When Ruckus made its debut late last year at Princeton University, the legal-downloading service got a big public-relations push: Mike Bebel, the company’s chief executive, even penned a column for the student newspaper (The Chronicle, December 15, 2006).
But all the good press in the world doesn’t seem to have been enough to assuage Princeton’s Mac users, who are upset that Ruckus isn’t compatible with their machines. Some disenfranchised students say that, until a service like Ruckus caters to the entire Princeton student body, the university should stay out of the legal-downloading game, according to The Daily Princetonian.
There’s not much Ruckus can do to accommodate Mac users: The digital-rights management issues that prevent the company from doing so are, by now, famously intractable.
But the company’s switch to a new business model may help keep it on campuses even in the face of student disenchantment. Ruckus now makes its money through advertising revenue, not by charging students or colleges for its service. Because no one’s paying for the software, the editors of the Princetonian reason, there’s no compelling reason to get rid of it: “A majority of the student body,” the paper argues, “can enjoy the service at no cost to the students who cannot use it.” —Brock Read
