Finally, for those of us who never got to experience Direct Connect, legal music downloading is finally coming to campus. Of course, it would be incredibly naive to think that illegal music downloading isn’t around, but hey, the University has done its darnedest to stop it. And now with Ruckus coming, illegal music downloading may be going the way of the Seahawks.

Well, of course not. Using the magic powers of Google, it’s pretty easy to see how Ruckus has fared at some other schools. And the results.let’s just say that it definitely doesn’t look good for “iPod ears.”

University of Minnesota: “But the service has a disadvantage: Janus [a technology that allows music to be transferred to MP3 players] doesn’t work with iPods, the industry-dominant portable players with a collective player-market share of 75 percent. This has the potential to largely hobble Ruckus at the University of Minnesota” (“U offers a deal on digital tunes,” St. Paul Pioneer Press, July 27, 2005).

American University: “In the latest trial, American University students were given a free trial of Ruckus, a movie and music downloading program. A full half of them didn’t even bother to try it, and a third of those surveyed said it should definitely not be offered in the coming academic year. Many complained about the lack of Mac support, and were concerned about instituting a mandatory music subscription fee as part of their tuition when clearly not everyone would be interested or able to use the service” (“Ruckus music subscription program fails to cause excitement at American University,” www.engadget.com, Aug. 9, 2005).

More American University: “You won’t find a recent hit like ‘The Island’ [you can't make stuff like that up], on these networks. Their films have usually sat for some time on video rental shelves. In a trial run of Ruckus at American University in Washington, students complained about the dated films. They also objected to restrictions on downloading music: they could not transfer songs to a CD or portable player like an iPod without paying more (Ruckus charges an additional $20 a semester to transfer music to a portable player)” (“Dorm Downloading Made Easy,” The New York Times, Nov. 6, 2005).

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI, which Ruckus seems very proud to be associated with, given its tech-nerd reputation): “Glitchy software, proprietary technology, and poor service sounds just like something RPI would adopt for their student body.” (From a thread entitled “Ruckus?” on the RPI LiveJournal group, Nov. 14, 2005).

More RPI LiveJournal: “My problem with it is that I can’t find the music I like.they don’t even have the Postal Service! I mean yeah there’s plenty that I do like on there, but I can use some other program, even though its illegal, and then I could even put it on my iPod! Wowzers!”

There were some decent reviews, and it’s true that Ruckus should divert RIAA’s attention to other schools without a legal downloading service. But the “Ruckus is lame” (from the same RPI LiveJournal thread) definitely appears to be a consensus. Who knows, maybe the kinks have been worked out. Ruckus could now have acts like the Postal Service (judging from the top 10 on Ruckus’ website, it certainly has Fall Out Boy). But if Ruckus can’t improve from its reviews at American or RPI, its name sure will seem fitting.

Daniel is a sophomore in Arts & Sciences and a Forum editor.

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