I'm making this third launch of QTrax, but one does lose count, don't you find? This time, at least, QTrax has got a deal with all the majors and, thus, some music to offer through it's not-at-all-clunky system:
The advertising-supported service works like this: users can download songs to a PC and move them to a portable device, but must sync the devices once a month. DRM prevents copying — it’s based on Windows Media Player 11 and the .NET framework — but also allows for tracking the number of plays and paying artists and labels based on that. Ads will be on the web, but not in songs.
About 300,000 users have been participating in the beta, according to Qtrax. The service isn’t iPod compatible but the company says it should work on a large range of cellphones and players.
Aha - nothing like the "it won't work on the music player you probably own, but providing you remember to sync every thirty days and have a device which can cope with Windows Media, why the world is your oyster" offering. Oh, and adverts. Did we mention the adverts?