The Apple rumor mill is gearing up yet again, with the blogosphere increasingly atwittter (pun intended) over the possibility that Steve Jobs will announce an iTunes in the cloud music service on June 7th at its Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco.
NME, The Electric Pig, Wired and many others have all weighed in despite scant evidence that a cloud music announcement is forthcoming. It is true that Apple likes to announce things at their gatherings. It's also true that lala.com is getting turned off a week prior on May 31st. Lastly, there has to be some reason that Apple bought lala in the first place, right?
I do know that Apple has been talking to the major labels about a service that would, at the very least, allow you to play tracks that you bought on iTunes from the cloud on any connected device. But, with the same "reality and the consumer be damned" attitude that has contributed to their decline, the major labels are claiming music from the cloud is an "additional use" and demanding more money before fans can play the music they've already paid for.
Sadly, I'm betting that June 7th is not the day that we'll see iTunes In The Cloud surface. I hope I'm wrong, and I believe that it will come. But the last time I checked, the heads of the major labels still had their heads (at least up to their ears) buried in the sand. - Bruce Houghton
