Apple signs cloud deal with Warner Music

Apple signs cloud deal with Warner Music
A frugal Google?The features that Google and Apple are working on are supposed to be much richer than Amazon's, music sources said. One surprise about the competition among these Internet titans is that Google is having a hard time licensing music. All the industry sources I have talked to say that top labels were practically hyperventilating at the possibility that Google would make a foray into the space. They were thrilled that the sector would finally see a deep-pocketed iTunes competitor, one that could match the kind of hardware and software one-two punch that Apple delivers. Google's Android mobile operating system has proven popular with the public and top handset manufacturers. Google Music could have a large audience the day it launches. That said, Google and the labels also have a history of haggling over money. Warner, the company that has already signed with Apple, pulled its music videos from YouTube in 2009 following a contract dispute. The two sides eventually came to an agreement. Here's the big question now: Is Google serious about looking for an alternative way into cloud music, or is this a negotiating tactic? I wrote this week that acquiring Pandora, which the Web's most popular radio service, might help give Google some added negotiating leverage in talks with the labels. Here's the one card, though, that nobody in the music industry wants Google to play. The search company could just decide to pull out and stick with YouTube, which just happens to be one of the Web's most popular music sites. Anyone can listen to free music there by watching the scores of music videos there. If Google chose this path, it wouldn't be the first time the search company has indicated it would launch a standalone music service and then pull out. Music industry sources said Google has expressed interest in opening a music store multiple times in the past during discussions with record-label execs. In 2009, some of the big record companies were led to believe that a Google search feature that focused on music was the start of something bigger.Google directed people, who had keyed in the name of a song into its search field, to audio previews of the track. This was later scrapped and Google didn't make another peep about music until last year, when it started talking about the cloud. So, it's not guaranteed that we will get head-to-head competition between Google and Apple some of us hoped to see. We can console ourselves with this: by all appearances, Apple's cloud-music service is on the way.