A blast from the past makes a foray into the future as Napster, a company that paved the way for modern music streaming services, plans to dive headfirst into the metaverse. The pioneering music service kicked off its web3 journey with its recent move to bring in former Roblox music frontman Jon Vallapulos as CEO of the company. Vallapulos will use the experience he gained working with the sandbox game to spearhead the company’s push into virtual concerts.

There’s no question that the music industry has struggled to figure out where the metaverse fits into traditional business models. As major record labels take meticulous steps to enforce their copyright infringement rights under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), many music companies have struggled to…