QTrax Drops The Ball But Keeps Running
The biggest news from this year’s Midem Conference in Cannes was the ‘launch’ of QTrax.
For those who missed it, Qtrax announced they had deals with all the major labels to release their catalogues. Then the major labels denied it. And so the launch wasn’t really a launch at all.
On more than just a few websites, the QTrax debacle is being dubbed as the worst launch ever. Others have been more kind, outlining that the QTrax launch hit ‘licensing snags’. That’s a bit like saying the Titanic hit an iceberg snag, but regardless, QTrax is now finding itself in a bit of hot water.
Qtrax was intended to launch as a fully legal, ad-backed download which would pay copyright holders for any songs distributed on the network.
Despite the fumbled launch, QTrax CEO Allan Klepfisz is still right on the money in terms of his intentions.
“You can’t change the attitudes and habits of what is now probably amounting to two generations who believe that music ought to be free on the internet,” said Klepfisz. “Those people are not going to be discouraged by Supreme Court decisions, they’re not going to be discouraged by technological interference. Ultimately, what will discourage them is a demonstratively better service.”
Indeed. It’s just a pity Qtrax jumped the gun so awkwardly. The thousands of people waiting to download music through their user accounts aren’t likely to be thrilled by the site fact they can’t actually get any music.
It will be interesting to see if Klepfisz and QTrax can dust themselves off and give music labels and consumers alike exactly what they want.
We are already almost two weeks on and still QTrax users are met by ‘technical issues’ messages when they hit the site.
Watch this space.
