Oxford University Bans Students From Spotify

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Spotify is a very popular music-streaming service especially in UK and among the younger crowd who enjoys free music-steaming. But this popular music service bunged up Internet pipes at Oxford University, which further had to take severe measures to ensure that the free Internet access is still life. The officials at University claim that students were using Spotify so much that it slowed down the entire network for everybody.

Oxford University Explained –

University authorities imposed the ban because the sheer number of undergraduates listening to free tracks in their bedrooms was crippling the network, slowing down those using the web for academic research. Oxford students are entitled to free internet access as part of their accommodation fees, but the university retains the right to block sites with no educational value. Spotify only launched in October 2008 and until now had managed to escape the university’s ban on so-called peer-to-peer sharing networks.

Obviously, the students are irate on the decision and want to restore the access. The independent student newspaper Cherwell quoted students saying it as

discrimination against music lovers… I hoped that it was a technical glitch, and that the university would be able to fix it. I never realised it was against the rules

The university goes on explaining that because the service doesn’t hold any educational value, it was considered needless and expandable. For now, the students does not any option left to get Spotify back other than owing paid Internet connection. Spotify has about 2 million dedicated users in the UK and its free, ad-supported service was probably valued by students who wouldn’t otherwise afford to either buy all the music or subscribe to a paid music streaming service.

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