Early 2000s P2P File-Sharing Platform ‘Limewire’ Returns as NFT Marketplace

If you were a teen in the early 2000s then you might remember LimeWire, the popular peer-to-peer file sharing platform that became a hub for music piracy. Well, after more than a decade, Limewire is making a comeback – but as an NFT (non-fungible token) marketplace.

LimeWire was shut down by a US federal judge in 2010 after a legal conflict with major record companies over copyright infringement.

Hits and Memories

Now, two brothers from Austria, Julian and Paul Zehetmayr, have bought the rights to the defunct platform and aspire to bring the old memories back by relaunching the site as a marketplace for digital collectibles, starting with music.

In the Twittersphere at least, the news has been greeted with a mixture of nostalgia, humour and cynicism:

LimeWire Debuts in May with Its Own Token

According to the Zehetmayrs, LimeWire will debut in May and will do so with its own utility token. The service offered will be related to music NFTs, including merchandise, exclusive songs, artwork, and backstage content.

Even if you look on Twitter today, there’s hundreds of people still being nostalgic about the name. Everybody connects it with music and we’re launching initially a very music-focused marketplace, so the brand was really the perfect fit for that with its legacy.

Julian Zehetmayr

The duo has also made it clear that LimeWire will not be an alternative for subscription-based streaming platforms like Spotify, rather an “additional channel for artists to sell exclusive music and art directly to collectors”.

As more and more marketplaces come together to try to take on the current market leader of NFT platforms, OpenSea, LooksRare launched in January with the aim of being a community-focused marketplace that intends to develop new features based on what its users want. It, too, is built around its newly launched token, LOOKS, and it seems LimeWire has taken a leaf from LooksRare’s playbook.