Apple is working to secure iCloud music rights for international customers, according to CNET. The iTunes legal team is trying to get international cloud-music rights for October 4th’s iPhone event, due to the fact that Apple is expected to launch iCloud to the public at that time.
Procuring these rights would assumedly give international iCloud customers the ability to re-download music and stream tracks through iTunes Match.
CNET reports:
“Sources familiar with the discussions between Apple, record companies, and music publishers, say Apple is seeking international music licenses for its iCloud service. The licenses would be similar to those the company has already obtained for U.S. operations, the sources said. If iTunes managers wrap up negotiations in time, they could announce the offering at a Tuesday press event at Apple headquarters in Cupertino, Calif., where the company is expected to roll out the iPhone 5, the next generation of the iconic smartphone.”
According to CNET’s sources, countries like Germany, France, and the United Kingdom will all be included in the deal. While an agreement is almost wrapped up, “nothing is signed” yet.
Canada was not mentioned in the report as a country that Apple is working on procuring rights for. A previous email from Apple VP of Internet Services Eddy Cue said that Apple was “working on adding Canada” and that the company hoped “to do so after the US launch.”
iCloud and iTunes Match will give customers the ability to download songs multiple times from any authorized device and stream an digital library on the go. While iCloud will be free with limited storage, iTunes Match will cost $24.99/year and offer a customer’s music library for cloud streaming.
It was previously assumed that the UK wouldn’t get iTunes Match support until at least 2012. It’s good to hear that Apple is working to secure international rights sooner, and we hope that a deal can be closed before Tuesday’s event.
Alex Heath is a journalist who works for Tech Insider. He’s the former co-host of The CultCast. He has been quoted by the likes of the BBC, KRON 4 News, and books like “ICONIC: A Photographic Tribute to Apple Innovation.” He lives in Lexington, Kentucky. If you want to pitch a story, share a tip, or just get in touch, additional contact information is available on his personal site. Follow him on Twitter.
25 responses to “Apple Working on International iCloud Music Rights for Tuesday Event [Report]”
Always makes me giggle when international means not the USA. As if other countries do not exist.
Instead, they should be working on making sure that they have a cloud mail and calendar program that is reliable and stable.
Is this the same CNET that published its hot fall tech list of phones, tablets, laptops and desktops and didn’t mention a single Apple product? Not a credible tech source, I’m afraid.
We don’t even have an iTunes Store in South Africa. “International” almost got me excited, until I saw it was a few other countries only. :-(
Same for Latin America…. we are always stuck out of apples business vision… i guess we will never get any music service offerings for us….
Seems all the “content owners” are loosening up a bit, we just recently got movies in many more parts of Europe… I’m more interested in TV shows that iCloud Music though :p
Those lists are roundups what products people are looking for/at on their site at the moment and which products end up marked “I want” don’t worry, after tuesday the iPhone will on top again as usual…
Well Apple is an American company so for them the term international means outside US borders…
I think Apple is doing much better in thus field than many other content providers like Sony and Microsoft.
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This is a major ‘no duh’. Of course Apple is working on the rights and wants to secure them as early as possible so they can get more money from more countries. And yes they are likely hoping to have more than the US come the release day. And have probably been working to this end for a while now.
got to love the record labels for that. they and the studios need to get their heads out of the butts on a lot of these issues
who says they aren’t. This is work being done by the legal department to secure contracts. NOT the engineering department