Your Music in The Cloud,...the big three options...so far
Here is how it works, you have music, video, pictures....files. You want to access them anywhere. Home, on vacation, at work, at play, but how do you do it? Introducing the battle of the cloud players, Google, Amazon and Apple. All three services work this way, you upload your files to their servers and use them on your portable device, computer or any device with Internet access. Here is a quick breakdown of what all three offer you.
Google Music
It's free for now, Google has not disclosed what any future pricing may be
You can store 20,000 songs on their servers
Songs need to be uploaded
You can stream them to any device with Internet access
You need a google email account to use the service
Amazon Cloud Player
5GB is free, $20 for 20GB up to $1000 a year for a terabyte. Music purchased from Amazon do not count against your storage limit.
Songs need to be uploaded
You can stream the music
You can download to music to different computers/devices
You can store any type of file to the service, not just music or video
You need an Amazon Account to use
Apple iCloud
Unlimited storage for music purchased on iTunes. All other songs on your computer can be stored after paying for iTunes Match, a service that will scan all of your non-iTunes music. iTunes will try to find a match in their store, if they do, it will be available for you. iTunes match costs $24.99 a year.
There is not streaming available
You can only use with Apple devices
For a more comprehensive list of features, check out this chart compiled by CNET