The James Kilgour BlogA Life Blog.

Qtrax, the fledgling free music download service has finally announced its intention on launching… this time for real. I’ve written about the company previously, regarding it’s many failed launches and missed deadlines. However, this seems like the real deal.

I’m excited.

Yesterday, I listened in on an online press conference with the CEO Allan Klepfisz.  I also posed my questions on the upcoming world launch to him. The first country to launch will be Australia/New Zealand on November 5th, with a new Asian-Pacific country launching every Thursday until Christmas. According to Klepfisz, the decision to launch in  this region first is down to the high illegal download rates; over 95% of music downloads are illegal. I asked Klepfisz regarding his US and UK/European launch plans; he responded that the US would be live in Q1 next year, and the UK by February. He also noted that Qtrax had music licenses for 77 Countries worldwide; more than any other global music service. Notably, Japan has not been included in this, although India  and other majors will be.

Klepfisz also announced a partner deal with Baidu search; China’s largest online search engine, with a 70% market share. From the Chinese launch (17th Dec), visitors to Baidu’s Entertainment Portal and Qian Qian Music Online software will be redirected to Qtrax artist pages; thus providing huge numbers of traffic. Klepfisz highlighted that Qtrax would work with other local partners in other territories to gain similar deals, as well as viral marketing to gain users. The motives behind this deal seem to be China’s tightening up on Copyright Laws. Klepfisz predicts that this will further aid Qtrax in gaining users and thus revenue. Baidu is notorious for linking to millions of illegal music downloads, something that has been a major source of criticism and investigation from the copyright bodies.

Obviously revenue in an important issue to Qtrax. Spiral Frog was another free download service that failed to gain revenue, and collapsed several months ago. Klepfisz revealed that the company had managed to acquire sufficient funding, and hopes to raise a further $50 million through their financial partners in China. Lance Ford, Chief Marketing Officer highlighted their plans to utilise ads for revenue; he “forecasts good advertiser pickup” with “high quality revenue from day 1”. Both Ford and Klepfisz believe that they will “hit the ground running” through a mixture of network ads and premium ads from blue chip advertisers; they noted that the two types of ads will integrate seamlessly into the Qtrax software to engage users, not repel them. 

I was also interested in how Qtrax is different from other services, such as the massively successful Spotify. Klepfisz responded that Qtrax would use Local Music to attract visitors. Other global services are very western, and do not utilise regional music. He highlighted that only 15% of music sales in China were for Western Artists. He also pointed out that Qtrax is a download site, and not just another Spotify. He did however preach his like for the Streaming Service, but also mentioned that Qtrax is “the ultimate step”. Furthermore, he identified that Qtrax will be easy to use with Social Networking features built around Music (as opposed to Facebook/MySpace etc, which uses music as an add-on).

Next, Klepfisz talked on the ability of Qtrax to attract users from illegal services, such as BitTorrent. His argument was that Qtrax will provide a superior user experience; a highspeed browser with “10 second downloads”, a good quality site and a full music catalogue. Another feature shows was the link in with other sites; Qtrax will link artist pages to sites such as TicketMaster and Amazon, providing users with the ability to buy merchandise and concert tickets from within the software; something that will also serve as an additional revenue stream. Next Klepfisz mentioned that Qtrax will have more than just downloads like a BitTorrent site; ie. Artist Information (nothing groundbreaking).

A final point I asked the Australian CEO was about DRM and Portability. Unfortunately Qtrax will use the system to track music usage. In addition, music will only be playable within the Qtrax player, (in order to keep users within the environment). A good piece of news on this subject was however that Portability would be available up to two weeks after each territory launch. Unfortunately, iPods won’t be supported at immediately, however Klepfisz promised that Qtrax will investigate possible deals with Apple on the issue. He promised that an iPhone App was in the pipeline. 

It’s great to hear that Qtrax may finally be coming. The service has been several years in the making, and has always been hope that free, legal music would happen. My only concern now is on uptake. If the company can do a ‘Spotify’ and capture the youth market, then may have a hope. A large user base would be the necessary bargaining chip for the company to survive and ultimately succeed in a notoriously tough industry. After all,  that’s Show Business.    

JK  

Qtrax, a service hoping to offer unlimited free music downloads in exchange for ads, is being sued by Oracle USA, in a lawsuit filled in the California Northern District Court, on July 21st.

The service, which has been riddled with setbacks and delays, had finally announced a Global Launch on the 22nd July 2009. However, the company failed to reach this, with the site still advertising it’s Preview version, with downloads suspended since the 21st: the date of the lawsuit. Are they related?

Qtrax uses Oracle software to power it’s music database. The exact reason for the lawsuit,  is as yet unknown, and Qtrax has kept tight lipped. Unfortunately, it looks like Qtrax will yet again fail to launch.

JK

This is just a quick post in tribute to Michael Jackson. He was a great performer, singer and dancer, and his music is and will always be the stuff of legend.

