Ruckus, the ad-supported music service that UT partnered with, closed on Friday, giving no warning to UT or its students.
When viewing the Ruckus Web site, all that is listed now is a notice saying, “Unfortunately the Ruckus service will no longer be provided. Thanks,” with various images of musical devices and accessories.
Ashley Barker, UT information technology manager, said the university has not decided whether to pursue a replacement for Ruckus or not.
“The last two companies to win the bid have gone out of business mid-semester with no notice,” Barker said. “The last time we went to bid, only one company (Ruckus) responded. I am not sure at this point if there is even anyone left to partner with in the educational realm that would add any value for students.”
Plus students can sign up themselves for services that work with their computer or device, she said.
Jeff Wilcox, Student Government Association president, said the university works to provide legal options for students, but Ruckus use had fallen.
“As student leaders, we will continue to work with administrators to find a suitable replacement, but at this time there are not many options out there to pursue,” Wilcox said.
Kyle Roschli, sophomore in public relations, started using Ruckus in the fall of 2007 and estimated he used the service daily. He expects students to turn to familiar illegal means to get music with the demise of Ruckus.
Barker said she thought UT music piracy would not go up because of the loss of Ruckus. She said the service did not meet many students’ needs.
“I believe users really want the ability to have the music on their personal devices like an iPod or MP3 player and therefore were already using other alternatives to obtain the music for such devices,” Barker said.
Ruckus did not allow music to be burned to personal devices or CDs because of the digital rights management protection. It also was not compatible with Macintosh computers, a brand that has become more popular with the youth market in recent years.
Ultimately Barker said the service functioned but did not allow students complete control of their music.
“My assessment of Ruckus is that it worked well for what it was intended for,” Barker said. “Ruckus had a pretty large, varied and up-to-date music library, and students could listen to a lot of music. However, I think users want the ability to listen to the music on more than just their computer.”
Ruckus was provided free of charge to both students and the university. If the university looked to an alternative, Barker said the university would probably not pursue a service with an annual subscription fee because students could sign up for those themselves if they wished.
Even with the closing of Ruckus, RIAA spokesperson Cara Duckworth said students still had a plethora of legal options to choose from for music downloading and consumption.
“Subscription sites like Rhapsody and Napster provide affordable services that give fans access to an unlimited number of songs,” Duckworth said. “Online radio services like Pandora let fans stream all the music they want for free. Fans can get high-quality songs for less than $1 at download sites like Amazon.com and iTunes. The options are unprecedented in number and only continue to grow.”
Duckworth said students should not use the closure of Ruckus as an excuse to go back to downloading music illegally and universities should not use it as an excuse to decrease efforts on notifying students of legal options for music downloading.
“We’ve always said schools need to be as proactive as possible in providing legal alternatives,” she said.
Many students heard of the loss of Ruckus either through friends, through visiting the Ruckus Web site in an attempt to download music or through using the Ruckus program to try to renew song licenses. Barker said the university put a notice on the OIT Web site and the UT UTunes site.
While Roschli said he thought it was not the university’s responsibility to provide an alternative, he felt the university could have promoted the loss of Ruckus more.
“I’ve never been to the UTunes Web site, and I’ve never been to the OIT Web site, and I assume a good portion of individuals do not go to those Web sites either,” Roschli said. “Maybe if they put it on the UTK Web site, it would be seen.”