WinMX (Windows Music Exchange) is a
freeware
Freeware is software, most often proprietary, that is distributed at no monetary cost to the end user. There is no agreed-upon set of rights, license, or EULA that defines ''freeware'' unambiguously; every publisher defines its own rules for the ...
peer-to-peer file sharing
Peer-to-peer file sharing is the distribution and sharing of digital media using peer-to-peer (P2P) networking technology. P2P file sharing allows users to access media files such as books, music, movies, and games using a P2P software program t ...
program authored in 2000 by Kevin Hearn (president of Frontcode Technologies) in
Windsor, Ontario
Windsor is a city in southwestern Ontario, Canada, on the south bank of the Detroit River directly across from Detroit, Michigan, United States. Geographically located within but administratively independent of Essex County, it is the southe ...
(
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by to ...
). According to one study, it was the number one source for online music in 2005 with an estimated 2.1 million users. ''Frontcode Technologies'' itself abandoned development of WinMX in September 2005, but developers brought the service back online within a few days by releasing patches. WinMX continues to be used by a community of enthusiasts.
Kevin Hearn released ''
Tixati'' in 2009 and ''Fopnu'' in 2017. ''Fopnu'' is a client and a network with some similarities to WinMX. In 2021, he released DarkMX, a serverless file sharing client with built-in privacy preserving features and a built-in TOR client, as well as the ability to host a .onion file-sharing that is reachable via the TOR Browser.
History
Beginnings
WinMX began its life as an OpenNAP client capable of connecting to several servers simultaneously.
''Frontcode Technologies'' later created a