• Ars Technica, Thursday, February 28, 2008 11 AM

The launch of Qtrax became a byword for "fiasco" when the company announced itself to the world as a free ad-supported music file-sharing service with the blessing (i.e. licensing) of all the major music labels. It turned out that Qtrax hadn't officially licensed anything from Big Music, and so the music pretender's launch turned into a disaster. Allan Klepfisz, the company's CEO spoke about "the launch that wasn't" at the Digital Forum East in New York City.

It's hard to imagine how a company could launch saying that key licenses were in place when they were not, but Klepfisz says that Qtrax was misled by the record labels. He believed the licenses were in place for the launch, but the labels apparently pulled out at the 11th hour. During launch day, Klepfisz says he became aware of an unnamed "hitch," which still persists in the negotiations today. In other words, Qtrax still hasn't secured those licenses.

Qtrax aims to be a legal way to grab music, but it requires a few things from its users. Firstly, they must view ads and agree to the site tracking their data. Second, they are downloading DRM protected files that only play in the Qtrax browser when users are online (the files must also be refreshed). And third, they must not transfer music to portable devices. Ad-supported, free music is definitely a cool idea, but this sounds like one too many restrictions.

Read the whole story at Ars Technica »