15 years since Napster launch

This month marks a decade-and-a-half since the official launch of Napster in 1999.

In light of Apple’s acquisition of Beats, a cursory glance over the service’s 15-year history proves that while it was a trailblazer – in pursuit of the same goals as its legal successors – its rookie status was ultimately its downfall.

Billboard has published a timeline of Napster’s high and low points taken from its own coverage: the company’s legendary suit with Metallica in 2000; the 2001 court ruling that lead to the closure of the illegal network; the brand sale to Best Buy in 2008 and its eventual absorption into Rhapsody in 2011.

Highlights include Napster’s resurrection as a legal file-sharing service in 2004, which saw it face debts of a reported $17 billion; the company’s deal with US military that same year where they offered the Army and Air Force Exchange Service discounted access; its 2005 licensing agreement with the UK’s biggest independent music company Beggars Group, which preceded an increase in its UK membership figures to 750,000 and the launch of the incredibly preemptive Napster Mobile in 2006, which saw a partnership between SunCom Wireless in the US make history as the first third-party brand to offer a mobile music download service (for $2 a track).

Last year, in the lead-up to the release of Downloaded, a biopic documentary for VH1, Billboard interviewed the company’s Founders Shawn Fanning and Sean Parker at SXSW.
When asked how they feel about Napster looking back, Parker, now an exec at Spotify said: “I feel super embarrassed by my 18/19-year-old self […] I had this notion that users were gonna pay for portability, that convenience was really the only thing that you were gonna get anyone to pay for. In fact, up until that time, CDs were the most convenient thing.”

Fanning, who has since invested in a number of social network start-ups like Path and Rupture, said: “From our standpoint it was hard to wait (for people to be ready to share music). Especially coming from a generation where you can get basically anything you want instantly.”