China's Baidu may not link to licensed music after all

An announcement earlier this week that seemed to indicate that China's Baidu would start linking to licensed music downloads may not have been the major step it first appeared to be for the search company.

Qtrax, an ad-supported music download service, said on Monday that Baidu would direct some users performing music searches to Qtrax. The statement appeared to mark a big shift for Baidu, which has been criticized for years for allowing its music search results to link to pirated copies of songs on third-party Web sites.

But comments from a Baidu representative on Wednesday did not seem to confirm that it would direct any users to Qtrax. "The partnership with Qtrax regards text-based information, such as singer backgrounds; it has nothing to do with the music itself," the Baidu representative said via e-mail.

No links to Qtrax appear to be showing up yet in Baidu's music search section or on its entertainment portal.

Qtrax, which runs what it calls a global music download service, says it has support from the major music labels and that its service will launch in China next month.

Baidu earlier this year said it was considering revenue splitting or another form of cooperation with music labels. The company said it was working with multiple labels to find a mutually beneficial form for its music search.

Baidu is by far the dominant search engine in China. It handles about two-thirds of online searches performed in the country, with Google in a distant but clear second place, according to local consultancies.

The popularity of Baidu's free music download search helped lead Google to launch its own competing service. Google this year expanded its ad-supported music search, offered only in China, after reaching deals with major music labels. Baidu has followed Google by moving toward a music search based on such deals.

Baidu and Google continue to unroll other services as well to win users from each other. Most recently, Google has enabled search by voice in Mandarin Chinese for Nokia S60 series phones, letting users input search terms by speaking them, the company said this week on its blog. Phones in that series, including the Nokia E71, are popular among well-off Chinese users. Google voice search in Chinese will later be offered for the iPhone and Android-based handsets, the state-run China Daily said, citing a Google engineering vice president.

IDG News Service

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