Great book. I'm not in the music industry or particularly interested in technology but Stephen Witt's writing pulled me right in and made me care about this story. Super compelling, endlessly fascinating. Up there with some of the great narrative nonfiction of our day.

As a denizen of the net in the time period covered, and a lover of music (for research purposes, of course) this book was amazing in bringing together the time and places and people that made that possible. From the invention of the mp3 to the bastard RIAA to Pirate Bay, these were times I too remember pretty fondly, especially as a lover of music and curious as to where technology was going. I didn't have the CD burner, or the job at a pressing plant, but I did have a fat T1 pipe (thanks, college!) and was on the periphery of the community detailed here.

The author does a great job at weaving the story with appropriate context and historical notes, and it is engaging and easy to follow. I've recommended it to the music heads I know, as well as the geeks, but that Venn diagram is pretty much a circle because of this time.

Aquest llibre conté:

-Els enginyers de so que creen el mp3 (i durant molts anys no es mengen un torrat)
-Com operava la comunitat dels pirates digitals més nocius de la història de la música
-El rap dels 90
-El lent declivi de la indústria discogràfica
-Vevo
-El magnat de la música més influent del món i el seu pas per diferents segells consolidats
-Napster, torrent i els iPod

This was a fascinating look into the underbelly of the music industry and the technology and people who destroyed the old business model. It's three interwoven narratives, focusing on "Dell" Glover, the biggest pirate in the industry's history, premier record exec Doug Morris, and the German group that invented the mp3, which was originally shunned. Witt is a lively and funny writer who humanizes each personality and distills complex cultural trends into memorable anecdotes.

One of my favorite books of the year.

You can read an excerpt here: http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/04/27/the-man-who-broke-the-music-business

Very informative, and made me very nostalgic for Oink.

The book was a great history of how the music business transitioned from CD's to Digital. They went kicking and screaming due to the pirate revolution of the late 90s and 2000s. Very interesting subject

3 1/2 stars really. Who would have thought the biggest source of leaked albums for the better part of the internet era was Shelby, NC. Learned alot reading this book, the cluelessness of the music industry, its blind attempts to remedy piracy and squash the MP3, and the reasons for the MP3's final triumph as a format.

Wow! These books are usually more tedious, with pages of technical specifications and statistics. This one feels like a thriller, following three key players into the mp3/piracy/music business mess that we've seen since music and computers have become so intertwined. Anyone interested in the topic should pick this up as the author's passion and research keep it moving. It's so engaging I wondered how much embellishment was put onto the facts, as normally this topic doesn't beget page-turners. You might be disappointed to find many important events glossed over or the reader is assumed to know about them, for example Napster is only given a few pages of mention. I guess if the author tried to cover all the angles on his subject then the book would be thousands of pages long, so he focuses on three important ones.
I'd put this alongside [b:How Music Works|13235689|How Music Works|David Byrne|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1340792878s/13235689.jpg|18433052] if you are looking for books that go a long way towards describing the confusing current state of music in a readable way.