The inevitable has now occurred, the revolutionary file sharing service known as "Napster" is seeking to enter into Chapter 11 protection.

With the announcement of bankruptcy protection, the planned out transition of control over the company into the collective of Bertelsmann AG is well under way.

Bertelsmann AG recently dropped an additional $8 million dollars in last second funding to pay off most of the outstanding debts of the company. The company now enters into phase two of the strategic reorganization of the company.

By declaring bankruptcy the company is virtually hitting the reset switch before the transition control of the company over to Bertelsmann AG, attempting to clean out the pending litigation and legal attack's against itself which pushed the company's file sharing technology off-line last July, 2001.

The company filed for chapter 11 protection with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware. Where the company heads next after this is up to the major label ownership who will now completely control it.

Damn this reminds me of when I announced Scour was shutting down Scour Exchange, but this time a major label player is simply eating all of the cake and not simply taking it away from all the people at the party. I am not sure if that is a better situation then what we found Scour in previously either actually.. hmm

I want scour back!!!!

hope napster wins!!!!!

I would imagine that the lawsuit will be dropped as soon as this chapter 11 filing is finalized and put into effect, so there is no longer a need to hope that Napster wins, there will be no more battle and (alas) no clear victory on either part (other then that the company is now controlled by one of the major label entities which collectively brought it to it's knee's).

thanx -x-!!!

Does anybody really care? I mean really. Napster has been dead for a long time.

Not to mention the end of the discovery as to who really owns the copyrights (which the Recording Artists Coalition filed a brief on behalf of Napster). Actually it seems like a clear win for THE RIAA. The suit is dead, The Old Napster is dead, BMG owns the technology. It took a $100 million plus attorney fees, plus nearly two years.

thumbtack - I think that this was a major concern on the majors part(the discovery as to who really owns the copyrights) and something someone (or something) is going to have to push for a conclusive answer too if there is going to be fair justice for artists in the future.

This is the very foundation for the future of artistic impression distribution and direct income for artists, I so hope something pushes the judicial microscope to focus on this (and this review is not bought out by the existing industry).

I so hate legal nonsense and corporate political control over music and it's powerful meaning to all of us who so enjoy it.

"corporate political control over its powerful meaning to all of us"

what does that mean?

Meaning that passions for music often get destroyed in the corporate political fight to control it. People just get damn sick of the bullshit being put on music by the industry selling it who just desire to control it to make money.

No one controls how I feel about music.

these labels are too greedy.....thaz all i have 2 say.

X absolutely correct.. That was the hope in the MP3.Com case, it didn't get raised again until the Naster case and now thats dead in the water.

meh, napster will just have to go through all this shit when they come back under AG's control.

BMG is getting to greedy.... I ordered a BMG partnership marketing brochure and they havene t given it to me in over 3 months!!! I need it!!!

This is pathetic. All the RIAA/MPAA file sharing lawsuits did was open up MORE file sharing programs that are harder and harder to stop.

If the RIAA were smart, they should have licensed their entire catalog to Napster two years ago, and people would have been more than happy to pay $5.00 to $10.00 per month for MP3s.

Ever since Napster was shut down I knew this would happen. However, Napster still lives on. It was the pionner to a revolution aginst the RIAA free of fees, free of restrictions, free of copyright. Now, a bussiness that was told would never make it is growing more popular every day. To see Napster return as a paying service would be a battle lost but the world we see today would be a war won. Napster didn't go down without a fight but it went down and that's were it should stay undisturbed. The Napsters of today carry Napsters dream with pride.

Hail Napster!!

Hail Mp3!!!

If I recall correctly, Napster had the good word of several popular bands, including the Dave Matthews Band. Aren't these the people that the RIAA is trying to protect?

In a gnutshell, the RIAA has its head up its ass. Or are they the same?

I smell a rat here - namely greedy music companies. If you have a look at the new Napster model it allows artists to authorize the release of their tracks on the Napster system and then themselves directly receive royalties. This could be the best thing for the music industry and no-doubt is why the greedy monopolies are fighting it so rabidly...
...
..death to RIAA!

is'nt this article from winamp.com ?

I agree that the major labels are very greedy and ripping off artists. That is why new sites/labels like Jukey will be huge. Not only do artists make more money per album than any other label out there, the customer can mix and match tracks and order. The days of buying a cd and only liking one track are over.. www.jukey.com

I just finished driving on a long trip. I could not find an MP3 player with allot of memory, so I went to Radio Shack and bought a 12v to 115v converter which I used to power my laptop. I placed my laptop in the car and connected it to my stereo through a cassette adaptor. Then I was able to queue up a bunch of songs for the trip. It was great. Radio is convenient, but sucks due to repeatability and commercials. CDs are inconvenient because of having to change them out. This worked well. It also occurred to me as I was driving that I didn't pay anything for the music I was listening to. However, I would if only the recording industry could somehow sell MP3s.

I'm not really aware already about gnutella, I suppose the protocol is bound to a GNU license ? In that case, what can do even a big company against that ? (sorry for my poor english and my need of information)

-wil, this article is from me and yes I slapped it up on winamp.com too for the hell of it.

I didn't mean it was stolen, sorry if i offenced you...

not at all, just clearing the record is all bro

well, i looked at jukey.com. doubt i would ever use it. sure, it looks like a good idea, but did you notice that the songs are from 'today's hottest artists'? meh.

hi i don't really understand this napster/gnutella stuff.
pls reply me for me to know better.

andate a fare in culo

Napster may be on a mayor comeback. I found out on CNET that there are some programs that increases the capabilities of napster, like Napster Debanner 2.0 (Run it and you will be sure to never get banned) and Napster Fast Search (Searches for a list of Napster servers, like Napigator does. Fast Search goes one step further, however, letting you search all (250+!!) servers at once). Be sure to read the descriptions on CNET and the instructions well. They contain very useful hints.

i want this program

dont worry out there, napster will be back soon, because my friend invented napster, he said we will be back!!

they aint gonna fuck with napster!