IP: Napster hypocrisy

[David Farber <dave@farber.net>]

>From: John Shoch <shoch@alloyventures.com>
>To: "Dave Farber (E-mail)" <dave@farber.net>
>
>Dave,
>
>For your amusement -- an item from today's WSJ, with an ironic bit of
>hypocrisy from Napster:
>
><begin>
>On the Chin
>
>Napster's founder Shawn Fanning took it on the chin at a pro-Napster
>conference in Washington, D.C., the night before this week's Senate hearing
>where Napster, the recording industry, and recording artists like Don Henley
>and Alanis Morissette aired their grievances before lawmakers.
>
>Mr. Fanning, 20 years old, took the hit over his company's efforts to
>protect its copyrights: its software code. A programmer in the audience
>demanded to know why Napster's "source code" for its software wasn't freely
>available. "That's a great question," Mr. Fanning stammered, "and one I was
>hoping you wouldn't ask."
>
>His answer: "Once the [Napster] user base grew ... we had to raise money to
>pay for bandwidth and for servers, and it became a business issue."
>
><end>
>
>So, we finally can understand Napster's business plan:  "I can help other
>people steal copyrighted material from you, but you can't steal copyrighted
>material from me....."



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