Aug 08

iTunes Anywhere

Call me a fool, if you want, but I don't like iTunes at all. Why? Well, the main reason is sound quality and how deep advanced settings go. iTunes is a good program for managing music, but a poor player, if you ask me. A lot of people use it for its close integration with Apple's iPods and the iTunes Store, and I fully understand them, but I would rather have a good audio player software, sync my music with my MP3 player manually, and buy audio CDs/DVDs, instead of having to move around DRM-protected tracks. Anyway, accessing the iTunes media library located at home when you're somewhere else is not that easy...but things are going to change pretty soon, as it was revealed by a new patent filing by Apple!

This is not something out of this world, since we heard about it before, and using mobile phones for various multimedia tasks, often involving control of a remote computer via the Internet, is not something new either, but what about a new version of the Apple iPhone Software able to provide both iPhone and iPod Touch users with the capability of accessing their entire iTunes media library located on a remote computer while being thousands of miles away, even without having to download the media items through a traditional sync first?

The new filing reveals that syncing could be reduced to metadata only, so the devices will end up hosting "virtual media items," while the media files themselves will remain stored on their home computers. "As a result, the user perceives that the virtual media items may be available on the [the media player]. In this manner, the virtual capacity of an electronic device may be increased," claims Apple.

Obviously, the media files will have to be accessed, but each at a time, when the user needs. Using a wired, cellular, or Wi-Fi connection with the remote computer, the file selected to be loaded will arrive to the player, and that's all!

The only problem is that you need a reliable and pretty fast Internet connection for all the above to come true, and I would rather have my data on my player, then knowing everyone could peak at my files. Just look at the recent ALPA claims in France, and you'll know what I'm talking about!

After all, even Apple said "This type of communication can be referred to as peer-to-peer interaction. In this regard, one mobile device can communicate directly with another mobile device (or) to a plurality of other mobile devices. In the peer-to-peer environment, one mobile device can communicate with one or more other electronic devices (whether mobile or stationary) in the immediate vicinity. Data sharing can be performed when such communication is available."

So...if this is going to turn into reality in the coming months, will you use it? You already know my answer, now let me see yours!