Beta

Music labels to Google: We're counting on Apple

If Apple rolls out a cloud music service next month, the offering could appear a little dated.

First Amazon and now Google have launched services that enable users to store music libraries on the companies' servers and access them from a variety of devices. This sort of computing via the Internet, rather than on a given PC, is known as cloud computing.

Google unveiled the beta version of its music storage service yesterday at its I/O developer conference in San Francisco. Amazon unveiled its Cloud Player and Cloud Drive offerings in late March.

But the services offered by Amazon … Read more

Music Beta vs. Amazon Cloud

Google has finally launched Music Beta, a cloud service that stores your music and lets you stream it to any browser or Android-based device. It's invite-only for now, but the beta version is free. It's not without its limitations, but we think it will certainly become a viable competitor against Amazon's recently released Cloud Player. Here, we present a chart that compares the two services.

Music Beta Amazon Cloud Player Storage capacity 20,000 songs Anywhere from 5GB to 1TB (that works out to around 740 to 152,000 songs, assuming each song is around 4 minutes long recorded at 255Kbps) Cost Free and invitation-only for now. 5GB storage for free; $20/year for 20GB, and $1,000 a year for 1TB. Songs bought on Amazon don't count against the limit. Offline options Recently played songs are automatically cached for offline listening on Android devices. You can also manually select songs/albums for offline listening. But you can't download songs to a different computer. You can download the songs to a different computer/device without restrictions. Amazon Cloud Player also uses caching to optimize streaming on Android. Free music Google provides some free samples during initial setup None Store None Yes; songs cost $0.69 to $1.29 and albums are $7 on average. There are often $3.99 album deals as well. Mobile Android app; playable on iOS via the browser Android app; playable on iOS via the browser Requirements Google account. U.S. only for now. Amazon account. U.S. only for now. Other features Custom playlists that can be synced with the cloud, intelligent mix Amazon's Cloud service extends beyond just music. Sorting New & Recent, Songs, Artists, Albums, Genres, Time, Song Title, Plays, and Rating. Songs, Albums, Artists, Genres, Time Edit song info? Yes No

Buzz Out Loud 1466: Google and the nine OS strategy, and Microsoft buys Skype (Podcast)

Huge news day today, with Google's I/O presentation packing about a day's worth of news into a single hourlong presentation--and this is just the first day. We wonder whether Honeycomb, Ice Cream Sandwich, and Chrome OS can exist in the same world, and whether the music labels will ever again get a seat at the table. Plus, why Microsoft bought Skype, cellphones getting disaster notification texts, and the New Yorker comes to the iPad. --Molly

How to use Google's Music Beta (hands-on)

Google's long-awaited cloud music service has arrived. It's called Music Beta; it's free (for now, and currently invite-only); and after giving it a test-drive, I'm happy to report that the whole system is fairly smooth.

From the perspective of the end-user, the payoff of Music Beta is to have your entire music collection in the cloud, available to stream instantly from any browser or Android-based device (phone, tablet, Google TV). Out of the box, a new Android smartphone or tablet can tap into your music collection within minutes, with no computer syncing required. That's pretty … Read more

Unlicensed Google Music arrives Tuesday

Google is preparing to launch a test version of a new digital music service that will enable users to upload their music libraries to the company's servers.

CNET reported in March that Google was testing its music service internally and was ready to unveil the long-anticipated service. And that is what Google intends to do tomorrow at the company's I/O Developer Conference in San Francisco, according to Zahavah Levine, one of the executives in charge of getting the music service off the ground.

While Google and Levine have been negotiating to obtain licenses from the four largest … Read more

Gears gone in Chrome 12 beta

Only a week after Google upgraded the stable version of Chrome to 11 , the company bumped its beta users to version 12 beta last night. Google Chrome 12 beta (download for Windows | Mac | Linux) pushed a moderate range of under-the-hood improvements to Chrome beta users, including better hardware acceleration, stronger privacy controls, and slightly safer file downloads. It also killed support for Google Gears, a move the company announced back in March.

The new beta includes two security improvements. Flash-based local shared objects, which are bits of Web sites stored locally on your computer, can now be deleted from within … Read more

Opera Next makes it easier to get 'dev'

A significant update to the Opera browser's Speed Dial feature launched today in Opera 11.50 alpha (download), along with Opera Next, which includes a mechanism that makes it easier for Opera fans to automatically download under-construction builds of the browser. Opera Next will install separately and alongside the "stable" release of Opera, sporting a silver Opera logo much like Google Chrome Canary is visually distinct from the other versions of Chrome with its all-yellow icon.

The new version of Speed Dial introduces support for Speed Dial-specific extensions. Originally developed by Opera, and now in use in … Read more

PSP does not pass Go

Links from Wednesday's episode of Loaded:

Sony has made its last PSP Go and shall make no more

T-Mobile launches an app that lets you make voice calls through Facebook

Facebook is expanding its social reporting system for users to report harassment

Microsoft offers up Office 365 as a public beta

Google opens Map Maker to Americans

AT&T closes shop on its local listing site, Buzz.com

A robot will throw the opening pitch at the Phillies game today

Microsoft opens up Office 365 as public beta

Microsoft has opened the tap on its cloud-based Office 365 and is now offering the service as a public beta for anyone to try out.

Available in 38 countries and in 17 languages, the new beta follows several months of limited testing among a couple thousand businesses that were able to kick the tires on the service. After the public beta, Office 365 will officially launch later this year.

Unveiled last October, Office 365 is Microsoft's attempt to offer businesses a cloud-based alternative to some of its traditional desktop and server products. The service combines Office Web Apps with … Read more

Norton 2012 betas tweak already well-regarded suite

New Norton betas include the ability to rate a download's stability based on the file behavior on the computers of other Norton users and full Google Chrome support, setting the tone for the premium security suite updates due later this year.

Released today by Symantec, Norton Internet Security 2012 beta (download) and Norton AntiVirus 2012 beta (download) also include a new start-up manager that debuted earlier this year in Norton 360, changes to Symantec's SONAR technology, and a new autofix feature for curing installation woes quickly.

The changes are not ground-breaking, but do appear to be able to … Read more