IU rejects alumnus' offer

IU alumnus, and Internet audio pioneer Mark Cuban was ready to write an open-ended check that would bring Napster back to IU computers.\nBut the University turned him down, Cuban said.\n"New technologies, new means of commerce, new uses of digital media are all learning experiences for the students, the University and for how commerce is done over the net," said Cuban, the founder of broadcast.com and current owner of the NBA's Dallas Mavericks. "Rather than learning from the experience, and coming to a conclusion that allowed Napster to continue, like so many other schools, IU wimped out from fear of legal issues."\nIU's "wimping out" on its dealings with Napster as well as the firing of basketball coach Bob Knight forced Cuban, a self-made billionaire, to cease giving money to his alma mater, he said.\nCuban offered to purchase extra bandwidth that would allow Napster users to unimcumber the rest of the IU Internet traffic, he said. An offer that he said the University rejected.\nVice President for Public Affairs and Government Relations Christopher Simpson said he had two general conversations with Cuban that included Napster, but no formal offer was made.\n"We talked with Mark in general," Simpson said. "And in the course of that conversation, he said he'd be glad to help pay for the bandwidth. But it was a general conversation. I certainly didn't think it was a formal offer. \n"It's a real leap to make, to say that there was a formal offer to pay for it."\nCuban said that the conversations were more than informal.\n"I told him multiple times ... that I would buy bandwidth so that they wouldn't have to shut off Napster," Cuban said. "They told me the problem with Napster was that it used too much bandwidth. I said that it was a cost of being a leading university, but if it was a problem, I would pay for it."\nCuban said he offered to buy one year's worth of service on a DS3 line priced at $540,000 -- or $45,000 per month.\n"Bandwidth is the electrical current for new ideas on the net," Cuban said. "If Napster, or any (applications) used bandwidth, increasing the amount of bandwidth available was as important as having enough room for books in a library.\n"That a school that wanted to be a leader in the digital economy and wanted students to be in a position to try new ideas, like e-commerce, digital media, or whatever the future would hold, had to have bandwidth to enable that.\n"That is what I said, almost verbatim."\nCuban's dismay with IU arose after the University installed filters to prevent use of the MP3 Web site on its computers. \nIn the April 20 release on the Napster decision, Simpson wrote, "We believe Indiana University has no liability by allowing access to sites such as Napster. We now believe, however, that our faculty, staff and students could incur legal exposure if they use this technology. Until those unresolved legal issues are clarified, it seems prudent to block the site."\nSince then, students have been unable to download music from Napster.\nNapster representatives, who are under litigation from a group of recording artists, have said students are in no danger of prosecution by sharing music through the site.\n"Students who engage in person-to-person file sharing are not copyright infringers," Napster CEO Hank Barry said. "And we hope that, while the litigation is pending, schools would not be intimidated by Metallica and limit the freedom of students to participate in the Napster community."\nMany big-name universities have agreed with Barry by recently rejecting a proposal to shut the service down from lawyers representing the groups suing Napster.\nMIT, Stanford, Princeton, the University of North Carolina, Georgia Tech and others all dismissed the proposal this week.\nMark Bruhn, Information Technology Policy Officer for the UITS said 61 percent of IU's bandwidth was used up by Napster at its peak, in the second week of February.\n"Everything else would be competing for what was left," Bruhn said. "There\'s only 39 percent left for everything else. The system tries to service everything and what happens is the response time slows for everything."\nBruhn said he took no part in the decision surrounding Cuban's offer. The decision he said, came from the vice presidential level and above.\nHe said that to service the entire network costs $25,000 per month. Napster cost approximately $16,000 a month to fund. He added that the exact amount involves more complex calculations.\n"To spend 16,000-plus dollars a month to support a program like Napster," Bruhn said. "It didn't seem like the responsible thing to do."\nEnter Cuban, and his checkbook.\nCuban who made his billions from Internet audio, takes issue with the critics of Napster who say it takes money from the artists.\n"Napster doesn't steal a nickel," Cuban said. "In fact, it probably makes artists more money. First of all, rare is the artist that even earns royalties from their music. Most revenue from CDs is used to cover the production and marketing costs of the CD and doesn\'t go to the artists. Second ... most people when they find new songs they like or listen to songs they heard on the radio, they end up buying the CD.\n"You only have to look at CD sales to see that they are up this year. In fact, some of the biggest selling CDs in history of the CD have come this year."\nCuban also said for those who decide to copy to CD or tape, the record industry has placed a tax on recordable media that is part of the price of the rewriteable CD or tape. So the industry gets paid that way as well, he said.\n"So the problem isn't one of sales, it's one of control," he said.\nAnd a lack of control with the handling of Knight is the other reason the billionaire will no longer be sending his checks to Bloomington.\n"They took someone who gave 100 percent," Cuban said, "no compromises and they left him out to burn in the media.\n"Coach Knight is exactly as advertised. He is volatile, intense, incredibly knowledgeable and caring for his players."\nCuban said the IU administration created a situation in which they knew Knight would not succeed. With all of the media attention, Cuban said the University wanted a problem to be created that would violate the "zero-tolerance" agreement.\n"It was a joke of an effort," Cuban said. "An embarrassment to the school, and the best way to describe it was that the school wimped out."\nSimpson responded to Cuban's remarks about the administration and withdrawal of support by expressing disappointment.\n"I am certainly dismayed to hear (Cuban's comments)," Simpson said.\nCuban recalled meeting Knight at an administration function.\n"We met at the President's house for a lunch," Cuban said. "It was fancy. All set up for them to try to get money from me. All of the President's men where in suits and ties. Coach comes in his sweater. I was in jeans.\n"Knight got a kick out of it when I told him that since I was here to write the checks, I was going to be comfortable."\nSince Knight's firing, Cuban has been publicly adamant that Knight could have a job with the Mavericks.\nCuban will still calls himself a Hoosier, and roots for the cream and crimson, but said he won't have anything to do with the administration.\n"I still love the school, the campus and the students," Cuban said. "It's just the administration I have a problem with"