This is News in :90 for Monday, Feb. 6, 2012.

The Department of Justice, FBI, and Intellectual Property Rights Center shut down the file sharing website Megaupload.com after arresting the administrators and site creator Kim Dotcom. The crackdowns come in the midst of the Stop Online Piracy Act, a controversial bill up for discussion in Congress. (Patrick Roche/TommieMedia)

Information Resources and Technology receives 250 to 500 complaints from record and movie companies each year due to St. Thomas students who violate copyright laws.

Senior finance major Alex, whose last name has been withheld for confidentiality purposes, said that Internet service provider Comcast recently sent him two emails threatening to suspend or terminate his service for violating copyright laws.

“I get where artists and stuff are coming from, like musicians losing money,” Alex said. “(But) I haven’t bought a music album in seven (or) eight years.”

IRT Director Chris Gregg said St. Thomas’ role in enforcing copyright laws “are almost 100 percent governed by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.”

The DMCA, which was passed by Congress in 1998, makes the copy or sharing of intellectual property–music, videos, games, software, etc., illegal without the permission of the owner.

If IRT receives a complaint, it will attempt to identify the student by the IP address listed in the complaint. IRT then forwards the complaint to the student.

Gregg said that IRT is required to follow this process because of the Higher Education Opportunity Act.

IRT receives hundreds of copyright complaints each year, and students may receive a cease and desist order telling them to stop illegal downloads. Students can rent videos for free from the library media room. (Josie Oliver/TommieMedia)

The Higher Education Opportunity Act was enacted by Congress in 2008 and asks universities and colleges to develop plans to combat the unauthorized distribution of copyrighted material.

Alex said that he received two back-to-back cease and desist orders at the end of January.

“I have been using torrent stuff… since high school, and I know other people who have used it too,” he said.

In the case of repeat offenses, the HEOA policy requires IRT to notify the Dean of Students’ Office and Public Safety.

Senior Taylor Melvin said that she does not know anyone who has received a DMCA complaint for illegally downloading music or movies but does know many people who download content illegally.

“It kind of sucks to pay for music and movies, especially when you see other people just getting it for free,” Melvin said.

Crackdowns on online piracy of movies, music and other intellectual property have been highly publicized since Congress proposed the Stop Online Piracy Act. Kim Dotcom, owner of the file sharing website megaupload.com, was arrested in late January for facilitating the illegal sharing of millions of movies and music.

Students can access St. Thomas copyright policies at: http://www.stthomas.edu/copyright/advice/infringementfaq/index.html

Patrick Roche can be reached at roch6667@stthomas.edu.

The Student Diversity and Inclusion Services Fun Night featured hip-hop spoken word artist, Desdamona, Friday, Feb. 3.

“We are bringing in Daughter’s of Africa, which is a theatrical performance,” said Courtney Brewster, Student and Diversity Inclusion Services assistant director. “(It’s) a one woman show, and it’s going to be talking about pioneers in black history as it retains to music and performance.”

February is recognized as Black History Month, which is an annual celebration of achievements by black Americans. The event was started by historian Carter G. Woodson from his original project “Black History Week” and has been recognized since 1976.

Senior Laura Carlson said that she has never been to an event put on by the Student Diversity and Inclusion Services but would be willing to check it out.

“Black history month gets a bad reputation about only being celebrated by people of color. I’m not black myself and would love to go to any of these events to learn more about other cultures,” Carlson said. “Plus, they look fun.”

The Student Diversity and Inclusion Services, formerly known as Multicultural Student Services, changed its name to better reflect the mission statement of “affirming identity, building community and cultivating leadership.”

“The perception has been that the Multicultural Services was an office exclusively for students of color when that is not the case,” said Ashley Booker, Student Diversity and Inclusion Services program manager. “We are here for the entire campus community that also includes white students.”

Senior Nicole Pilarski said that she agreed with the reasoning behind changing the name.

“Student diversity opens up the possibility of including people of not only varying races but also varying religious views, political views and so forth,” Pilarski said.

