Despite the demise of online file-sharing pioneer Napster and the recording industry"s focus on prosecuting any online music trader that aims to replace it, experts say that Internet song swapping is here to stay.
Recent court victories and massive copyright payments won by the major record labels certainly put pressure on Napster knockoffs.
However, industry observers said they think that newer services will survive because they use distributed network technology, unlike Napster"s central server model. In addition, they noted, consumers simply prefer the freedom these networks afford compared with licensed trading models that limit both content and portability.
Yankee Group senior analyst Michael Goodman told NewsFactor that he gave up counting the number of free services being used to swap songs and other content online when the number of peer-to-peer (P2P) networks topped 70.
"You knock these out and there are another 70 to take their place," Goodman said, referring to current top traders of Kazaa, Morpheus, LimeWire and iMesh. "You"re never going to shut down the free services."