Napster On Fire

          Napster has been the leading service for people all over the world to share copyrighted songs and full CD’s for some time now.  Napster has a large community of people who share their music between other members of the community via an Internet connection.  Napster has changed the Internet and the way people use it in order to provide free songs to users instead of paying money for them.  Napster targets people of all ages, since more than half of its users are over the age of 30(Steinberg).  With the Napster invention, companies all over are jumping on the bandwagon such as Microsoft, Yahoo, and Sony(Tillett 2).   People who use Napster feel they are not committing any crimes by sharing these files,  but the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) feels differently about the subject.  They feel Napster has violated the Copyright Law and should be shut down or be made to filter out the songs that are protected under this law.  There are many ways of selling music online, and Napster chose by far the most controversial(Moschella 1).  Napster does have a good side, it lets unsigned artists present their work to people for hopes of  being noticed by the public.  Napster feels that they are not violating any laws and should continue to share song and let people decide whether or not they will buy the CD.

          Napster was created in May of 1999 by Shawn Fanning, a nineteen-year-old  college student who had a vision of letting people sample music before buying it.  These songs are in MP3 format which can be downloaded and played on a computer with software such as WinAmp, Sonique, and Real Player.  The song files a fairly small, about three megabytes for an average song.  Thus, making it very easy for a novice user to use and with the use of visual aides, Napster has become a big hit.  The popularity of Napster can not be forgotten.  According to Media Matrix, Napster is the fastest growing Internet company ever(Steinberg).  The statistics are impressive for being such a new company just starting out.  Napster currently has 32 million registered users and 92 thousand simultaneous users(Steinberg).  Napster users share hundreds of gigabits of sound files which is a tremendous amount of  material over the Internet.  Napster even offers chat sessions that let users  talk about their favorite artists or song.  With all that Napster has to offer, it is appealing to a lot of people.  With records showing that Napster’s population is increasing at a rate of one million users.   Many feel that if Napster is forced to shutdown, then a new invention or program will be introduced and may be stronger than Napster.  It will be an ongoing process to entirely get rid of the illegal material off the Internet mainly because of the Internet’s size and the users it targets.  People can just download a song and listen to it while surfing the Internet, which is more comfortable then sitting in front of a CD player.  With it’s fast fame, Napster really as the RIAA in an uproar, fearing that record sells will take a nose-dive and may never recover.

          The RIAA has been trying to put a stop to Napster by suing them for copyright infringement in December 1999.  They forced Napster to filter copyrighted songs off the server so users could not download them, or in a sense, stealing them.  Music artists such as Dr. Dre and Lars Ulrich of Metallica, have stepped forward in an effort to shut Napster down.  Dr. Dre even went as far as sending letters to college campuses across the world asking them to remove Napster from their computers in and effort to stop the file sharing.  Napster argues that it is protected by the Audio Home Recording Act which allows people to record musical programs in their homes for personal use(Steinberg).  In early March 1999, The RIAA and its member labels had a preliminary injunction ordered against Napster for not complying with the law, forcing Napster to improve the filtering software it uses.  The RIAA also suggests that Napster deploy a technology that would not allow users to place copyrighted works onto the system(Fitzpatrick 1).  The RIAA has submitted lists of 660,715 copyrighted works by artist name, album name, and song name in an effort to have them filtered by Napster.  Napster says it already has blocked more than 275,000 unique songs and more than 1.6 million different file names since March 5, but Russel Frankman of  the RIAA outside counsel, says Napster’s claim is irrelevant since new copyrighted material is put up on the server everyday(Fitzpatrick 2).  Providing this information, the RIAA has a strong case against Napster, but Napster feels that they have been doing all that can be done in an effort to block the titles.

          Napster CEO Hank Barry countered many of the accusations by the RIAA stating “Effective blocking is an ongoing and iterative process that we are taking very seriously”(Fitzpatrck 2).  Napster feels strongly about their efforts to obey the copyright law and the decision of the court.  Napster also feels that they can eventually block all of the copyrighted songs.  They have introduced a new search engine called Gracenote that searches variations of song titles and artists names so if users alter the names they can block them also.  Distributors of music, video, research reports and other content are taking a cue from Napster’s legal troubles and turning to new types of digital  rights management technology as protection against lawsuits(Tillett 1).  Napster is still trying to stay in the game with improving software and protecting copyrighted material is top of mind.

          If the RIAA can succeed in shutting Napster down for good then a new file sharing program will replace it.  Napster has many sister programs already released where people can do basically the same actions as they can do on Napster.  The other programs that are available are not as easy to use as Napster.  Some of the programs include Gnutella, Imesh, and Aimster. Some feel that destroying Napster now will probably mean replacing it with one enemy with an even stronger one(Kirkpatrick 1).  If Napster dies, music users will find other free servers to download from and this will have the RIAA tripping over its own feet.    According to eCommerce boss Andreas Schmidt, “This totally disruptive technology wasn’t a force just a year ago, it’s hard to change your mindset so fast.”  “If the music industry’s lucky, it will complete its epiphany before it has destroyed what could be one of its best opportunities ever”(Kirkpatrick 2).  In stating this, Schmidt feels that the RIAA should embrace Napster as an opportunity to get more music out to the public, rather than shut it down.  Record sells would increase and new music groups would have their chance also.  Of course the RIAA would rather shut Napster down in fear of the worst case scenario, but they will have to think if they can ever end the sharing of songs on the Internet.

          The sharing of files on the Internet is not a new idea by any stretch of the imagination.  File sharing has been going on since the beginning of the Internet and will probably go on until the end.  The RIAA may be able to shut Napster down for now, but when a new service comes, they will have to fight the battle all over again.  Napster has revolutionized the Internet for the short time that Napster has been around.  Both sides of the court case are strong, the RIAA has the right to claim that Napster has violated the Copyright Law, and Napster has the right to claim that they are protected by the Audio Home Recording Act.  The court has ruled for the blocking of certain copyrighted songs but it may be impossible for Napster to handle all of them.  With all of the protective software that Napster has available, someone will still find a way to distribute copyrighted songs.  The sister programs to Napster are looking for ways to improve their software so they do not have to go through the struggle that Napster had to.  By making users pay or by disguising it’s server, the newer programs will be much harder for people to catch in the act of sharing songs.  It reminds people of prohibition, when alcohol was made illegal, people went to the black market in order to sell and receive it.  The law eventually reversed it’s decision when they knew it could not be possible.     The file sharing era will never be over and businesses will have to find a bulletproof way to end illegal sharing for good.