“I think if anything is communicated, it is that we are here for every student,” Booker said.

Sara Kovach can be reached at kova7636@stthomas.edu.

The No. 7-ranked men’s hockey team used goals from five different players to clinch the MIAC championship after defeating the Bethel Royals 5-2 Friday night at home.

This is the team’s first regular-season conference title since 2006, and theTommies will also be the top seed in the playoffs, despite having three MIAC games left.

After the game, senior assistant captain Chris Hickey said that he was proud of his team.

“As a player on the team, it’s great to see a bunch of guys step up,” Hickey said. “Any given guy can score at any given time, and it makes you play at ease when everyone is playing tough.”

 Coach Jeff Boeser is also proud of the team’s hard work.

“We don’t really have one superstar,” Boeser said. “We have 35 players that bring it everyday, work hard and play together. That’s been our motto all year long.”

The win also kept the team’s 10-game winning streak alive.

“We’re not thinking about the win streak,” Hickey said. “It’s tough to even think about the championship right now – the end goal is still out there.”

Freshman Chris Cass scored the team’s first goal on a power play in the second period, followed by goals from junior Travis Baker and freshman Loren French.

“I got a really nice pass from (senior) Matt Lipinski right out front and was able to put the puck in the back of the net,” French said.

Junior Riley Horgan and senior captain Rob Philipp each scored goals in the third period to clinch the win for the Tommies.

Junior goalie Tyrone Simcoe stopped 22 of 24 shots.

French and Boeser both agreed that though the team already clinched the MIAC title, “nothing changes” when it comes to thinking about the next three regular-season games.

“We’re approaching it like we have to get ready for the playoffs,” Boeser said. “We are going to keep getting better. I’m very proud of what we’ve done, but there’s always a bigger picture.

The Tommies will play the Royals again Saturday, Feb. 4, at the National Sports Center in Blaine.

 Terese Quarberg can be reached at quar3707@stthomas.edu.

The College Grind, a social media site that launched last fall, is generating buzz among St. Thomas students for its party and humor-based posts that cater to students in the Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference.

Junior Ben Watson said that he found the website just by Googling “MIAC.”

“I kind of stumbled upon it on the Internet one day,” Watson said. “I just clicked on it and started messing around on the website. It was cool.”

The founder of TCG, Matt, would not reveal his last name or college that he attends for privacy reasons but described the website as a content-based, community-driven site that is used to connect students within the MIAC conference. He said that there is no affiliation with the MIAC or any educational institutions.

“I was pretty surprised that there was no social media platform or anything that connected all the MIAC students together,” Matt said. “It’s 57,000 plus students and a lot of us are from the same background and have the same interests.”

The site spiked student interest when it announced its hottest girls of the MIAC competition in early December, allowing people to submit pictures of attractive, local girls. TCG received mostly positive feedback, but there were a few concerns.

“For the hottest girl (competition), 85 percent were submitted to us and the other 15 percent were the campus representatives that did some digging,” Matt said.

Matt said that the girls who did not want their pictures included in the competition, along with the copyrighted photos, were removed when his staff was notified.

“There is a copyright law at the bottom (of the site) where it says if your photo is up and you don’t want it up, you can email us and we will take it right down. We’re not trying to create negativity… we’re just trying to spark some interest,” Matt said.

Sophomore Chris Nathan thinks TCG’s posts are an accurate portrayal of St. Thomas students’ college life.

“You just really don’t have like a good judge of social life. You can’t find that anywhere,” Nathan said. “I came up for an overnight visit and I played video games in a dorm room. I don’t think I’ve stayed in on a Friday night and played video games since then.”

Watson said that the site is a good tool for determining the social life at each university.

“I like the site because it shows a different perspective than maybe what the university openly presents,” Watson said. “If you had an older brother or sister on campus, it’s kind of all the stuff that they would tell you that goes on.”

Junior Sibel Dikmen said the website portrays the fun and light-hearted side of college students.

