Traffic swamps new Canadian music service

October 17, 2003

BJC used our news submit to tell us that Canadas first online music service is an overwhelming
success. They can't handle the traffic and have put up a notice that the site is
at full capacity. Please return later.

"Due to
overwhelming publicity, our store is currently at full capacity," the
message said. "Please return shortly."

It's unknown how many visitors the Web site had in its
first day or how many songs were downloaded through the service. Officials
at Moontaxi Media Inc., the company behind Puretracks.com, could not be
reached for comment yesterday.

One source close to the company said the demand for a
music download service in Canada was underestimated and the volume of
traffic caught Moontaxi off guard.

"They've had 10 times more volume than they
anticipated," said the source. "They're victims of their own
success."

More than 175,000 songs are available on
Puretracks.com, including music from the five major labels: BMG Canada,
EMI Music Canada, Sony Music Canada, Universal Music Canada and Warner
Music Canada.

Most songs on Puretracks.com sell for 99 cents each.
Music fans can also download entire albums, with prices ranging from $
9.99 to $ 13.99.

For the short time it has had it's
online store, Puretracks.com had its share of traffic related
issues yesterday and Tuesday. "I had a lot
of problems Tuesday evening, not to mention a lot of errors when just surfing
the site," Puretracks.com patron Andrew McKinnon said.

The site is still down as of Thursday, 9pm mountain
time.

Source: thestar.com