JK

Tonight is Eurovision, and I will be watching and supporting the UK. Below is the first rehearsal of Jade Ewen, and I am very impressed. She has a great voice, and this is well worth a look:

JK

The Pirate Bay founders have now be sentenced to one year in prison, and a huge £3 Million fine. There site is the webs biggest illegal file sharing website, and home to free downloads of Music, Videos and Software. But will this be the end of the site?

I don’t believe so. The site has already survived a raid, and if it did go down, there’s always another site to instantly take its place. But I don’t believe this is the real question. The question we shoudl be asking is one of morality: Is file sharing right?

Of course, the content creators need to make a living; their job is making Music/Movies/Software or whatever. But are any of these people empoverished? Madonna/Britney Spears/Take That? The music industry is worth several billion dollars. 

The Internet has arrived, and its popularity is reflected by the huge number of users of Facebook and Myspace. The Music and Movie industry need to embrace this. Record Artists make a huge proportion of their money through Touring and Merchandise. If the music is out their, then maybe more people will start listening to it. I believe that the time has passed from where Music was paid for, and delivered in physical form. Piracy will never be defeated, beacause so many people are not willing to pay for their music anymore. The Industry should stop being in denial of this, and accept it, and develop.

JK

It’s nothing personal Lady Gaga, but you are kind of weird. With three inch false eye lashes and an “out-there” fashion sense, your hardly conventional. However, your music is amazing, and Just Dance is a fantastic song! The fact it was number 1 here in the UK proves it.

See the video below:

JK

Alexandra Burke is this year’s winner of the nationwide talent search, the X Factor.

Her first single, a cover of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah has already reached the number 1 spot, and out sold Leona Lewis’ Run.

But some are not happy. Hallelujah is a special song, that took Cohen 5 years to write, and the late Jeff Buckley’s version, (which is currently number 2), is regarded as the definitive version of it. How dare Simon Cowell manufacture the song?

I disagree with their arguments. Hallelujah is an amazing song, but I think anyone has a right to sing it. That is the intended point of a song; to be sung. The song gives praise to God, and I believe this is something to be shared.

Why should she not sing it? Just because it has brought the song to the public’s attention. It’s a good version too; perhaps not as simple but effective as Buckley’s, but still a good cover. And the nation agrees.

JK

Britney’s performance on the X Factor last Saturday has been heavily criticized in the press. To some extent I agree; the performance wasn’t as good as it could have been. It was disappointing that she didn’t sing live, and she was thinking a lot when she was dancing, which disrupted it’s “natural flow”. However, I think she should be given a break. She’s had a tough year, and it’s great to see that she’s coming over the hill from that. Her confidence will surely grow again, and we’ll see her back on top soon.

When she performed Womanizer on Star Academy in France, her performance was better I thought. See it below:

UPDATE: This video has now be removed because of TF1. See the X Factor video instead.

JK

Same Difference, from last year’s X Factor performed on yesterday’s result show. They followed in the footsteps of Mariah Carey, Leona Lewis, Take That and Celine Deon. All those artists sang live, and they haven’t even been competitors on the show. Then it was Same Difference’s turn. And they mimed. It was terrible miming too, and if that wasn’t enough, you could hear that there voices had been enhanced, because the song had almost quite an ‘electronic’ ring to it. Then, at the end when they spoke the sound became completely muffled. Wow. Watch it for yourself below:

It’s despicable for them to Mime on the X Factor. Being contestants who sang last year, they should have done the same yesterday. Big difference.

JK

Spotify is a new music service, where you listen to as much music as you like for free! It all runs through it’s very well designed client, and the service has all the latest music.

Getting an invite to the service was the easiest! Luckily, I managed to win a competition to get an invite; the code arrived today in my inbox!

Downloading the software was very quick, and installing even more so! I only had to make one click inside the installer window!

Once installed I opened the program. I was shocked! It look almost identical to iTunes, except with no prices! The choice was good; ‘Funhouse’ by Pink and ‘Human’ by The Killers were just two of the available albums.

You would expect with such a service, (especially one in beta) would be very slow to load. Not at all. The songs start straight away, and actually, quicker than in Napster or  in iTunes. Neither have I had any problems with the streaming.

The service is also meant to have ads, but after 20 songs, I’ve only heard one of these, which lasted about 15 seconds or less. It was for Xbox Guitar Heroes, and I didn’t really bother me much.

The only thing that could improve the service would be the ability to download the songs free as MP3s! Here’s hoping. If it wasn’t for my Napster subscription, which allows me to download, than I’d probably switch to it.

So, if you want to give the service a go, I have some invites to give out. The first commenter’s on this post will be sent one each, (to as many as I get).

Update: 30.1.09 I have just recieved new invites. Please comment below. Due to the high number of requests, I will give priority to those who have commented elsewhere on the blog. Thanks.

JK