News needs to suffer more to adapt to AI - then get dirty...

Part three: The media exec who helped kill Napster and negotiated iTunes, shares his step-by-step guide for publishers to build a future with AI...

In 1999, an earthquake hit the music industry. Two scruffy college kids hacked code to create Napster, changing music and the digital economy forever.

More than $10 billion was wiped off the big labels and musicians went to war - as 26 million delighted music fans piled into Napster and loved what they found.

What’s an industry to do when a digital disrupter with zero responsibility drops a hand grenade in an internationally stable ecosystem that’s worked for half a century?

The crisis - and what happened next - bears startling similarities to the battle publishers are facing from OpenAI, Perplexity, and others, today.

At the heart is flagrant copyright abuse, and the destruction of established business models for products millions of consumers are showing they want.

One of those closest to the Napster fight and fallout, joins me to share how music righted itself from its death dive with strategies that news can use today.

In part one, former BMG record chief Scott Dinsdale revealed how Napster emerged from his industry’s worst fears to wreak havoc and destroy its value.

In the second instalment, he tells the music and film industries used star power to sell IP to government, before finding an unexpected ally to force Napster out of business.

Now in the final part, he reveals the strategies that enabled the music industry to overcome tech goliaths, and win back its digital future, and how publishing can replicate them today with AI.

Welcome to newsletter #270, and hey there to new subs overnight from the tech desk at the Sydney Morning Herald, Mediaweek, South African news innovator The Daily Maverick, Yahoo, The Persistent (committed to amplifying women’s voices), the UK’s Fuller Project, Dutch creative agency Triggertale, the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY in Manhattan, Univision, largest Spanish TV network in America, and Sullivan’s Cove, whose 18-Year-Old American Oak Second Fill Single Cask Nº TD0033 Malt just won gold at the World Whiskies Awards. Congrats, Slàinte, and Scotch and Watch is still looking for a sponsor 🥃 🥃 🥃

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And be sure to check out this course run by three of my besties who are deciphering the most effective ways to leverage AI.

Join the in-crowd alongside The New York Times, Business Insider, Reuters, CNN, Bloomberg and more… And get 10 per cent off with code: FUTUREMEDIA

PS: They really are my mates, and not some randos…

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Right, let’s get into it.

This plan is not based on half-baked guesses, dog-eared Post-Its, or overpaid MBA strategists, it’s one that has already proven effective and saved a $35 billion industry.

Tried, tested, and victorious.

But it comes with a warning: Publishing’s not been hit hard enough yet. So, who has the energy for the fight?

Here’s the final instalment of Napster, And The Lessons That Can Save News...

Let’s have at it…