Napster, My.MP3.com, Digital Music, and the Future
By Dr. Chris Evans, Founder, Internet Freedom

 
There are two technological innovations that are currently
creating a storm on the Net. They go by the names of "Napster"
and "my.mp3.com". They both make it easier to distribute music
over the Net. And the developers are both being sued by the
Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). Internet
Freedom founder Chris Evans investigates.

An edited version of this article appears in Practical Internet
Issue 39.

Napster is a very simple piece of software. You install it.
Place your favourite MP3 music files in a folder on your hard
disk. Then connect to the Net. Immediately you have access to
every other Napster user's MP3 files (and they to yours). All
the files are automatically catalogued on the Napster server.

As CEO Eileen Richardson put it: "Everyone looks at Napster and
goes, 'Holy Shit!'". That is certainly what the RIAA must have
done, alleging that Napster encourages piracy. Napster argue
that they don't store the files, and aren't responsible for
whether users have legal or illegal copies of music. Its like
holding them responsible for copyright infringement for
manufacturing a photocopier.

My.mp3.com is just as simple, but even cleverer. Launched early
this year, it allows Net users to access MP3 music files from
any computer, anywhere, anytime. As MP3.com CEO Michael
Robertson described: "This is so cool, it's going to blow you
away". You put a CD in your drive. The details of the CD are
sent to MP3.com. They then transfer MP3 files corresponding to
all the tracks into your folder on their server. With your
password you can then download them from anywhere on the Net.
Since you put the CD in, MP3.com are not technically giving you
anything you didn't already have. Except the RIAA disagree,
since it might not have been your own CD, or your own password.

It's war. On one side is the recording and music distribution
industry trying to protect its sectional interests in the face
of Internet technology. On the other side is the future of
digital music. Do I need to say which side I am on?

Dr. Chris Evans (aka Chris Ellison) is the founder of Internet
Freedom and lectures in ecommerce and multimedia computing at
London's Brunel University.