Amazon has launched an online music player that lets users upload and play their music from a range of devices – and the music industry isn’t happy.The cloud-based service, dubbed Cloud Player, gives Amazon users (so far only in the US) up to five gigabytes of space to upload audio files for free that can then be played on any web browser or Android phone. Users can get up to one terabyte of storage for a fee.
A spokesperson for Sony’s Music division has said the company is upset by Amazon’s offering since the service was launched without music licenses with the major record company. While Sony hopes that a license deal will be reached, the company is keeping its legal options open at this point.
“Our customers have told us they don’t want to download music to their work computers or phones because they find it hard to move music around to different devices,” said Bill Carr, vice president of Amazon’s movie and music division.
The cloud player allows users to listen to their uploaded music from a web browser or through its Android application for smartphones and tablets.
Similar cloud services exist, though contenders like Apple and Google are yet to release their own equivalent of the service. Apple owns mobileMe which allows storage and access to documents from a web browser, though does not include a music player function.
Australians can currently subscribe to services like Sony Qriocity and Anubis.fm for monthly music subscriptions with content from the four major record labels, though Amazon’s offering focuses on users playing the music they already own.
BBC News and the Los Angeles Times have pointed to rumours of Apple and Google each working on their own versions of the service.
