In 2010 music was files: ripped from CDs, downloaded from LimeWire or torrents, bought from iTunes, traded on USB sticks, and organised (badly) in iTunes or Winamp. A library of 5,000 tracks with half the artist names wrong was normal, and the iPod's storage limit decided what you carried.
- Type
- trend
- Origin
- Napster era, 1999 onwards
- Peak
- 2003-2011
Related
- WebsiteVerified
LimeWire
The P2P client a court shut down in October 2010
LimeWire was the file-sharing program of a generation: a green-and-grey Gnutella client full of misnamed MP3s, fake files and viruses. On 26 October 2010 a federal court injunction forced it to stop...
- WebsiteVerified
iTunes Store
Ten billion songs sold, and the Beatles arrive
The iTunes Store was the centre of legal digital music in 2010: it passed ten billion songs sold in February, iTunes 10 arrived in September with the ill-fated Ping social network, and in November...
- ProductVerified
iPod nano (6th generation)
A tiny touchscreen square that people wore as a watch
The 2010 iPod nano dropped the click wheel and video camera for a 1.5-inch multitouch square with a clip, the size of a postage stamp. Watch-strap accessories turned it into an unofficial smartwatch...
- WebsiteSupported
The Pirate Bay
The torrent tracker that would not die
The Pirate Bay was the world's best-known BitTorrent index in 2010, a year after its founders were convicted in Sweden. Its pirate-ship logo, comment threads and "legal threats" page made it a symbol...
