Music Industry Responds to iCloud Announcement With Cautious Optimism
“…How powerful iCloud could be won’t become evident until the fall, when Apple is likely to unveil the crucial song-streaming part of the service.
This will probably be part of the $25-a-year iTunes Match, which Jobs said will scan users’ hard drives for music ripped from CDs, pirated online or purchased from non-Apple stores, “match” the songs on servers and allow them to listen to it via any Apple device. To be most efficient, sources say, this process will have to rely at least in part on streaming from the cloud to the device. “It’s going to play instantaneously and beautifully,” says Eric Garland, chief executive of BigChampagne.com, which monitors music fans’ file-sharing habits. “In that moment, you’re going to be a huge streaming aficionado.”
