Google Music Beta-Testing Proceeding Just Fine, As Long As Users Aren't Interested In Actually Hearing Music
"Technologically speaking, then, Google Music--a streaming service users would access from Web-connected devices--appears close to being ready. However, the sources said the actual launch is being held up by the lack of one vital component. Music."
--Everybody's talking about the news that in-house testing of Google Music, the search-engine giant's attempt to enter the streaming-music space and allow users the always-sexy, if sorta amorphous, "cloud storage" option, has begun. But as Greg Sandoval of CNet notes, Google's still negotiating with all the major labels and big publishers to get the rights (read: pay money) so it can actually have music (like, say, the Pulsars' "Technology," as embedded above) stream through its service--a hitch that so many of these tech companies who are so enamored by their ability to create fancy doodads seem to forget about as they whip themselves into a "WE'RE GONNA CHANGE THE WORRRRLD!" frenzy. (Billboard notes that Sony and Universal are the alleged bottlenecks here.) This will all work out faster than you can say "Spotify launching in the U.S.," right? Oh, wait.
UPDATE: Beta invites are open now. A cute video about how all this will theoretically work--basically you upload things to Google's servers, then listen to music via the web and your Android-powered devices--is after the jump. "More time listening to music, and less time managing it," it claims. Huh! We'll see.
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