But it would be nuts to count out Google in the race to replace iTunes pay-per-download model with a cloud-based music service that is easy and attractive enough to convince non-music-buyers to open their wallets.
The tech behemoth has traditionally steered clear of music, reportedly because co-founder Sergei Brin isn't a music fan and on at least one level, Google is about addressing its co-founders needs. (The somewhat-botched launch of Buzz, which Brin apparently loved, is one example of this).
Apple has owned the digital music market since it essentially created that market with the launch of the iTunes music store in 2003. Since then, the company's one-two punch of iTunes and iPod has fended off all comers.
But were approaching a major inflection point in the short history of digital music, a time when we stop administering our own music collections on local hard drives, and instead build them online, where they can be accessed on a multitude of connected devices smartphones, netbooks, tablets, computers, televisions, bookshelf systems and cars without the tedium of managing each and every file transfer by hand.
And, piece by piece, Google is slowly laying the groundwork to be a player in that space.
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