It was a breakthrough deal that would have put the Napster kitty on millions of Hewlett-Packard computers.

But in the days leading up to Napster's re-launch in late October, HP suddenly -- and without explanation -- returned Napster's $250,000 check and canceled the agreement to install a link to Napster's online music service on its computers. Worse, in January HP announced a surprise partnership with Napster rival Apple Computer to feature the iTunes Music store on HP computers and sell Hewlett-Packard branded iPod music players.

Neither HP nor Napster's parent company, Roxio, would comment on the soured deal, whose details were confirmed by sources familiar with the agreement. But its collapse was one of several setbacks since the reintroduction of Napster, the pioneering song-swapping renegade, as a paid music service.

Napster is losing money, and top executives have left the company, including its president, chief financial officer, vice president of programming and head of corporate communications as well a key board member. On Wednesday, Roxio began laying off people at its Napster division. A Roxio spokeswoman said the company was ``eliminating redundancies in the organization'' but declined to say how many people lost their jobs.

And while Napster can legitimately claim it's the second most popular online music service, information provided by insiders at two of the major music labels shows it sells only about a quarter the number of downloads from their artists as Apple's market-leading iTunes store. Napster refused to release download figures.

Perhaps more telling is the state of Napster's subscription business, which is widely perceived as more lucrative than selling 99-cent songs. That's especially key for a service like Napster, which unlike Apple, derives no income from the sale of a branded music player.

Napster declined to provide specific subscriber numbers for its service, aside from noting that downloads and subscriptions each contributed equally to Napster's $3.6 million in revenue for the last three months of 2003.

That means Napster has attracted about 90,000 subscribers in its first two months -- ranking it fourth, behind RealNetworks' Rhapsody service, America Online's MusicNet and MusicMatch.

Complete Story

Gee, Napster seemed to be working fine before the recording industry got a hold of it. Oh yeah... no DRM the first time.

one down.

And Napster was the only centralized server that tried to work with the recording industry. Now it's just not working for them, and they own it!

at least god has a sense of humor.. but they knew it was doomed.. this is all playing out like a well planned chess game for them.. they managed to stir up enough paranoia on copyright to hijack our fbi and use our own government to do its dirty work in eliminating its independent competitors.

the only question is, when will the congressmen wake up and realize this is a monopolistic cartel and not some kind victim of public betrayal and "theft"..

There was a new Napster?

I must have been busy downloading something when that news came out.

Just goes to show that if you play with the Devil you're going to get a pitchfork in the butt.

Cya later Nappy Sir.

Sherm, me too.

i cant believe they really didnt see this coming....their top businessmen. it doesnt matter what it is, if you have a cheaper, more convienient alternative, then thats where the people are going to be. whos going to go crapster or ipoons and pay over a buck a song and then have to fill out all that credit card information and then be bombarded with ads, etc, etc, when you can go on kazaa, emule, soulseek, name your poison, and download almost any song, for free, instantaneously. do they really think people are going to feel bad for doing this??? then they go and spend all their money on some crap service and it expect...ah, nevermind, this isnt even worth finishing.

"I cant believe they really didnt see this coming...."

"top executives have left the company, including its president, chief financial officer, vice president of programming and head of corporate communications as well a key board member. "

Apparently they did.

didnt see this coming, as in why the hell did they get onboard a doomed project in the first place.

You know, if you don't have to pay for the service, Rhapsody is pretty neat. I go visit my boyfriend at Best Buy and just use the free in store version there, subjecting the customers to something other than rap and hiphop for a few minutes. Muahaha, no "Heya" for the next 20 minutes!

It wasn't until about a month ago that I learned that Napster had come back as a RIAA infested tick on the internet. Most everyone bailed out of Napster when the filtering software was put on the first time. Sorry, but when I get filtered out of looking for local garage bands, I know there's a problem.

Yes to digital music, no to DRM!

And they will blame it on P2p....

Not the poor business model, poor management, and bad non-original idea (everyone sells the same music for the same price 99 cents). I-Tunes is the current king of the 99 cent downloads, they have run everyone else over.

You know many predicted this, a lot will get in only to get out a short time later. Sort of a bursting of the pay per song bubble.

It baffles me as to why all their music is 99 cents. I could possibly understand a slightly higher price for new releases but 99 cents for some old slag songs from the past is beyond me.

No price competition, proprietory music systems (the music will only play on certain brands of music players), and DRM will kill the pay per song model.

But the big 5 want it that way...

