While EMI may be eliminating DRM, the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) has appears to be moving in the opposite direction, announcing its list of its top 25 schools for pirating movies….

The Top 25 Schools For Pirating Movies (per MPAA)

1. Columbia University
2. University of Pennsylvania
3. Boston University
4. University of California at Los Angeles
5. Purdue University
6. Vanderbilt University
7. Duke University
8. Rochester Institute of Technology
9. University of Massachusetts
10. University of Michigan
11. University of California at Santa Cruz
12. University of Southern California
13. University of Nebraska at Lincoln
14. North Carolina State University
15. Iowa State University
16. University of Chicago
17. University of Rochester
18. Ohio University
19. University of Tennessee
20. Michigan State University
21. Virginia Polytechnic Institute
22. Drexel University
23. University of South Florida
24. Stanford University -
25. University of California at Berkeley

Purdue University wins the distinction of achieving the highest overall ranking on the MPAA list (#2) & the RIAA’s list of pirating schools (#5).

via Ars Technica

The MPAA has filed a lawsuit in federal court in New York, Paramount Pictures v. Load ‘N Go Video, suing a small business for loading DVDs onto personal media players (e.g., iPod Video) on behalf of customers.

Load ‘N Go sells both DVDs and iPods and will load purchased DVDs onto iPods for customers who purchase both. The company then sends the iPod and the original DVDs to the customer. The movie studios’ suit claims that this is illegal, because ripping a DVD (i.e., decrypting it and making a copy) is illegal under the DMCA. The suit also claims that this constitutes copyright infringement.

The Load ‘N’ Go site is currently disabled, noting “We Will Be Back Shortly!”

According to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the MPAA believes it is just as illegal for you to rip videos to iPod at home.

“This is copyright gone too far,” says EFF’s Fred von Lohmann. “If you buy a DVD, you should be able to make a personal copy of it for your iPod, just like you should be able to make a copy of a CD for your car, without having to ask permission or pay a second time.”

“That’s one of the things fair use is for,” adds Lohmann. “This lawsuit is just the latest example of the entertainment industry taking aim not at “pirates,” but at the legitimate fair use rights of music and movie fans.”