Nevertheless, the growing popularity of P2P’s misuse – namely, for illegal activities like sharing digitally copyrighted works – raises strong concerns. Most alarming is that the rapidly increasing use of P2P by college students is contributing to an emerging software piracy problem on thousands of campuses nationwide. In fact, according to a recent survey, a majority of academics say downloading software is a real problem and nearly two-thirds of students say they would potentially download pirated software.
The survey further shows that software piracy behaviors and perceptions vary widely among students, professors and administrators. Disparities in awareness and understanding about illegal downloading and file-swapping, if ignored, have the potential to become a gateway for increased software piracy on campuses.
Students need to be educated about the consequences of commercial software piracy. Copying software without authorization is stealing someone else’s property – their intellectual property. That is breaking the law. Downloading software programs illegally from the Internet or making unauthorized copies for a friend is no different than ‘lifting’ it from a store.
The goal of this Web site is to raise awareness, educate users, and help higher education institutions prevent piracy on their campuses by addressing these critical issues through knowledge of the law, emphasizing ethics and how to avoid misuse of the Internet.
