Napster vs The Record Labels - Battle of the Bands | 4
Business Wars
Audible
4.6 • 13.5K Ratings
🗓️ 30 October 2018
⏱️ 28 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
As the game of cat and mouse heats up with the record labels. The labels know that unless Napster is stopped, it’ll destroy the record labels. That doesn’t stop Napster co-founder Sean Parker from feeling the vice grips closing in. By early 2000, Napster has 10 million users and a landmark copyright case from the RIAA and a court date with Metallica. It’s survival of the fittest, and both sides are playing with fire.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hey, Prime members, you can listen to Business Wars Add Free on Amazon Music. |
| 0:04.6 | Download the app today. |
| 0:07.0 | It's September 1999. |
| 0:15.4 | The record industry's piracy chief, Frank Creighton, has seen enough. |
| 0:19.8 | It's time to act. |
| 0:21.2 | So he writes a careful polite inquiry to the Napster websites publicly listed contact. |
| 0:27.6 | John Fanning. |
| 0:29.0 | I am writing to you to see if we could start a productive and mutually beneficial dialogue |
| 0:34.3 | regarding your service. |
| 0:36.4 | Creighton represents the Recording Industry Association of America. |
| 0:40.2 | He gently raises the piracy issue, but he also calls the technology exciting. |
| 0:46.8 | John interprets the email as good news. |
| 0:50.1 | John replies that he needs to coordinate things internally before getting back to him the |
| 0:55.5 | following week. |
| 0:57.1 | Then he crows to the others at Napster that RIA is coming in soft, that it might not even |
| 1:03.0 | think it can win in court. |
| 1:05.5 | The so-called coordination drags on for a month. |
| 1:09.4 | John's plan is to stall as long as possible while Napster keeps growing. |
| 1:15.4 | He knows a showdown is coming. |
| 1:17.7 | But if he can keep giving the RIA the runaround, Napster can come back with maximum leverage, |
| 1:24.0 | lots of buzz, tons of users, and reams of invaluable data on all of their collections |
| 1:29.8 | and listening habits. |
... |
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