SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Napster, the revolutionary Internet song-swap service hailed by millions of music fans but damned by the powerful recording industry, officially shut down Tuesday after a U.S. bankruptcy court blocked its final sale to German media giant Bertelsmann AG.
Dude. Napster’s been dead for a year and a half. Check out this February 2001 GLONO piece: https://gloriousnoise.com/arch/000346.php
Dude, there was a chance for reorganization but today they filed for Chapter 7, total liquidation. That means selling off the assets and all. Until today, there was a chance of a (watered down and shitty) version of Napster to resurface. This was just the last nail in the coffin, that’s all.
I like the fact that Bertelsmann’s $85M investment is being called a “loan” now: http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/news/local/3994793.htm Ha ha. Suckers. I wonder what that kid Shawn Fanning is doing these days… Hopefully, he was able to bank some of that dough before his shit got ruined.
And now it takes a trun toward the weird:
One of the Internet’s leading purveyors of pornography has offered to purchase the Napster trademark and Web site address for nearly $3 million in hopes of cashing in on the bankrupt song-swap company’s notorious reputation.
http://www.salon.com/tech/wire/2002/09/16/napster/index.html