Sony BMG became the third major to license its tracks to legal P2P system Qtrax (read press release).

The New York Times has an article today on Qtrax. According to Qtrax's president, the company is in talks with Universal Music Group and Merlin, an indie label trade group. News.com reported today that former SpiralFrog CEO Robin Kent is doing consulting work for Qtrax.

To call Qtrax a file-sharing service is misleading. So what if Qtrax uses the Gnutella client? There's no actual sharing of licensed tracks between users, and the protections glued into Qtrax files are nothing like the unprotected files acquired through real P2P. Though the Qtrax site boasts "unlimited free downloads and plays," the Times article said "listeners will be able to hear songs a certain number of times — probably five in the case of most major label acts" -- before they must purchase the song. (And what protected format that does not work with the iPod will users get to purchase?)

The Times' Robert Levine gets it wrong. "From the user’s perspective, Qtrax works much like any file-sharing program," he wrote. That's not true, and because that's not true Qtrax has a very tough hill to climb. I don't have much faith that its initial model will get anything more than a tiny niche of users.

[music jobs] HR Manager at EMI NA; New York, NY.