How Music Got Free: The Inventor, the Music Man, and the Thief

For fans of The Social Network, the story of an accidental pirate, a mastermind, and a mogul.How Music Got Free is a blistering story of obsession, music and obscene money. A story of visionaries and criminals, tycoons and audiophiles with golden ears. Its about the greatest pirate in history, the most powerful executive in the music business, and an illegal website six times the size of iTunes.It begins with a smalltime thief at a CDpressing plant, and a groundbreaking invention on the other side of the globe. Then pans from the multimilliondollar deals of the music industry to the secret recesses of the web; from German audio laboratories to a tiny Polynesian radio station.This is how one mans crime snowballs into an explosive moment in history. How suddenly all the tracks ever recorded could be accessed by anyone, for free. And life became forever entwined with the world online.It is also the story of the music industry the rise of rap, the death of the album, and how much can rest on the flip of a coin. How an industry ate itself. And how the most successful music release group in history is one youve probably never heard of.How Music Got Free is a thrilling, addictive masterpiece of reportage from Stephen Witt. Its a story thats never been told but thats written all over your hard drive.