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Apple Has Completed Cloud Music Service (rumored)

26 points by kenjackson 16y ago

krosaen 16y ago
The idea of uploading and storing "my music" seems antiquated; what difference does it make if my bits are copied over there vs sharing access to the exact same bits? Given that they acquired lala.com, I hope they go with their model: you "buy" a streaming album cheaply (was ~$0.10 per song) and get unlimited streaming for good, except this time they wouldn't get acquired and refund my money for lousy itunes gift certificates :) And if in addition to the right to stream unlimited, they let you sync offline to your mobile device ala rdio or spotify, then they have a winner.
- kenjackson 16y ago
  The idea of uploading and storing "my music" seems antiquated; Except for at least a few issues: 1) Encoding quality. For CDs I ripped from the encoding quality is pretty high. I'd like the option to playback with my higher encoding quality. 2) Probably 1/5 of my music collection doesn't exist in iTunes. 3) I've never bought anything rom iTunes, so they'd have to determine what music I had locally. That seems like its fraught with peril.
  - krosaen 16y ago
    yeah, good points. I think lala was pretty good about granting access to music you already owned: - they matched your collection and automatically granted you "ownership" to anything they had license to - anything they didn't, the desktop app actually uploaded it to host on their servers so you could still host it I can't remember the encoding quality but it was good enough for quality headphones / programming for my taste.
trotsky 16y ago
Two of the sources said Google originally wanted to launch a basic locker service and an 'iTunes-like' store. In recent weeks it has suggested exploring licensing for a subscription service, they said. Weird, I doubt the bit about google in recent weeks is true. Having worked on a team building an early subscription service, I feel like I can say with some authority: There are loads of good reasons no one has been launching subscription services. Not the least of which is that people just don't seem to be interested in not owning their content, at least at the price points you need to charge to cover the licenses.
yid 16y ago
They'd win me over if they got at&t to remove the data cap for their service

26 points by kenjackson 16y ago

The idea of uploading and storing "my music" seems antiquated; what difference does it make if my bits are copied over there vs sharing access to the exact same bits? Given that they acquired lala.com, I hope they go with their model: you "buy" a streaming album cheaply (was ~$0.10 per song) and get unlimited streaming for good, except this time they wouldn't get acquired and refund my money for lousy itunes gift certificates :) And if in addition to the right to stream unlimited, they let you sync offline to your mobile device ala rdio or spotify, then they have a winner.

kenjackson 16y ago
The idea of uploading and storing "my music" seems antiquated; Except for at least a few issues: 1) Encoding quality. For CDs I ripped from the encoding quality is pretty high. I'd like the option to playback with my higher encoding quality. 2) Probably 1/5 of my music collection doesn't exist in iTunes. 3) I've never bought anything rom iTunes, so they'd have to determine what music I had locally. That seems like its fraught with peril.
- krosaen 16y ago
  yeah, good points. I think lala was pretty good about granting access to music you already owned: - they matched your collection and automatically granted you "ownership" to anything they had license to - anything they didn't, the desktop app actually uploaded it to host on their servers so you could still host it I can't remember the encoding quality but it was good enough for quality headphones / programming for my taste.

trotsky 16y ago

Two of the sources said Google originally wanted to launch a basic locker service and an 'iTunes-like' store. In recent weeks it has suggested exploring licensing for a subscription service, they said. Weird, I doubt the bit about google in recent weeks is true. Having worked on a team building an early subscription service, I feel like I can say with some authority: There are loads of good reasons no one has been launching subscription services. Not the least of which is that people just don't seem to be interested in not owning their content, at least at the price points you need to charge to cover the licenses.

yid 16y ago

They'd win me over if they got at&t to remove the data cap for their service