To the vice provost:

I'm disappointed you chose to cooperate with the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). Their tactics are nothing short of thuggery. In a nation where one is supposed to be innocent until proven guilty, by cooperating with the RIAA, you presume the accuser to be correct. Its methods for identifying copyright violators en masse are dubious. Students who have allowed others to use their computers are particularly at risk of false accusation. In a university environment servers are everywhere, as is charitable computer use.

I fear that the only effect this will have is to freeze up the open and imaginative atmosphere of the UW. Students will become paranoid about allowing others to use their computers or setting up servers. Experimental computer use, one of the hallmarks of a high-tech future, is in doubt. None of this matters to the RIAA, a government-endorsed monopoly whose sole purpose is to protect intellectual property (which, it should be noted, increasingly consists of dead musicians owned by mega corporations).

The letter you sent out to the campus community will have an effect. A few very poor students will think they have no other option but to borrow money to settle this bogus suit.

But what if students have not done anything and are only accused of it by this Kafka-esque RIAA? To think that the University has signed on with this is a shame.

John Muir Kumph

School of Oceanography