Google Drive has been spinning around in the rumour mill for months now, but according to word from the Wall Street Journal, the cloud storage service is set to go live any moment now. Will a seamlessly integrated storage service drop a bomb on rivals like Dropbox? Read more
It seems that iTunes Match is available in the UK. Or is it? We’re not entirely sure, and nor is iTunes. We’ve had confirmed reports of the service going live for some users, only to not actually work. Read more
Steve Jobs’s biography is out on Monday. And a number of deliciously confrontational quotes from Apple’s late leader are causing a stir in the run up to its release. Yet while Jobs’s distaste for Android is laid bare, there’s a fascinating hint about new features which could put iCloud right up against Google Docs. Read on for all the details.
iCloud is now out for all Mac OS X Lion and iOS 5 users, quietly working its way in the background to store all your important details and data in a server in a faraway land. It does also work with PCs however, something Apple hasn’t made much of a song and dance about. If you’re a Windows iPhone user, you’ll want to check out this free new download which lets you monitor it straight from your desktop.
That iTunes Match music streaming video we saw yesterday might not be as simple as it first seemed. While the clip from Insanely Great Mac appeared to show the iTunes cloud service streaming songs directly from Apple’s servers, AllThingsD has heard from an Apple spokesperson that things are slightly more complicated. Apple says that what looks like streaming is really the ability to listen to the song while its downloading to local storage.
Apple is keeping its cards close to its chest about precisely how the iTunes Match service will work when it launches for real in the US later this year but it seems it will feature very limited caching for songs. A music industry source told All Things D that while Apple has streaming rights, it doesn’t trust mobile networks to effectively handle on-demand streaming. That’s a little odd since Spotify seems to be doing just fine.
Out TBC | £TBC | Apple (via AllThingsD)
There’s still no ETA for iTunes Match in the UK but the the developer beta has just gone live in the US revealing more details on how the iCloud-based music sharing service will work. The big news is that iTunes Match will allow you to both download tracks from your cloud library to a Mac or iOS device and stream them directly.
To kick off iTunes Match will scan your music library and compile a list of tracks from what it finds. Songs already in Apple’s cloud library will be streamed from a master recording at 256kbps.
Music that iTunes Match doesn’t recognise will be uploaded to iCloud based on your local copy. You’ll then be able to access the cloud library of up to 25,000 songs on up to 10 devices (five of which can be computers). Take a look at iTunes Match in action on video after the jump…
Here’s a wild rumour to sit alongside the latest chatter about the iPhone 5 launch: the cheaper iPhone we’ve been calling the iPhone 4S is coming, will have substantially less flash storage than we’re used to and will rely heavily on iCloud to do its magic. The new name being pinned to this currently mythical device? The iCloud iPhone. Yes, really.
It’s a pretty crazy idea but one we’ve explored in the past with our mock up of the iPod Cloud (which you can see above) which we suggested could use local storage tied to some clever caching algorithms. Read on for the full story on the rumour and the arguments for and against the iCloud iPhone…
The prospect of iTunes Replay, an iCloud-based movie streaming service which would allow you to re-download previous purchases for free, was revived in a string of rumours last week. However, reports from the US have now doused those claims with the cold, cold water of reality.
While the latest Apple TV update gave US owners the ability to stream any previously purchased TV show from the cloud, it seems arguments over rights have stopped the iTunes Replay plans in their tracks. Apple is reportedly struggling to get all the major movie studios on board and that doesn’t bode well for the UK…
