Oops! Seems like Qtrax might of jumped the gun on their reporting that they had the blessings of the music industry. Shame, shame Qtrax. Your company is already starting on shaky ground which is not going to build customer loyalty. Seems after the report I made yesterday about Qtrax [here] the crap hit the fan.

The TimesOnline reports the following:

A website which promised to give music lovers the world’s first legal file-sharing service was forced into a humiliating climbdown today after it emerged that the company had not secured the backing of the record industry.

Qtrax, a New York firm, unveiled its service with a glitzy £500,000 launch in Cannes at the weekend, hiring stars including James Blunt, LL Cool J.

Today it emerged that none of the four major labels had done deals with the site, putting a large dent in the promised catalogue of 25 million songs and prompting allegations that the site’s founders had misled fans.

EMI, Warner, Sony BMG and Universal all confirmed that they had not agreed deals with Qtrax which would allow fans to download their music for free in return for being exposed to advertising on the site. Warner and Universal said that they were in negotiations with the site.

Qtrax’s founders insisted that they had not misled fans, and that they would not have launched the service if they had not secured the backing of the industry. They admitted, however, that the “ink hadn’t dried” on some of the deals.

So it seems some of you who commented were right. This was to good to be true. Put your music download on hold for now. Something tells me that Qtrax may just disappear over night.

What do you think? Did Qtrax mislead music lovers all over the world?

Comments welcome.

Full story is here.

[tags]qtrax, music, downloads, music industry, contracts, truthful, [/tags]