NEWS
2020/04/19
At the end of the 1990s, as technology improved and internet access soared, the online realm opened up like a new frontier, full of untold possibility and peril. For purveyors of creative media, it was the rise of a new Wild West, run roughshod over by Silicon Valley’s fresh-faced cowboys in plaid shirts and cargo shorts. Unprecedented times call for unexpected heroes, and much as few would have expected Bay Area mavericks Metallica to be the ones to make a stand for artists’ rights, none could have foretold the pertinence of their arguments two decades on. It all began in June 1999. On the face of things, Shawn Fanning was just another bullet-headed college dropout, having departed Boston’s Northeastern University after too much partying. Following a se...
