A new Web site has emerged with hopes of becoming the top source for college videos, but some videos on the site may have been posted illegally.

Theuniversitytube.com was started in November and has already expanded to compile Internet videos for 124 universities, each with its own Web page.

“We’re trying to provide an atmosphere for college fans to express themselves as freely as they can,” Theuniversitytube.com president Ashley Sweat said. “We feel we’re providing a place to do that through video.”

The Web site works much like YouTube, the world’s most popular video Web site. Users who register with the Web site can post their own videos for anyone who visits the Web site to see. Also like YouTube, the site allows users to add other users as friends, gather videos into a playlists, and join groups with other users. Sweat said these features were added to make the site a social networking tool.

Sweat said that he wanted the site to encompass all types of college-related videos.

“In the future we want frats on campus and drama clubs on campus posting their event and plays,” Sweat said. “And marketing students can post their marketing videos from class and share those with other schools.”

But for the time being, sports-related videos dominate most universities’ Web pages. Videos on the University of Kansas’ page include the Rock Chalk Chant in Allen Fieldhouse and a Kansas State fan singing “I’m a Jayhawk” after losing a bet on the 2007 Sunflower Showdown football game. Many universities’ sites have videos taken from ESPN.com. The videos are clips from various ESPN television programs that the network allows users to post online using embed codes.

One of the users has posted televised broadcasts of Kansas athletic events on the Web site. The user, 13Hawk, has posted games from this year and previous years, including the 2008 Orange Bowl and Kansas men's basketball game against Marquette in the 2003 Final Four.

The user, who asked not to be named for fear of legal ramifications, said that he did it for friends who couldn’t see the game in other parts of the world.

“I did it for my wife’s friend who’s stationed in Iraq and for family in Colorado who are out of the range for the KU games,” the user said.

He claimed that copyright laws extended to rebroadcasting the games for personal gain. He said that he was fine because he didn’t receive anything for posting the games online.

“It may be stretching the laws a bit, but I’ll be fine,” he said.

Michael Hoeflich, professor of law, said that even though 13Hawk didn’t gain anything from posting the videos, he still violated copyright laws.

A representative from CBS said that the network would look further into the possible legal problems with the Web site. Representatives from ESPN and the Big 12 Conference did not return phone calls from The Kansan.

Associate athletics director Jim Marchiony said that Kansas didn’t own the rights to any of the posted games, but said that he didn’t like the idea of the video being posted online without proper consent from the owners.

“I don’t know if they have licenses for this, but if they don’t, that’s bad,” Marchiony said. “I don’t like to see people’s property being used for purposes that they have not approved of. I just think there’s something inherently wrong with that.”

Sweat said that he was seeking advice to make sure that the Web site was following copyright laws, but he personally felt the site was doing nothing wrong.

According to Theuniversitytube.com’s user code of conduct, users are not allowed to post “illegal or unauthorized copies of copyrighted work.” The policy also says that users are responsible for the material they post.

Hoeflich said that it was doubtful that the terms in the code of conduct would keep Theuniversitytube.com legally safe.

“We’re not out to break laws,” Sweat said. “The whole premise behind the network is to provide a clean atmosphere for university fans to express themselves.”

—Edited by Matt Hirschfeld