Shawn Fanning
Shawn Fanning
Shawn Fanningis an American computer programmer, serial entrepreneur, and angel investor. He developed Napster, one of the first popular peer-to-peerfile sharing platforms, in 1999. The popularity of Napster was widespread and Fanning was featured on the cover of Time magazine...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionEntrepreneur
Date of Birth22 November 1980
CityBrockton, MA
CountryUnited States of America
thinking numbers people
I think the most difficult thing had been scaling the infrastructure. Trying to support the response we had received from our users and the number of people that were interested in using the software.
thinking media brilliant
But I just really think there is a natural extension into other types of media because it's an excellent system for reliably locating and retrieving content.
thinking ideas issues
There really was nothing like it at the time. We had good ideas for implementation, so we proceeded. I think it was an excellent solution to the reliability issues with existing search engines.
thinking media data
I think it's pretty obvious to most people that Napster is not media specific, but I could see a system like Napster evolving into something that allows users to locate and retrieve different types of data other than just MP3s or audio files.
thinking term
I think in terms of the work were doing now a lot of the UI cleanup... I see it getting much prettier.
thinking computer antisocial
If you think about computer programming, it's as antisocial as it gets.
american-businessman time understood widely
I understood an idea like this could become popular, but at the same time I didn't think it was my implementation that would be so widely used.
believe invested understood vision
Bertelsmann understood our vision when they first invested in us. They still believe in that vision.
believe invested understood vision
Bertelsmann understood our vision when they first invested in us, ... They still believe in that vision.
agreement along close moving napster phase step
We're close to moving into a new phase of Napster and this agreement is an important step along the way.
american-businessman prototype sure took
I wasn't really sure that my implementation of it would be what really took off, but fortunately I was able to get a prototype done.
grateful leadership music showing technology using
I am grateful they are now showing that leadership when it comes to using technology to make music more accessible.
american-businessman basic design drafting feedback playing university
I was at Northeastern University playing with the idea and getting feedback from my roommates, and then started drafting a really basic design idea.
american-businessman avid excellent few people sending software user work
Well, user feedback was excellent. Even when the software didn't work at all, there were few people who were avid users, and there were people who were just sending excellent feedback and excellent ideas.