Roccatune files for insolvency

German music streaming service bites the dust

Streaming music isn't an easy business to get into.  Today, Roccatune, a German music streaming service, has filed for insolvency.

Roccatune was running an ad-funded business, which apparently wasn't enough to cut it if your streaming music.  In their blog, Constantin Thyssen, CEO of Roccatune blames its failure on a failed round of financing.

The startup, launched last summer as adTunes.  It soon had to change its name because Apple found it too similar to iTunes.  Since then, the company experienced its ups and downs.  Roccatune was completely down the entire month of July.  It also didn't pay for ads it placed on other websites like German music blog Musiktipps24, according to Techcrunch.

Roccatune functioned very similar to Last.fm.  Users could listen to free mainstream music sponsored by advertisers.  They could create playlists and if they liked the music they were listening to, could purchase songs through links to Amazon.  

Hearing stories like this make me feel subscription-based music streaming services are the way to go if you want to survive.  Spotify, another Europe-based music streaming service is nearing a $50 million dollar round from Li Ka-shing Foundation.  One key difference - besides a freemium model, Spotify also has a very neat subscription based model which costs users £9.99 per month and gives them unlimited, on-demand access to over 6 million tracks.