"It's been all over the press, and schools are deciding to shut it down. We released a public announcement saying that we had some potential solutions that we were working with, and once we had something concrete we would start implementing it and approach schools"
About this Quote
Panic, rebranded as “potential solutions,” is the real product Shawn Fanning is describing here. The line lands like damage control because it is: a young tech founder watching a cultural wildfire spread faster than any corporate PR team can run. “All over the press” isn’t just media coverage; it’s the moment Napster stopped being a clever tool and became a public morality play about theft, teenagers, and the future of music. When “schools are deciding to shut it down,” the stakes sharpen. Schools weren’t only internet providers; they were de facto governors of early online life. Losing campuses meant losing the densest hub of users, bandwidth, and evangelists.
The subtext is negotiation through vagueness. “We released a public announcement” signals legitimacy, an attempt to look like a responsible institution rather than an insurgent service. “Potential solutions” and “working with” are classic appeasement phrases: they promise cooperation without conceding the underlying conflict. Concrete details would imply enforceable limits, and enforceable limits would puncture the very appeal of Napster’s frictionless abundance.
What makes the quote work is its careful choreography of time. Fanning positions Napster as proactive (“we were working with”) while also buying room (“once we had something concrete”). That delay is strategic: in a network effects race, every extra week of usage is market power. “Approach schools” frames shutdowns as a misunderstanding to be resolved, not a verdict to be obeyed. It’s the rhetoric of a new economy colliding with old gatekeepers, trying to sound collaborative while keeping the engine running.
The subtext is negotiation through vagueness. “We released a public announcement” signals legitimacy, an attempt to look like a responsible institution rather than an insurgent service. “Potential solutions” and “working with” are classic appeasement phrases: they promise cooperation without conceding the underlying conflict. Concrete details would imply enforceable limits, and enforceable limits would puncture the very appeal of Napster’s frictionless abundance.
What makes the quote work is its careful choreography of time. Fanning positions Napster as proactive (“we were working with”) while also buying room (“once we had something concrete”). That delay is strategic: in a network effects race, every extra week of usage is market power. “Approach schools” frames shutdowns as a misunderstanding to be resolved, not a verdict to be obeyed. It’s the rhetoric of a new economy colliding with old gatekeepers, trying to sound collaborative while keeping the engine running.
Quote Details
| Topic | Internet |
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