But the one thing almost everyone agrees on is the record companies have only themselves to blame for the rise of Napster. Napster newsgroup, referring to Napster's announcement this week that they plan to charge a monthly subscription as early as this summer. Diggi wrote to say that if Napster should fall, an invisible army of programmers is poised to create an alternative system. Napster, of course, is the most mainstream method of obtaining music over the Net. Don't stop the evolution, embrace it.
Nobody can stop it.
Since its rise to prominence over a year ago, Napster has become the easiest and most popular means of trading music files online. The record industry and artists such as Metallica and Dr. Dre have sued the company, claiming it facilitates widespread piracy. Late last year, Bertelsmann, the German media conglomerate that owns the BMG family of labels, broke ranks with the rest of the industry and promised to drop their lawsuit while funding Napster's development of a copyright-protected version of the software. To be honest, I think it sucks. Not the other way around.