The Proceedings of the Information Systems Education Conference 2001: §07c Home Papers/Indices prev (§07b) Next (§08a)

Paper (refereed) Current Issues and Trends in Information Systems Programs

Recommended Citation: Siegfried, R M. What's Wrong with Napster? A Study of Student Attitudes on Downloading Music and Pirating Software. In The Proceedings of the Information Systems Education Conference 2001, v 18 (Cincinnati): §07c.

What's Wrong with Napster? A Study of Student Attitudes on Downloading Music and Pirating Software

Refereed

Robert M. Siegfried    [a1] [a2]
Department of Mathematics and Computer Science
Adelphi University    [u1] [u2]
Garden City, New York, USA    [c1] [c2]

Software piracy is older than the PC and has been the subject of several studies, which have found it to be a widespread phenomenon in general, and among university students in particular. The author replicates an earlier study done by Cohen and Cornwell a decade ago, adding questions about downloading music from the Internet. The survey includes responses from 224 students in entry-level courses at two schools, a nondenominational suburban university and a Catholic urban college with similar student profiles. The study found that students generally felt that copying commercial software and downloading music from the Internet was acceptable and that there was no significant correlation between student attitudes and their school's religious affiliation or lack thereof. Finally, the reasons for these attitudes are discussed as well as what colleges can do to correct the situation.

Keywords: software piracy, music downloading, computer ethics, student attitudes

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