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Napster could honestly claim to be surprised when the RIAA sued in December 1999.

Even then, many record executives didn’t get it. That changed the day after the Grammy Awards in February 2000. At the regular RIAA board meeting at the Four Seasons Hotel in Beverly Hills, Rosen decided to try a little show-and-tell. It had been a good year for the industry, and people were feeling upbeat. “You know about Napster,” Rosen told them. “But you need to understand it. This is going to be big, and the fact that we sued them is going to make it bigger.”

Staffers downloaded the software and registered in front of the eyes of a couple dozen label bosses. Then Rosen asked the executives to start naming songs. Not just big hits, but tracks deep into albums, either brand-new or obscure. The record men took turns calling out more than twenty songs. The staffers found them every time, and fast. Soon no one wanted any more convincing that the threat was serious. As the crowd grew increasingly uncomfortable, a Sony executive tried to cut the tension. “Are you sure suing them is enough?” he asked. The capper came when someone suggested a hunt for the ’NSYNC song “Bye Bye Bye.” The cut had been on the radio just three days, and the CD hadn’t been released for sale yet. And there it was. Maverick Records executive Ronnie Dasher had seen enough. “This is too depressing,” he said. “Let’s move on to other business.”

With the labels now enthusiastic backers of the lawsuit, they began thinking more about public relations. Worried about the bad press they were getting for attacking a nineteen-year-old, they redoubled their efforts to get their bands to speak out. “We want to do a national advertising campaign and will have a large coalition of interests that support it including artists,” Rosen e-mailed top record executives in March. “I don’t believe we will change behavior until there is more legal music online, but a campaign to raise consciousness is critical and as an industry, we must put our stake in the ground.” Eventually, most big-name acts who took a public position were anti-Napster. But in the early days, it was slow going. When Metallica stepped forward, “they got crucified for it,” said EMI’s Samit. “You don’t want to look uncool to your fans.” Many

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