“I think everyone can appreciate that. Even the Tommies go to the site and laugh at their own stereotypes that other people portray,” Dikmen said.

The university had no comment about the website.

TCG’s most recent competition is for the hottest guys in the MIAC, and Matt said that 100 percent of the pictures have been submitted directly from the guys.

The hottest guys of the MIAC is one of many projects TCG has in the works, but there is one competition that Nathan would like to see included.

“Hottest professors, that would be the greatest,” he said.

Olivia Cronin can be reached at cron2722@stthomas.edu.

This is News in :90 for Wednesday, Feb. 1, 2012.

This is News in :90 for Tuesday, Jan. 31, 2012.

Students wait in line at the Bookstore Monday, Jan. 30. (TommieMedia)

The bookstore faced the busiest day of the year Monday, said Bookstore Director Tony Erickson. The university registrar and service center both ran into similar situations. That’s what happens on the first day of a new semester.

“At about 12, the store will be packed, and we’ll have people waiting in line to get in the store,” Erickson said. “We will have to close the store down for a while because of fire regulations. That usually happens three or four times the first day of the spring semester.”

Freshman Sean Warner was in the bookstore Monday because it was the only time his schedule permitted buying books.

“It wasn’t open yesterday, and I was in Mexico over J-Term,” Warner said.

Service Center Director John Barron said that the center has been working overtime for the last ten days printing classroom materials.

“We have been very busy with calendar year-end documentation for a variety of departments on campus,” Barron said. “So a lot of what we have been doing is not class related, but we have also been doing a lot of class related stuff too.”

University Registrar Paul Simmons said that the registrar’s office is normally busier during the first day but because technology has simplified the process, things have stayed relatively calm.

“We have gone from 20 years ago where we used to have gymnasium registration where everything was done by paper, in person…to web-based registration,” Simmons said.

Freshman Nicole Scott said that she bought most of her books in the bookstore over the weekend, and it wasn’t really busy. On Monday, Scott bought the last book on her list, knowing the line would probably be long.

Sophomore Mohamed Samaha bought his books Monday and thought it went well.

“It actually went pretty fast. Me and my roommates just waited until today for some reason…kind of procrastinating I guess,” Mohammad said. “It went fine though, I got everything I needed.”

Patrick Roche, Katherine Curtis, Olivia Cronin contributed to this story.

This is News in :90 for Monday, Jan. 30, 2012.

Sheran died Wednesday, according to the Washburn-McReavy funeral home. His daughter, DFL state Sen. Kathy Sheran of Mankato, told the St. Paul Pioneer Press he died at his Bloomington home.

Robert Sheran graduated from the College of St. Thomas and the University of Minnesota Law School. The Waseca native served as a special agent with the FBI during World War II and practiced law in Mankato and Minneapolis. He also served in the Minnesota House from 1947-49 and was an interim dean at Hamline University School of Law in St. Paul.

“There is absolutely no question that he was a master of law. He knew the law like no one else,” Mankato attorney Scott Kelly, of the law firm where Sheran worked for nearly 20 years.

Kelly said Sheran had a photographic memory and was able to retain complicated medical affidavits simply by recall.

Sheran also had a deep, rich voice that added to his imposing demeanor.

“When he talked, you listened,” Kelly said.

Known as a liberal, Sheran served on the Minnesota Supreme Court twice — first as an associate justice appointed by Gov. Elmer L. Andersen from 1963-70, and then as chief justice appointed by Gov. Wendell Anderson from 1973-81.

Sheran cited financial reasons when he resigned from the high court in 1970 to return to private practice at a Minneapolis law firm, the Pioneer Press reported. At the time, Minnesota Supreme Court associate justices made $26,000 a year. Salaries had since been raised when Sheran returned to the high court in 1973, and he earned $40,000 a year as chief, the newspaper said.

In addition to his daughter, survivors include sons Thomas, John and Daniel.

His funeral will be held Monday, Jan. 30 at Our Lady of Grace Catholic Church in Edina. Burial will be held at Calvary Cemetery in Mankato.