Recording company tries shaking down universities

Shakedown, breakdown, takedown...Everybody wants into the crowded line...Breakdown, takedown...You're busted, Warner Music Group!

A while back, Warner - one of the 4 remaining major record labels - hired a bloke named Jim Griffin who supports something he calls a "blanket license." This was basically a tax on all Internet users that would be redistributed to record companies to cover what they claim are losses caused by file sharing. (There's nothing like the government being a tax collector for the entertainment industry, is there?)

Now Warner is trying to extort money from universities. They've pitched this tax to universities by telling them that if they "voluntarily" pay, they'll stop filing frivolous suits over file sharing.

There's a word for what Warner Music Group is doing. It's not just a shakedown. It's racketeering. This extortion attempt is clearly actionable under RICO. Not a question about it.

Shockingly, several major universities appear ready to agree to this tax. If you think tuition is high now, think what it's going to be when students are forced to pay for their school to pay protection money to the recording industry!

If this fee is imposed, then pretty soon, any American who wants a college education is going to be forced to fund the recording industry - an industry that won't even give musicians their fair share! All because the industry refuses to adapt to the digital age (which everyone else did in 1995).

(Source: http://techdirt.com/articles/20081204/1534153023.shtml)