Qtrax Free Downloads Too Good to Be True?

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


mojo-photo-qtrax.jpgThe Drudge Report gave it a top-line link: Free, legal downloads of every song in the universe on some weird site called Qtrax! Come and get ’em! Qtrax claimed all the major record labels had signed on to their new service, an ad-supported, filtered P2P platform that would allow actual downloads of every song in the labels’ catalogs, the files wrapped in DRM, but whatever, they’re free, right?

The announced launch time of midnight came and went, and nothing. Then reports emerged that three of the four major labels, Warner, Universal and EMI, issued statements denying they had finalized deals with the service, and an “unconfirmed rumor” says that Sony’s deal doesn’t cover downloads. What does it cover, looking at pictures of their artists? The Qtrax website promises “over 25,000,000 songs,” but that’s the “theoretical” size of all the catalogs. You have to download a special application (annoying!) and it doesn’t seem to be working yet, or else I’d get right on a test run here. And now I see reports that Qtrax is run by “refugees of Spiralfrog;” hmm, Spiralfrog, where have I heard that terrible name before? Oh yeah, they tried this same thing back in September, and it didn’t work then either. Crazy!

Well, at least Qtrax is good for one thing: the level of desperation of internet startups is a good economic indicator. Are they auctioning off their little puppet dog mascot to an auto loan firm? That’s a slowdown. Are they corralling James Blunt for an announcement in Cannes where they bluff about having deals with all major record labels even though they can barely make their front page work? That’s a recession.

Fact:

Mother Jones was founded as a nonprofit in 1976 because we knew corporations and billionaires wouldn't fund the type of hard-hitting journalism we set out to do.

Today, reader support makes up about two-thirds of our budget, allows us to dig deep on stories that matter, and lets us keep our reporting free for everyone. If you value what you get from Mother Jones, please join us with a tax-deductible donation today so we can keep on doing the type of journalism 2024 demands.

payment methods

Fact:

Today, reader support makes up about two-thirds of our budget, allows us to dig deep on stories that matter, and lets us keep our reporting free for everyone. If you value what you get from Mother Jones, please join us with a tax-deductible donation today so we can keep on doing the type of journalism 2024 demands.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate