Napster isn't going to be a free service for very much longer. CEO Hank Barry said Tuesday that the 38 million Napster users will soon have to pay "monthly dues" of, perhaps, $4.95 to access each other's hard drives; it is the result of a deal Napster reached with one of five record companies suing it for copyright infringement.
Napster is forcing people who want to trade music through its file-swapping site to upgrade to a severely restricted version that allows trading of only a fraction of the songs previously available.
Analysis: For all the glitz surrounding the unveiling Monday of Apple Computer's new music service, a quick look suggests that it's a solid, but hardly revolutionary, addition to the market.
Napster may have been defanged, but other rogue peer-to-peer music services still exist. Even if the music industry were to crush these services too, millions of music fans won't forget the Napster experience.
Digital music and DVD movie add-on packs for Windows XP could stir controversy around its decision not to fully support the MP3 file format.
Not many in the music business have heard of Cirrus Logic's Matthew Perry. But he just might have as much influence on the shape of digital music as Napster's file-swapping service or any of the music studios.
The new millennium was the year Microsoft was ordered to bifurcate, dot-coms tanked on Wall Street, WorldCom's Bernie Ebbers saw his merger mania capped and Napster scared the recording industry nearly to death. 2000 was a cascading waterfall of events that ended any doubts about the Net's ability to change the way we think, learn, play and do business.
Every day someone new pipes up and promises cool and exciting means to encrypt music files. But nothing seems to work. Will there ever be a secure digital music format?
A little Napster, a dash of Gnutella and you've got Audiogalaxy: a new haunt for music fans who want to share MP3 files. But get in while you can--the file-swapping service has already raised eyebrows at the RIAA.
Napster's offer to the music industry of a US$1 billion payment over five years has been met with a cool reception. Some describe it as nothing short of a publicity stunt.
Napster is back, with an inescapable marketing campaign that's put the familiar kitty-with-earphones logo everywhere, from Yahoo Mail boxes to stickers seen on the streets of San Francisco.
Music publishers yesterday won an important legal ruling against the world's largest record label in a case that could set rules for streaming copyrighted songs over the Internet.
Napster's plans to block some music from its system could put pressure on other file-swapping services to do the same, but don't expect any rush to filter.
Song-swapping company Napster says it is delaying the launch of its subscription service yet again, after running into serious snags in its settlement talks with the big record labels.
The controversial online music swapping service Napster has blocked Manic Street Preacher fans from sharing unreleased tracks from the forthcoming album Know Your Enemy.
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