Inside Google

The story that Google is going into the music business, first floated by Tech Crunch last fall, has returned with CNet’s Greg Sandoval citing “multiple music industry sources” saying the launch could come this fall.

Google has already signaled that it wishes to give users of phones equipped with Google’s Android operating system a better music offering. At Google’s I/O conference last month, the search engine offered attendees a demonstration of a Web-based iTunes competitor. Also TechCrunch reported two weeks ago that it discovered a “Google Music” logo hosted on Google’s domain.

The idea is to combine Google search with a downloading and/or streaming capacity. The music industry, squeezed by iTunes’ dominance, would welcome the move, according to Sandoval.

A Google-backed challenge to Apple’s dominance of legal online music sales would be warmly welcomed by the top labels. They have tried for years to convince heavy hitters such as Google, Facebook, and AOL to take on iTunes.

But if Google Music takes down iTunes, notes Andrew Orlowski at the Register, consumers could simply find themselves with a different monopolist.

If Google were to employ the same ruthless approach to music as it did with books, Google Music could be a serious challenger not just to every music retailer on the planet, but every producer and rights owner too. We’ll have to see if the company has been chastised by the experience, in which governments eventually turned against the landgrab. I suspect it hasn’t.

Inside Google has reported on the search giant muscling its way into new online markets. Playing the same song here?