LIGHTSPEED LENDS A HAND
3/3/00 - Lightspeed Systems, a supplier of high-performance network traffic management tools, today announced pre-configured bandwidth management solutions for college campuses dealing with a surge in bandwidth usage. The largest culprit behind the surge is MP3 music files, which are often obtained using Napster, an increasingly popular online file-sharing program. For campuses that need to strictly limit or prioritize network usage by application or person. This is exactly the course of action that SAUC is suggesting the universities take to solve their increasing bandwidth problem. Along with the fact that they need to educate and inform students on how to responsibly utilize their network connections, bandwidth caps are proving to be an effective way to solve this issue. For more information on Lightspeed Systems click here.
Petition count: 8,763.
University list: 198.
WVU STUDENTS FIGHT BACK
3/3/00 - Some students at West Virginia University are using alternative protesting measures to compound the universities cold and harsh Napster ban. Although SAUC does not agree or condone these measures taken by the West Virginia students, it just goes to show you what the lack of communication and education from the various universities leads to. SAUC's goal is to establish lines of communication to further resolve this bandwidth issue as a whole. Working together we can provide the university students the proper education they need to use programs like Napster responsibly and legally. The following is testimony from the respective West Virginia University students. I'm writing to let you know about a project we're working on, to complement, not replace napster. Its aimed at places (Universities and Corporations) where napster has been banned. Here at West Virginia University, Napster was abruptly banned one weekend, no reason was given, the plug was just pulled. After looking at router stats down at our Office of Information Technology, I can say that Napster was NOT bringing down performance, as we have obscene amounts of bandwidth here. (Multi-T3 and OC links) It is our suspicion that the RIAA may have had a heavy hand in this action. People have resorted to using SOCKS proxies found in various places on the internet, but the bandwidth is not anywhere where it used to be; 10kbyte per second compared to our usual 3.3Megabyte per sec over the 100BaseT in the dorms, I'd even gladly take the 500k/sec that some of the older 10BaseT links here were getting. For these reasons, we're working on a Sharing Mechanism that is both distributed and immune from blocking. It relies on use of Random Port Numbers that cannot be blocked (without killing tons of other protocols) by your normal Cisco, Bay, or anything Lucent can throw at it. Even a light touch of encryption (8-bit high speed) to confuse any packet inspecting gateways. Also, we have given thought to intelligent bandwidth management, where after the initial burst rate, the program will inspect the max rate, and throttle back so that more than just a few people can saturate a whole dorm's ethernet. Petition count: 8,526.