On 1 June 1999, a piece of computer software was released that changed the way we listen to music forever.

Napster didn’t exactly sound like something that would cause consternation in the boardrooms of record companies. But within a few short years it would spell the end of the gold rush record companies had enjoyed in the age of the CD, and change how music is consumed and even written.

Napster was the brainchild of Shawn Fanning, a 19-year-old US computer hacker who had worked out a way to share music for free. It was, essentially, a cataloguing system that searched your hard-drive, listed all the MP3 music files contained in it, and allowed those to be shared with and played by anyone else using the software. Together with Sean Parker, Fanning created a service that made music discovery almost instant and without cost.

“It was something that provided a better, more reliable and fun way for people to share music and see each other’s music collection,” Fanning told the BBC World Service. “For the first time this full history of recorded music was available online to everyone instantly.”