A new music download service, Ruckus, is now available as part of UCLA's Get Legal campaign, which is designed to provide the campus community with legal digital entertainment services.

Ruckus replaces the Ctrax service offered by Cdigix, which announced in February that as of this month it would no longer provide music services to colleges and universities.

Jonathan Curtiss, manager of technology development for the UCLA Division of Student and Campus Life, said that Ruckus, which has a library of more than 2.75 million songs, is playable on Windows-based computers. There is no charge to students for this "tethered" service, which is also available to UCLA staff and faculty for $8.99 per month. Also, both students and non-students can play these downloads on portable Windows Plays4sure devices for a fee of $4 per month.

Students, faculty and staff who wish to purchase tracks can do so for 99 cents each, or $9.99 for albums.

UCLA's Get Legal campaign offers other services as well, including iTunes, which rebates 5 percent of every sale made through the Get Legal Web site (www.getlegal.ucla.edu) to UCLA student councils, and Mindawn, which sells non-copyrighted music from independent labels.

Get Legal services are safe from computer viruses and other malicious and unwanted software.

Curtiss said that as the recording industry gets tougher on copyright violations, services made available through campaigns such as Get Legal become more attractive.

"Students who download music and other entertainment files off the Internet risk being sued by entertainment industry watchdogs who are determined to protect the creative property of media artists," Curtiss said. In addition, he said, illegal file sharing is a violation of the UCLA Student Code of Conduct.

Information about Ruckus is available at www.getlegal.ucla.edu. Questions can be directed to getlegal@ucla.edu.

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