Apple

Apple’s  acquisition of online streaming music company  Lala.com last year was seen as the Cupertino based company’s foray into cloud computing services, it made sense. Google  already was successful in its cloud based ventures (gmail, picassa and related services), Microsoft was focussing big time with online collaboration getting extra focus in  Office 2010 version. When Apple acquired Lala, the thinking among some music insiders was that Lala’s local scanning and internet streaming technology would we deployed to serve the users hard-drive-based iTunes music libraries from the cloud. Many months after the acquisition we still are to see where Apple is going with Lala.

Delays launching a cloud music service may have definitely disappointed a section of iTunes users, but if rumors are to be believed, Apple is focusing resources on a cloud-video service.  Sources at the film studios have said that Apple plans to create “digital shelves” that enable iTunes users to store movies and other media on Apple’s servers. This service definitely would be a useful one, especially, it would be welcomed by those who have maxed out hard drives with videos. This news does makes sense, in view of  Apple’s plan to open a 500,000 square foot data center in U.S at a cost of $1 billion. What better facility to serve up 99 cent streaming TV rentals to a completely overhauled Apple TV in the home and to the highly mobile Apple devices.