I’d just realized that today is MP3’s 10th birthday! On 14 July 1995, Germany’s Fraunhofer Institute chose to use the .mp3 extension for files holding audio data encoded using the MPEG standard’s Audio Layer 3 specification. The MPEG Audio Layer 3 codec was standardised in 1992.

Fraunhofer researcher Juergen Zeller broke the news ten years ago in the following email, provided by the Institute today:

Date: Fri, 14 July 1995 12:29:49 +0200

Reference: Endings for Layer3: mp3

Hello,_according to the overwhelming opinion of all asking: the ending for ISO MPEG audio Layer 3 is mp3.
i.e. we should for coming www sides, Shareware,_Demos, etc. on it respect that no more bit endings rausgehen.

It has a reason, believes me : -)

Juergen Zeller

A thank to Fraunhofer Institute, who brings these wonderful file extension to us. Today, MP3 still remains its unbeatable popularity among the digital audio file formats. Indirectly, the MP3 brings us to the world of P2P. Remember Napster? Although it lost the lawsuit against RIAA, the crowds are still heading to the P2P technology.

Happy birthday, MP3!

{ via The Register }