Sunshine State Congressman Wants To Make Illegal Downloading A Floridon’t

Meet U.S. Representative Ric Keller, a Republican from the eight district of Florida. This week, he introduced the Curb Illegal Downloading on College Campuses Act of 2007 (or, we like to call it, CICADA), a bill that seeks funding for programs that will stop college kids from illegally downloading songs:

“Illegal downloading of music and movies on college campuses is harming their computer networks by consuming a huge amount of education-related bandwidth and exposing them to viruses. It’s just plain wrong to steal billions of dollars in intellectual property from hardworking people whose jobs hang in the balance,” said Keller.

“My legislation encourages colleges to be part of the solution by allowing them to apply for federal grants to help purchase innovative technologies that will stem piracy on their computer networks,” Keller added.

Yes, jobs have been lost and expense-accounts slashed in the wake of digital pirac–but are we really at the point where we need to start dipping into federal funds just to prevent some Sigma Pi pledge from downloading The Chronic in time for the next “Pimps And Ho’s”-themed mixer? We’re pretty sure federal money could be better allocated to any of the 23,754 more pressing problems in the world today–some of which are taking place in Keller’s own backyard. Don’t get us wrong: We love Orlando, but someone needs to medivac a few salad bars into there, pronto.

Keller Bill Aims to Curb Illegal Downloading on Campus [Ric Keller press release]