Is Apple Buying LaLa To Kill It?

Leander Kahney ()

Lala's unreleased iPhone App. Image from Gizmodo.

Lala's unreleased iPhone App. Image from Gizmodo.

Harry McCracken at Technologizer is worried that Apple’s rumored purchase of Lala could be the best thing for iTunes – or the worst.

Harry has been testing LaLa’s as-yet-unreleased iPhone app, and it’s just like iTunes in the cloud. The app streams your iTunes music collection to wherever you are, plus you can buy new songs for a dime (well, streams of new songs).

“…all of a sudden, the iPhone’s relatively skimpy memory isn’t nearly as much of an issue, since you can stream all the music you’ve got in iTunes on a PC or Mac to your phone. You can also listen to and buy songs from Lala’s 8-million song store. It’s all surprisingly fast for a streaming service, and it even caches recent music you’ve listened to so you’re not completely out of luck if you don’t have an Internet connection.”

Harry is in love, and hopes that Apple will roll Lala’s functionality into iTunes if Apple buys the company. But he’s also worried that Apple may be buying Lala to kill it — it’s a competitive threat to iTunes.

Over at Silicon Alley Insider, the same notion is implicit in a quote from an industry insider who says LaLa’s licenses are non-transferable:

One industry source with years of experience in the digital music business is very surprised by the apparent deal. “I would be completely shocked,” he says. “None of the licenses are transferrable (not that Apple has a hard time getting licenses). Why would they buy it? Again, I’d be shocked.”

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Thing is, as far as I know, Apple has no history of buying companies to shut them down. Anyone know any examples? And as Elliot Van Buskirk at Wired points out, Apple does have a history of buying companies to kickstart new products. Apple’s iTunes was based on SoundJam.

In addition, as we reported in August, Apple is building a one of the world’s largest data centers in North Carolina. Given it’s enormous size, the new data center is likely to focus on cloud computing, perhaps hosting services like Lala’s for Apple’s giant iTunes customer base.

7 comments »

About the author

Leander Kahney

is the editor and publisher of Cult of Mac, and author of three books about technology culture: Inside Steve’s Brain, the New York Times bestseller about Steve Jobs; Cult of Mac; and Cult of iPod. Leander has written for Wired, MacWeek, Scientific American, and The Guardian in London. Follow Leander on Twitter @lkahney and Facebook.

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Posted in Apple, iPhone, iTunes, News, Rumors |

  • Pete Mortensen

    As the Cult staff’s biggest Lala fan (I’ve never been on the Spotify bandwagon), I think there’s absolutely no way that Apple shuts it down. It would be inviting an antitrust lawsuit that they would lose.

    I see instead that Apple has finally seen a new generation of music streaming sites that actually have a business model behind them and realized that they need to leap into the future. Lala is amazing; its only flaw has been the hold up on the delivery of its iPhone app. Here’s hoping the new iPod app for iPhone with Lala rolls out FAST.

  • Jamie

    Pete,

    Let’s also consider the fact that “buying Lala to kill it” is an ineffective long-term strategy for Apple. They should know that the minute Lala disappears, another small startup company will come and take its place, doing the same thing Lala was doing. Does Apple try to buy out that other company too? And then another? And then another? And then another?

    So, whatever the reason Apple wants to (allegedly) buy out Lala, hopefully it’s to make good use of the small company’s assets.

  • alen

    there is a similar app called Simplify Music 2 in the app store that will do the same thing. just like Apple bought itunes from another company, they did the same with LaLa. cheaper to buy than code your own

  • FeralFreq

    While I can’t think of companies purchased and shut down by Apple, I can think of several companies purchased, integrated and made great. Witness Final Cut. Apple has its own licenses with music providers and the clout to renegotiate them. And Steve’s reportedly favorite time of year to renegotiate- Christmas Eve- is right around the corner. Signs say Yes!

  • http://fxrant.blogspot.com Todd Vaziri

    >Apple has no history of buying companies to shut them down.

    If I remember correctly, Apple bought high end compositing software maker Silicon Grail to essentially kill their product, Chalice (and absorb any talent to help beef up Shake, which Apple purchased a few months earlier).

  • http://www.lassa-partners.com Marc Mandel

    I think if you pair this (LaLa) with the recently announced plans for Apple to build a 250,000 sq foot data center (hosting site) in North carolina, the pairing of the two is remarkable.

    That site could be the brains behind the Apple-fied LaLa and bring a whole ton of compute horsepower to the service.

    This, my friends, could be game-over time.

    Marc

  • http://www.slymiser.com Spencer

    I really think that the yet to be approved Lala iPhone app would be a great basis for the iPhone Remote App. I’ve always fount it odd that I can control my music through the iPhone, stream it to an Airport Express, but not listen to the music from computer while on the network. Lala takes it one step further and allows me to listen to all of my music on the run.

    Please Apple, do this one solid for us!