Audiogalaxy
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Type of site
|
Music |
|---|---|
| Website | www.audiogalaxy.com |
| Commercial | Yes |
| Current status | Closed |
Audiogalaxy was an Internet music service with three incarnations. From 1998 to 2002, it was a file sharing system that indexed MP3 files. From mid-2002 to mid-2010, it was a promotional website for the Rhapsody music subscription service. Finally, from mid-2010 through 2012, it was a personal audio place shifting service. Audiogalaxy ceased operations on January 31, 2013.
The original Audiogalaxy system was created in 1998 by Michael Merhej as an site index called The Borg Search. It quickly evolved into a robust peer-to-peer system with client software (the Audiogalaxy "Satellite"), a web-based search engine, always-on searching for requested files, auto-resume and low system impact. It quickly gained ground among file sharers abandoning Napster in 2001. Some observing the previous downfall of Napster via lawsuit were shocked at the design of Audiogalaxy, which was in some ways more centralized than Napster.
Audiogalaxy's stated mission was to facilitate sharing of music, though it was also notable for its strong community due to such features as chat-enabled groups and per-artist internet forums. This strong community also facilitated a very broad reach of content across many genres, particular those that tend to remain under-developed in more modern systems.
In June 2008, CNET hailed this incarnation of Audiogalaxy as one of the greatest defunct websites in history.
In May 2001, Audiogalaxy implemented "groups" which allowed group members to send songs to everyone in the group. Hackers used this backdoor to circumvent the "blocked songs" restriction, where Audiogalaxy could deny transfer of specific copyrighted songs. In addition, even when a specific file was blocked, it would often be replaced by an identical file with the group or song incorrectly spelled. For example, if "Wish You Were Here" by Pink Floyd were blocked, another track with the same title, but credited to "Pink Lloyd", would suddenly appear. The latter file would be completely identical to the former; however, since Audiogalaxy would never have received any notification for "Pink Lloyd," the downloading of that track would not be affected.
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