Computer Hiccups Hassle PSH
By Paula Marinak
Capital Times Staff Writer
Some PSH students and faculty had
difficulty traveling the "Information
Superhighway" when classes began this
semester. The staff in the Information and -
Instructional Technology Department has
successfully removed the roadblocks
related specifically to Internet use, but
other problems remain. Internet woes
have plagued the entire Penn State system
for the past several weeks. But as of late
September, these problems have been cor
rected.
"The primary cause of Internet slow
ness at Penn State Harrisburg and Penn
State Schuykill lies with our Internet
Service Provider, and the Pittsburgh
Super-computing Center," said HT
Director Robert Brinkley. These problems
University Monitors Internet Usage
By Jessica Schmidt
For the Capital Times
All over the country, people are swap
ping and downloading free music onto
their computers thanks to the Napster rev
olution. Many of these people are college
students, getting free music through their
respective school's Internet service.
Twenty universities have been asked
to unplug access to Napster by Los
Angeles lawyer, Howard King. Penn State
was one of the universities that received
King's letter at the beginning of the school
year. Although King's letter served as a
reminder rather than a threat to the school,
a response regarding Penn State's
plans about its Napster access was
requested by Sept. 20.
have caused Web pages that are not part of
the Penn State domain to appear on a
computer monitor very slowly, or not at
all.
Though disgruntled users have blamed
the Internet for most of the hassles,
Brinkley pointed to two other culprits
that are exclusive to PSH: problems with
the Local Area Network, and difficulties
with dial-up access to the campus system
(the intranet).
LANs are groups of interconnected
computers that share resources. For exam
ple, a computer lab would make up one
LAN, while a classroom that had comput
ers or other technology in it would be part
of a separate LAN.
"The LAN issues have a slowdown
effect for students, faculty and staff,
Continued on Page 2
In his letter, King noted that many
local colleges and universities in
Pennsylvania, such as Shippensburg
University and Lebanon Valley College,
have banned Napster altogether. He added
that the University of Southern
California, Yale University and Indiana
University banned student use of Napster
after King's law firm sued. Penn State,
King alleged, is too lenient in its policy,
allowing students to download their
music from Napster. Napster is used to
swap copies of MP-3 formatted songs
through the Internet. Because many col
lege students have access to Napster
through their school, they are receiving
CD-quality music through their comput
ers or stereo devices.
In April, King's firm sued Napster on
behalf of Dr. Dre and Metallica. The
judge ruled Napster shut down in August,
but the company appealed this ruling and
Napster has been able to remain online.
Dr. Dre and Metallica argued that Napster
allows people to steal copyrighted music.
This, in turn, hurts the music industry.
Lawyers for the record industry point out
that allowing Napster to thrive makes
people more inclined to download music
illegally, rather than buying the CD.
After reviewing King's letter, Penn
State lawyers said they had no plans for
changes at this time. Steve McCarthy, a
university spokesman, said that Penn
Students
Rant on
Reality TV
page 2
Itimc 41. No. 4 Monday., October 9, 2000
State complies with the Digital
Millennium Copyright Act, which
requires the university to block access
only if it receives a specific complaint
about an individual student. Before they
are granted Internet access from the
school, Penn State students are required
to sign a written policy'regarding copy
right violations. This written policy
specifically mentions Napster.
In response to the Sept. 20th deadline,
Penn State decided to compromise rather
than ban Napster altogether. The universi
ty plans to review patterns of how people
use the computer network. If Penn State
finds anyone consistently moving big
files around, that person must provide an
explanation of what they are doing. The
university has already notified 80 users
who were allegedly using the network
heavily. These students were given seven
days to provide the school an explanation
of their computer use. If it is proven that
they have been illegally copying copy
righted material, they may lose access to
the network.
McCarthy said that because there are
some legitimate uses for Napster which
are legal, the university has not banned it
completely. McCarthy added that "The
policy isn't any different. Doing anything
illegal on Penn Sate computers is always
prohibited."
International
Study in
Nepal
page 4
Dark Days
Demand
Attention
page 6
Grace
Under Fire
By Steven E. Moses
Capital Times Staff Writer
On Sept. 23, the Student Government
Association and Student Activities Office
co-sponsored "Grace Under Fire," a lead
ership workshop about conflict resolu
tion. The workshop was presented by the
Institute of Cultural Partnerships.
The ICP was founded in 1995 as a
non-profit organization based in
Harrisburg. ICP's purpose is to provide a
wide range of programs and services to
communities and institutions on prevent
ing misunderstanding, prejudice and cul
tural differences.
Everyone has been involved in a con
flict whether with a boyfriend or girl
friend, spouse, friend, boss or professor.
The bottom line is that conflict exists in
our lives.
In the workshop, ICP presented strate
gies for how to achieve a win/win result
to conflicts. The main strategies taught in
the workshop were:
(1) Be concerned with the perspective
of others when dealing with conflicts.
(2) Understand how you deal with
conflict and relate it to your style of com
munication.
Continued on Page 2
The
Snapshot
Plot
Thickens
page 7