"And they will blame it on P2p...."

Honestly ask yourself... if, after Napster/Kazaa/Morpheus has turned SO many people into filetraders, there WERE no other alternatives, no other non-RIAA-Approved apps, how many people would be signing up to Napster?

I would think it would swell their ranks tenfold. This is why they want us out of the picture. They are used to consumers with no alternatives. I recently saw a full page ad in a magazine with Sheryl Crow's face, and the header " I DOWNLOAD (legally) "

Of course you do. Its the only way you can get any money in that slave contract you signed, Sheryl. Please stop making videos that make you look like Britney plus a guitar, it's embarassing.

Napster dead again, doesn't suprise me.

meh

I tried the "new" Napster and it had a bad selection of tunes. That plus the fact that when I tried to change my CC info it wouldn't let me. Trust me, they're better off dead. I think this Cat used up its 9 lives long ago.

I'll really cheer when Itunes bites the dust but I don't see that one happening

Well, there you go. I am glad to hear Napster is dying.

Spanier at UNPenn took student fund money and walked in Napster to the campus dorms on all Penn properties. Overlooking one little fact, that ALL STUDENTS pay for it, but they're SOL if they are Mac users. 16,000 people live on campus and 58,000 live off. Spanier annointed himself to spearhead a drive to spread Napster to other campuses through EduCause. No details have been ascertained yet, how much money was exchanged for the right to UPenn campus monopoly of music services. Possibly it was free of charge to make U Penn a Prime Mover.

One little problem, people are already getting full catalog with no DRM!

Why did Spanier decide it was his business anyway to fund corporate propaganda in school?

One side affect that Kevin Doran notes, the imposition of Napster on campus would relegate indie music to the sidelines. Whereas college radio at one time was considered the hotbed of latest hottest trends, that didn't suit the purposes of multinational conglomerates to cram the pipelines with hit songs, rather than let this generation choose their own winners in the market.

Mp3s are not the same audio quality as CDs. I will not pay the same price for an mp3 as I would for a CD. But I am willing to pay a fair and reasonable price for either.

A CD should cost no more than $10 tops. It should have at least a dozen good songs and excellent packaging with liner notes and all that. I would consider paying slightly more ($1-$2) if it had a booklet filled with pictures and links to websites unavailable to general public.

A mp3 should cost no more than 1 cent per MB. You are not really getting anything tangible and if you want to play it anywhere other than your own computer, YOU must supply your own time, effort, supplies and equipment to do so, effectively raising the cost even more. An mp3 file does not equal an audio CD song.

They blame P2P. But it is simple economics.

The supply the product. We supply the demand for the product. If the product sucks, we will not buy it. If the product is overpriced, we will not buy it. If the product is filled with so much DRM, that it is utterly useless, we will not buy it.

Put out a good quality, low priced product with no DRM and WE WILL BUY it. They just don't get it.

oops, should read "They supply the product".

If the RIAA wants P2P business for themselves, then all they have to do is

1) Stop Suing little girls, old men, and poor mothers

2) Offer a reasonably priced, non-DRM'd, non-spywared, P2P app where the artists get more than 10% royalties and we all have a virtually unlimited library.

Yes, basically like a reasonably priced eMule, etc.

The RIAA is fucked until they do this, because everybody knows that Napster 2.0 is an ultra limited library, overpriced, and full of DRM. allofmp3.com is a Russian site offering *one cent per meg* downloads. RIAA fools aren't even profiting off of it either, and it's their music.

Instead we all get to hear "Napster 2.0 failed, so it's clear that 60 million criminals in the US will refuse to pay for anything." Well, so far.. that's pretty much right. Put in a little more effort next time guys.

The Sherminator strikes again!

It looks as if all those college presidents that signed up all their students are going to sucking hind tittie pretty soon.

Don't give em any ideas Sherm.

Shmoo, of Electric Gypsy
Support Local and Independent Music!

Not U Penn. Penn State.

tomsong: Why did Spanier decide it was his business anyway to fund corporate propaganda in school?

maybe because at PennState, like other institutions, have investments in stocks, hedgefunds, etc. and just maybe PSU has interest in ROXIO. (just a thought)

TheSherm: RIAA fools aren't even profiting off of it either, and it's their music. ------ That's because the RIAA never authorized allofmp3 and doesnt have international jurisdiction. (i'm still skeptical on the legal claims that allofmp3 claims and a review article on them. note: russia is considered to be very lenient on the distribution of copyrighted material.)