As we know, computer technologies — and especially the Internet — have changed the way many things are done, including audio recording and dissemination. Nowadays, for example, anyone can create a podcast program or even release music albums with just a computer or even a mere smartphone.
More or less 20 years ago, however, these transformations were still in gestation. Thus, those most affected by this freedom still tried to control the effects of these innovations. And that was the case with RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America)United States Record Industry Association in relation to the application Audio Hijack.
According to Paul Kafasisfounder of Rogue Amoeba (app developer), back in 2003 they identified a purchase of the software from someone at the RIAA. Knowing the organization’s litigious history — behind the demise of the music site Napster —, in addition to the app’s audio editing potential, concerns were raised that the RIAA would try to do lobby to kill Audio Hijack.
However, over time, Rogue Amoeba has not faced any type of lawsuit or action by the association against the app. It, on the contrary, grew in these two decades, gaining new functions and being adopted by a good part of podcast producers and users. That, however, is not to say that the RIAA hasn’t tried to do something.
In an interview, the producer Adam Curry (known as “the father of podcasts”) told about a conversation he had in 2005 with the co-founder of Apple, Steve Jobs. At the time, he reported using Audio Hijack to edit his podcasts. Eddy Cuesenior vice president of services at the company, then revealed that the RIAA had asked for the app to be disabled, precisely because of its ability to record any type of audio.
Jobs, in yet another demonstration of his very practical and direct way of seeing and solving things, asked if the app was necessary to create the podcasts. Faced with a positive response from Curry, Jobs simply decided not to attend the RIAA.
Had it not been for that, it is possible that Audio Hijack would not have survived and many things would be different today. Of course, we can’t credit all the evolutions that apps like Rogue Amoeba provided to the fact that Jobs didn’t let the app be removed from the Mac. Still, as Kafasis himself said, it’s a little desperate to imagine how the future of the app — and its creators — depended on a conversation in which he didn’t even participate.
How crazy, huh?!
via AppleInsider