It was an industry-destroying genie, and Napster was the spell that released it from the bottle forever. Napster came at the end of a decade of expansion and healthy profits in the global music industry. The s gave birth to many classic albums, but not every LP was deep-pile quality from start to finish. People were paying a premium price for a CD which might contain only two or three songs they wanted. So, the lure of free music proved just too enticing to fans, and the music industry was initially slow to respond to the looming crisis.
Metallica took Napster to court after finding an alternative mix to their song I Disappear on the service — a version which had never been officially released. On 13 April , Metallica filed a lawsuit against Napster for copyright infringement, racketeering and unlawful use of digital audio interface devices at a district court in Northern California. Metallica then tracked down the names of , Napster users who had shared their music and asked Napster to ban them from the service which Napster did.
None of these defences worked and record executives spent four or five crucial years losing serious business to Napster before Steve Jobs came along with the iTunes Store. Shawn watched his uncle John Fanning try to get rich in when he was hawking chess.
The company quickly created a buzz among San Francisco tech investors during the dotcom boom. She and her friend Yosi Amram, who knew John Fanning from his chess. There is an ossified narrative that record labels were too arrogant and lazy to see the digital revolution coming, and deserved their downfall.
But the story is also about the slowness of a generational handover of power. But it was a Sisyphean struggle to get the boards to really listen. Alison Wenham was heading AIM, a newly formed trade body for independent labels, when Napster appeared. As the new millennium began, in San Francisco, a power struggle within Napster was threatening to pull the company under. John Fanning did not respond to multiple requests from the Guardian to speak about his time at Napster.
Federal appeals court confirmed its ruling from July that deemed its filesharing software to be engaging in the exchange of copyrighted materials and therefore violating copyright laws.
Unfortunately, the labels did not accept that offer, forcing Napster to remove all copyrighted material. They went ahead and hired 50 temps to form an editorial team that, with the help of software, would scour the platform off of any illegal files. As a result, the average number of files shared per person dropped from in February to just 21 in May of the same year. A month after the ruling, Napster had already lost a quarter of its 60 million users. As a result, on July 1 st , , it shut down access to the software.
District Judge Marilyn Hall Patel, later that month, ordered the service to remain offline until it could figure out a way to keep the illegal files off. Around the same time, Napster had also settled its lawsuit with Metallica. On the 20 th of July, a U. His replacement became Konrad Hilbers, a former executive at Bertelsmann. In the coming months, Napster continued to battle lawsuits while trying to legitimize its business.
In October , it had to lay off 15 percent of its workforce equal to 16 employees in an effort to keep the business afloat. The ongoing negotiations with the remaining record labels furthermore led to the delay of the launch of its subscription-based product. In the meantime, Napster continued to lay off employees while sourcing more loans from Bertelsmann. Then, on May 17 th , , Bertelsmann announced that it had acquired Napster. The transaction, furthermore, allowed Napster to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
Konrad Hilbers, who just a few days prior announced his resignation, as well as founder Shawn Fanning, decided to remain with the company. In September , a federal judge decided to block the acquisition, thereby forcing Napster to sell off the remainder of its assets. Two months later, in November, U. Roxio, which became known as a creator of CD-burning technology, had big plans for Napster. That relaunch occurred a few months later in October Much like its biggest rival iTunes, the new Napster offered music downloads for 99 cents apiece.
To promote the service, Roxio offered day trials of Napster. Furthermore, it partnered with universities such as Penn State to give students unlimited access to the service. By February , the revamped Napster had passed five million song sales. In May , Napster became the first American music store to launch in Europe when they debuted it in the United Kingdom.
Roxio continued to double down on Napster. At the beginning of , Napster began to heavily invest in various marketing efforts to promote its newest product. The service, dubbed Napster To Go , allowed users to download an unlimited number of music to compatible MP3 players. There was another huge problem that Napster faced with its new mobile technology.
Apple, via its iPod, owned around two-thirds of the MP3 player market. Despite these hefty limitations, Napster continued to grow its subscriber base. The company had often partnered with device manufacturers which began to ship their products with Napster preinstalled on them. The bill attempted to equalize the number of slave-holding states and free states in the country, allowing Missouri into the Union as a slave state while A British ferry leaving Zeebrugge, Belgium, capsizes, drowning people, on March 6, Shockingly poor safety procedures led directly to this deadly disaster.
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