Launched at Northern Illinois University in 2004, Ruckus was supposed to offer students an alternative to downloading copyright-infringing tracks. Owned by TotalMusic – the digital music effort formed by SonyBMG and Universal Music Group – Ruckus started as a subscription service but moved to a 100 percent ad-supported business model in 2006. At one time the service had partnered with more than 80 campuses, according to PC World.

But Ruckus couldn’t compete with the times. The service’s music held on to DRM long after DRM-free stores like Amazon MP3 launched, and even after iTunes announced it would drop copy protection.

The service shut down Feb. 6. Students trying to log in were greeted with the message, “Unfortunately the Ruckus service will no longer be provided. Thanks.”

Of course, you can blame the shutdown on an ever-worsening economy, but Ruckus had enough flaws to prevent it from competing with other services even in the most robust of financial times.

One of Ruckus’ most obvious flaws was that music downloaded from the site wasn’t compatible with iPods, iPhones or Macs. Other blemishes in the Ruckus service included a smaller library than most services, an inconsistency in file-naming conventions, no clear policy on differing between “clean” and “explicit” tracks and the inability for customers to transfer tracks to mobile devices.

Ruckus product management VP Jason Herskowitz wrote on his blog, “I only hope that someone else figures out how to crack this music-on-the-Web nut in a way that is a win for everyone in the value chain. The problem is that to make a music service a win for everyone, then they all of the famished participants have to sit at the table – and be content to let all the others have a little bit to eat, even though they are still hungry themselves.”