Free Ruckus subscription music service now open to all students

February 12, 2007 —

Ruckus, the college-based music subscription service, has recently decided to make their service available to all students with a .edu e-mail address.

Previously, the service was only available to students at universities that had contracts with Ruckus. The new offer will not apply to faculty or staff members, however. As was the case before, they will still be charged a modest $5.99 per month for access to the service.

While this does not fundamentally change the way SVSU students will interact with the service, it could affect how labels view digital music distribution: while the most popular digital music service, iTunes, sells music by the song and by the album, Ruckus charges colleges a flat subscription fee. If the company's decision to expand their offer to all students with a .edu e-mail address turns out to be successful, the major record labels may take notice.

Ruckus spokesperson Mairin Brzica, the company's representative at SVSU, said that the licenses Ruckus has obtained from the "Big Four" music labels - Universal, Sony BMG, EMI and Warner - allows the company to distribute music in the way they do.

"We have a relationship with all the major labels. The four big ones, and hundreds of independent ones," she said. "They're fully supportive of our business model. We've worked with them to get us permission."

Brzica reinforced the fact that faculty and staff will still be required to pay the monthly fee for access.

"Faculty members and staff can access our service, but there is a charge," she added.

Currently, 1,813 students are registered for the Ruckus service at SVSU. Additional usage statistics could not be obtained, as the on-campus server is off-limits to technology staff at the University.

"As this is a black box system to SVSU, we have no usage statistics," mentioned Executive Director of ITS Ken Schindler.

Ruckus does not charge SVSU for the use of the service, and the company's income is based mostly off of sales of Ruckus-to-Go subscriptions, which allow students to transfer Ruckus downloads to certain MP3 players and subscriptions purchased by staff and faculty members.

Students who are looking for more information can visit Ruckus' SVSU Web site at svsu.edu/ruckus.