Posted by Matt Kolowski on Tue, Jul 06, 2010
Would you want your iTunes in the Cloud? Put the Cheezy Poofs down for a second and pause last weeks True Blood, you loser.
What does that even mean, anyway: In the Cloud?
I just downloaded the Last.fm iPhone app which has been updated to work with the new iOS 4 features. Meaning it can now stream audio in the background. OMGCOOL! Last.fm is very cool in that there is a small app that will “scrobble” your collection as you listen to it inside of iTunes. It will then know what is in your library, and shoot it up to your Last.fm account. So now, when I pop open the iPhone app and select “My Library” it will wirelessly play songs that are also in my iTunes library right on my iPhone. Very cool. But if you want it to “just work” and be completely lazy it’s not very cool at all. (note: It’s also cool in discovering new music, or something.)
So what IF iTunes knew what songs you had ripped from CDs and purchased and threw into your own library. Let’s say you fire up your iPod app on your iPhone or iPad but you haven’t transferred any songs or video to the phone, yet. Wouldn’t it be cool if the app would automatically know what music you have on your laptop? Songs would appear in the app just as if you had sync’d them. Click on a song, 2 seconds later it would play. I can dig it.
Since you use your iTunes account sign in for pretty much everything you do on an iPhone and inside of iTunes, one would think this kind of syncing would be relatively simple to maintain for Apple. One would also think this would allow for wireless App syncing from the iTunes store on your Mac, right to your iPhone or iPad. Download Doodle Jump on an iPad and it could automatically start download on your other iOS devices. The same would go for songs, podcasts and maybe even videos. Why not? It’s all using the same iTunes account info.
On the XBOX 360, Microsoft uses similar streaming capabilities on their Zune Marketplace nowadays. You can choose to download or stream a movie you rent. Less HDD space taken away from you. If I had to choose to download an HD movie to my iPad or just stream it right away, I’m not sure why on earth I would want to download the entire thing. Well, maybe if I was going somewhere without WiFi. But if I was home snuggled in bed with some pepperoni & cheese, why not choose the streaming option?
This obviously would be huge for a possible iTunes.com website where you could stream your entire library over the web to another computer, too. And also that Apple TV thing. But without iOS on an Apple TV, I doubt anyone gives two hoots about it.
Just not yet, anyway.