Content revision 4e771eaf0390cc87b6c7c6fd8469f3508f6ceeec7119472e6c1ccf17e2e1e5d2

## Music streaming hacks

How I Started Building with Code
Source ID early:music-streaming-hacks
Original https://www.henryw.me/#/early#music-streaming-hacks

In my first year of high school, I spent several months developing a music downloader for Chinese streaming services. Users could paste a song-page link into one interface to download music across several services.

The technical work involved web scraping and reverse engineering how the services exposed media URLs. The interface accepted song-page links from QQ Music, NetEase Cloud Music, KuGou, and KuWo, with options for audio quality and batch downloads from an artist’s catalogue. I also built an account system with different levels of access, including restricted lossless downloads.

The service ran for about six months and reached 413 registered users. It could also retrieve paid tracks without authorisation, an implication I had not understood when I began. I closed it once I recognised the problem.

These screenshots show the Simplified Chinese interface used by the original audience.