Is Amazon MP3 Headed For The Cloud?

Many in  the digital music space believe that Apple's purchase of Lala is an indication that iTunes will soon be helping consumers move their music into the cloud for everywhere access. So yesterday's announcement that Amazon had added media streaming to its online content delivery service CloudFront caught my eye.

Amazon CloudFront is primarily in the business delivering content for other online media companies like video sharing site Vidy; and the new feature enables streaming of audio and video, providing an alternative to progressive downloads where users have to download the full media file.

If Amazon can offer this service to other sites, it would not be much of a stretch for them to also offer it to consumers.  With Amazon S3 (Simple Storage Service), the company already has already become a leader in cloud based storage and delivery. 

How rights holders might react to any Amazon plans to offer music in the cloud options could be an issue. But most record labels view Amazon as a partner in their battle against iTune dominance; and particularly if ownership could be proven because it was bought on Amazon MP3 wouldn't they also be protected by "fair use" laws? 2010 could get very interesting very quickly.

More: Why Apple Really Bought Lala.