p2p in college

[AC7]

hey all! i'll be going to college next year and i wasn't too sure of the situation with colleges and p2p nowadays. even if they try to block the use of p2p programs (through whatever means), there are ways around it. However, is there still a big crackdown on p2p in college? I haven't heard too much news about it lately, but that doesn't mean anything one way or another. do you think it would be safe to continue downloading in college (this includes everything: music, games, movies, software, etc.) or is it just too risky to do? Note: by safe, i mean in relation to downloading at home because i realize that "safe" is relative to the preventive methods you take. I'm even considering dl'ing the stuff on my comp at home, burning it, and bringing it to college during breaks lol. Obviously this would be safer, but the inconvenience is apparent. Basically I just need to know what the deal is with college and p2p today. Have they become more lax or have ppl just been forced to stop? thanks for all the help.

[thewhitrbbit]

hey it depends on the college. Some are really strict, some are more lax.

[Miniver]

The best way to find out is to ask someone who goes to the school.

[alliercollins]

I'd look for your college's network section. Ours is called ResNet and on it's section of the website it tells us it's P2P guidlines and stuff. It basically says we don't care what you do, use the line how you want, if you get caught it's your problem.

[thewhitrbbit]

our college provides a guide for disabling sharing.

[flantanella]

i know that most are taking the steps to block p2p. when i was on the network, I couldnt use anything except ares.

besides the speed of downloading in p2p on the networks sucks, it may be t3 but you are sharing that t3 with least 10,000 other students, and your uploads are faster then your downloads.

If you going to use it, its best to disable your sharing because you will be caught no matter how well you think you can get away with it. THe RIAA and the MPAA are targeting schools more

[Miniver]

your uploads are faster then your downloads.
That's a good thing...it helps the community

If you going to use it, its best to disable your sharing because you will be caught no matter how well you think you can get away with it. THe RIAA and the MPAA are targeting schools more
You should always give more than you take. Otherwise file sharing wouldn't exist. As long as you are reasonable with your bandwidth usage, there's no reason for them to single you out among the thousands sharing on the campus. As for the RIAA, they seem to only go after those sharing huge amounts of files. Just don't share 1000's of songs. As far as I know the MPAA has yet to file a single lawsuit against filesharers. They've been going after the sources. Currently all you have to worry about from the MPAA is nasty DMCA violation notices.

[crackerjacker]

bittorent might be good for college users but lets wait till malicious intent or miniver says otherwise.

[ccc1005]

Ya what college are you going to?

At Penn State we have a 1.5 GB/week limit, as we as stupid ass firewalls this year that will block all incoming connections (so much for BT)

[AC7]

well i just checked and it appears i'm screwed, heh. It says p2p is not allowed and continues to quote the ResNet policy, "You are not to run any services (i.e., ftp services, listservers, publish MP3s using napster, publish files via generic file services, etc.) via this residence hall connection except http servers." Boo on NYU! so many ppl love it, but it was just the only place i got accepted so i'm transferring next year anyway (yes, unrelated topic lol).

I will try to ask some people who go there though and see what they have to say. I can't imagine a life w/o filesharing :(

[alliercollins]

Ya what college are you going to?

At Penn State we have a 1.5 GB/week limit, as we as stupid ass firewalls this year that will block all incoming connections (so much for BT)

Didn't they take your network money and make you all get napster accounts?

[flantanella]

yea i know file sharing wouldnt exist if everyone disabled their sharing, but most colleges are either requiring for all students to disable their sharing or have their internet cut off, and no the RIAA is not going after only people that have many files. A friend got caught cause he had one song file in his share folder. SO basically my opinion is that if they want to find you they will.

And no having more upload speed is not good cause then it slows down your computer.

[FrozenShadow23]

Anyone ever heard of Port Tunneling? making your p2p traffic look like normal web traffic is a good thing. It's not an end all means or a perfect solution, but it works usually

[Herr.Wenz]

AC7, if you want a websight that offers free music then go to www.espew.com
though i suggest you hurry up and get all you can off that websight before the RIAA shuts it down

i see flants point thats why I use bittorent so no programs can hog my system of its resources because i wouldnt like some other dude to take more then i am getting and slow my computer down

[ccc1005]

Anyone ever heard of Port Tunneling? making your p2p traffic look like normal web traffic is a good thing. It's not an end all means or a perfect solution, but it works usually
Well that would be nice, but PSU doesnt even allow HTTP servers...


