How much bandwidth will shared itunes be using?

[anne1]

There seems to be an increase in the use of shared itunes across our network. It used to be just dance and music etc who could make an educational case but now it seems to be spreading for background music in general. Do you think this will be slowing down the network? They assure me copyright is not a problem... music is not stored on network drives and the aup makes it their responsibility but I'm concerned about the network.

[Domino]

erm, just cause they say its not a copyright issue doesn't make it so, you'll also need a PRS licence...but that's another matter.

 

iTunes will use all the bandwidth it can find to get the best quality streamed audio it can.

[t_h]

Who assured you copyright is not a problem? If these are "off the shelf" CDs that have been ripped or digital downloads then it is a problem. I'm 90% sure Apple specify in their iTunes AUP that sharing is only permitted on local home networks.

[GrumbleDook]

As Domino mentioned, PRS licence required unless it is released under specific CC agreements. Ownership of the original CD does not give the right to broadcast it publicly, even for education.

 

Same applies to Spotify, Last.fm, Blip ... etc ... their T&Cs point out that public broadcast must follow the law of the land. More info from CEFM: Licensing - PRS for Music: Schools and please point them to item 6 in the FAQ. If they then turn round and start talking about how certain types of music can aid numeracy work, etc ... then brilliant, you are in a switched on school and they obviously have the details of the tracks they are going to play in their lesson plans along with how it will help students meet the learning objectives.

 

If you have a teacher that is doing this then set *them* the task of getting a definitive answer about it all so that the school can adopt it as a policy.

 

Seriously though ... if they are looking for that sort of thing then your LA / RBC is probably signed up for http://Audio.lgfl.org.uk and this might be suitable for finding music ...

[Domino]

Actually spotify says the below

 

Spotify grants you a limited, non-exclusive, revocable license to make personal non-commercial use of the Spotify Software Application (including a right to download said application) and the Spotify Service and to receive by stream the media content made available through the Spotify Service in your home country. You do not have a right to transfer or sublicense your rights under this Agreemen

 

Personal use makes me think Schools may not be covered

[john]

ooh Interesting that will go down well when I throw that to staff about why I won't put iTunes back on all the PCs again, I removed it as A I put VLC out and it plays anything but also as iTunes does bandwidth suck. But clearly there is now reason C it means your not PRS playing your music that is unlicensed to use in College muhahaha

[Mr.Ben]

The kids were using a website called grooveshark until I almost had a fit last week when I got round to checking the logs.

 

44GB of info downloaded from the site in 2 days!

 

I don't think it's causing our internal network to slow (there has been no noticable difference), but our paltry 2Mb Internet connection was suffering!

[anne1]

Thanks for all the comments, the cefm site saying background music is not curricular is interesting! We do have the ppl licence etc. I'm hoping to pass the copyright responsibility to someone else after giving the benefits of my research (thanks people).

But that still leaves the bandwidth issue? Does anyone have anything other than a gut feeling about how much could be being used if half a dozen staff are giving their classes the benefit of their musical taste?