“A new Amazon.com Inc service that lets customers store songs and play them on [some] phones and computers is facing a backlash from the music industry that could ignite a legal battle,” Phil Wahba reports for Reuters. “Amazon’s Cloud Drive, announced on Tuesday, allows customers to store music files on the company’s Web servers instead of their own hard drives and play them over an Internet connection directly from Web browsers and on phones running Google Inc’s Android software.”
“Sony Music, home to artists such as Shakira and Kings of Leon, was upset by Amazon’s decision to launch the service without new licenses for music streaming, said spokeswoman Liz Young,” Wahba reports. “‘We hope that they’ll reach a new license deal,’ Young said, ‘but we’re keeping all of our legal options open.”
“Music labels were alerted of the plans last week. Only later did Amazon address the issue of negotiating licenses, one source close to the discussions said,” ” Wahba reports. “That executive called the move ‘somewhat stunning’ and said some within the media industry said the service might illegal. ‘I’ve never seen a company of their size make an announcement, launch a service and simultaneously say they’re trying to get licenses,’ said the executive, who requested anonymity because the discussions were not public.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: So desperate was Amazon to claim “first” with their iPod-, iPhone-, and iPad-incompatible music service that they neglected to have licensing in place before launch? Stunning, indeed. Google TV repeat.
Gee, which “music locker” service people will use, the one that works with their iPods, iPhones, and iPads, or one of the many that don’t? Amazon seems to know the answer to that one already.
I’m confused,
The media industry want’s to charge us a license fee to listen/stream our music that we already bought?!?!?
Can someone explain that one to me?
The RIAA want to dick AMAZON for providing a method for streaming. And yes, it’s insane. We are dealing with the RIAA after all, the morons who just asked for over a $TRILLION$ in compensation from LimeWire for serving 11,000 songs, the morons who almost killed Internet ‘radio’, the largest free source of music marketing on the planet, with massively inflated royalty fees.
If it’s the RIAA: It’s got to be insane.
What I find utterly hilarious about all this is that I have been able to stream my music from ‘the cloud’ from anywhere on the planet with an Internet connection FOR YEARS! It’s called MobileMe, formerly .Mac.
Just toss your tunes in your Public folder! Surf there and play away! Couldn’t be easier! Get bent Amazon! Bite me RIAA!
!!!!
Oh, the tech ignorance of the world…