Didn't they take your network money and make you all get napster accounts?
Yup, and they they use some more money to install the bullshit firewalls... Thats just Penn State for ya

[alliercollins]

Yup, and they they use some more money to install the bullshit firewalls... Thats just Penn State for ya

I heard some people fought against it. Whatever happened with that?

[ccc1005]

Fought against the firewalls?

And ya if people tried it didnt go anywhere, look at these emails i got from ResCom

---------------------------------------------------
You will not be able to host Warcraft games anymore. That is acting as a server and you are not permitted to use servers in the residence halls.

Please read the revised University Policy AD-20 referenced on our web page.

The security office and the University have just changed and released these changes. The firewalls will protect students from viruses Trojans and it will also enforce the university policies of no servers in the residence halls.

You will not be able to remote control your computer from outside the RH's either.

I personally do not believe hosting a Warcraft game server is a legitimate service to run on the residence hall LAN. You can join one off campus somewhere if you wish but hosting it is not something I agree with in the residence halls.

Glad to hear you are running a firewall on your computer as well. This will help protect your computer.
-------------------------------------------

For your machine in the residence hall to allow anyone, including yourself, to control it from in or out of the residence halls, labs or anywhere else, your machine needs to act as a server. The new AD-20 policy changes do not allow RH machines to act as servers. Therefore you will not be able to control your computer from a lab, outside campus, on campus or within the RH's. The firewall you are attached to is most likely not turned on yet.

When it is you will not be able to use your machine as a server. This includes remote controlling your computer from outside the residence halls.

You will be able to move files to your web space or U: drive area. This will give you access to files that you need to get when around campus at other locations. Please use that access instead of remote controlling your computer.

It may be convenient but it is not necessary. We must follow AD-20. Servers in the RH have used a lot of bandwidth in the past. Acting as servers machines in the RH also have been spreading worms, viruses and allows compromise. To fix these kinds of problems it also causes some inconvenience in other areas.

My suggestion is to change your working habits on your computer to include files you need on the U: drive so you can share them. It is also convenient, you just need to get used to relying on that instead of VNC or remote controlling your computer.



It may be convenient but it is not necessary. We must follow AD-20. Servers in the RH have used a lot of bandwidth in the past. Acting as servers machines in the RH also have been spreading worms, viruses and allows compromise. To fix these kinds of problems it also causes some inconvenience in other areas.
Ya ok so educate people on how to protect their computers, we are in college afterall...

You can join one off campus somewhere if you wish but hosting it is not something I agree with in the residence halls.So what is the difference, when you host it uses like 2 KB/sec, would you rather I upload at 200 KB/s?


So ya in the end I am paying the same price for a half-assed connection, and of course Napster as well..

[alliercollins]

You typed all of that and I meant fought against the napster thing, lol.. :)

[ccc1005]

HAHA, ok well I just copied and pasted anyway so no big deal ;)

And ya people tried to fight it, but nothing ever happened with it

[Lord_of_the_Dense]

I just received the following email. It may or may not have come from a member of this community, but I figured I would throw it out here for discussion.

In a move similar to two years ago, Penn State has
disabled internet access to an unspecified number of
students claiming that they are in violation of the
Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

Students have been informed to await further action:
"The issue will be referred to the Office of Judicial
Affairs (OJA) for further action. Staff in OJA/Student
Affairs will contact you to arrange an appointment and
will meet with you to determine whether you violated
the University Code of Conduct. If so, a sanction will
be assigned for the specific violation."

I thought that this information might be of some
interest to the zeropaid community. Feel free to post
it at your discretion. All that i ask is that you do
not include my email address in the post. Thanks.

I haven't read anything showing Penn State taking action yet. Is this the calm before the storm?

[mike07]

Majority of colleges disable and p2p sites, they have been pretty strict about the whole situation. I need some student loans (http://www.nextstudent.com/) to help pay for this semester. Anyone have any suggestions?

[washounce]

i know many colleges have bandwidth limits, so make sure to check if your college has a DC++ network setup to get around the bandwidth limit and so that you can enjoy really fast downloads. (these college networks are only open to people within that college. if you move off-campus, you can no longer access them)

also, if your college disable sites, you can always use proxies to get around it.