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Filed under: Audio, Internet, Windows, P2P, Beta

QTrax launches free, legal, and limited P2P music app

Qtrax
Want to download popular music without paying and without breaking the law? Qtrax is a new advertising-supported service that lets you download music from two of the four major labels, Universal and EMI as well as several smaller labels. The service uses a modified version of the Songbird Media player to let you search or browse for music and download tracks. Some music willbe available through P2P connections while music from Universal and EMI will be hosted on Qtrax servers.

The files use Windows Media digital rights management and are designed to be played with the Qtrax media player. But once you play a song using the Qtrax software and acquire a valid license key, you shold be able to play it using the media player of your choice. The one thing you cannot do is transfer songs to a portable media device like an iPod. That makes sense, since Qtrax makes money by showing ads while you search for and listen to music. There's no particularly good way to do that on a mobile device.

The music selection is somewhat limited at the moment. Not only are Sony and Warner Music Group tracks missing, but there are plenty of albums that show up in the Qtrax interface even though the songs are not yet available for download. But since the service just launched in beta, we're willing to cut Qtrax some slack.

The Qtrax client is Windows only for now, but a Mac version is in the works.

[via Silicon Alley Insider]

Filed under: Video, Apple, Microsoft

TSA videos MacBook Air X-ray. Mis-judges target audience.

Macbook Air
Earlier in the year, at least one blogger was stopped by drooling unprepared TSA agents rightly wary of the so-far-unseen beast known as a MacBook Air. Of course, the incident brought to the TSA's attention the fact that the MacBook Air might not be your conventional laptop, and that agents might mis-identify the machines as something more suspect. Thankfully, the administration responded, giving MacBook Airs the green light, and promised to try and X-ray a MacBook Air.

True to their word, the TSA has announced that they have indeed X-rayed an Air, and published a video for all the Apple-loving readers clearly wanting to gaze in awe at an X-ray of Cupertino's finest. By now you're wondering: "Why on earth is this posted here at Download Squad. I don't want to see no photos of a MacBook Air!". So here's where this tale takes a rather ironic turn: the video's certainly online, but for Mac-using fans (arguably the main target audience of the video) it's something of a non-starter because the video can only be found in the most Mac-incompatible format known to man: Windows Media Video - the antithesis of Mac-friendliness, surely?

If you want to check out the video, then be sure to download the Flip4Mac QuickTime components from Microsoft before heading on to the TSA blog.

[Via This Week in Tech]

Filed under: Internet, Video, Web services

Netflix planning streaming video support for Mac

Netflix Watch NowSure, Apple may have launched digital movie rentals from the iTunes Store, but Netflix lets you watch videos for free. Well, free if you happen to already have a monthly subscription for their DVD-by-mail service. But while iTunes videos play on a Mac, PC, or Apple TV set top box, right now you can only watch Netflix videos on a PC. That's because the company uses Windows Media DRM to keep you from saving a copy of the streaming videos.

But Netflix is working on a Mac compatible version of its online video service. Silicon Alley Insider reports that during the company's recent earnings call, Netflix announced that Mac support could be coming sometime in 2008. Of course, there's a good 11 months and a few days left in 2008. And since Netflix didn't offer specifics, we're going to go out on a limb and say you might not see Mac support until leaves have grown on the trees and then started to change color. But we'd love to be proven wrong.

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