Chapters 17 and 18 Summary and Analysis

Chapter 17: March 2004

Sean Parker lived in a house just off the campus of Stanford. He was not a student there but everyone knew him. In fact, he was idolized by Stanford students. He and his business partner, Shawn Fanning, while still high school, created a website called Napster. The site allowed kids to download their music at no cost. Napster eventually imploded but it had brought fame and fortune to Sean and Fanning. The record industry came down on Napster and the site was brought down. Sean and some friends then created an online business card system called Plaxo. When venture capitalist Michael Moritz of Sequoia Fund was brought into the company, he and Sean butted heads on most every issue. Sean was eventually thrown out of his own company.

Even though Sean had created two of the biggest...