by improving network performance and distributing additional video content on campus.
“We are very excited to make our music service available to students at USD, to help them discover and share new music,” said Chris Utah, director of campus marketing at Ruckus. “We are happy to now provide a full featured digital entertainment service – and a safe and legal alternative to file-sharing – at no cost to students or to the school.”
USD students can begin using the service immediately by going to the Ruckus Web site, clicking on “Join Ruckus” and entering their .edu e-mail address. Registration takes only a few minutes. For more information about Ruckus Network, Inc., please visit www.Ruckus.com.