The Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits, inventor of the digital format, announced it was terminating the licensing program for MP3s. While the group was successful in getting the format off the group, it failed in its attempts to kick-start an MP3 player and a music-streaming service (“because it was technologically absurd”).
“The MP3 not only upended the recording industry but, thanks to the iPod, also contributed to Apple’s late-’90s transformation into one of the most successful companies in history. (On Tuesday, the tech giant passed $800 billion in market capitalization, the first U.S. company to do so.) But now, 22 years later, the MP3 truly is dead, according to the people who invented it.”
