Napster Promotes Internet Piracy

To the editors:

In response to the recent Metallica suit (Editorial, April 26), I found it heartening to see a band finally standing up against Napster. It's disappointing that many students still try to pervert "freedom of speech" into a freedom of piracy.

There are many simple ways for Napster to cut down on piracy, but so far it has done nothing. Here's one example: Metallica has made it very clear that none of their work is authorized for free distribution. Napster's best feature, their search engine, quickly shows a number of users with Metallica MP3's. Why hasn't Napster banned them? Maybe it's because once this starts, Napster would end up with very few (if any) users left.

You can never eliminate piracy, just as you can never eliminate theft. But like speeding, just because it has become mainstream doesn't mean it should be legal. And it certainly doesn't make it right.

Kai-Hua Yu '03

April 26, 2000