Remote iTunes Streaming to iPhone or iPod Touch?

[MacRumors]

A new patent application (as detailed by AppleInsider) by Apple reveals that Apple has been working on the ability for iPhone and iPod touch owners to wirelessly stream content from their at home iTunes library for use on the road.

At present, iPhone or iPod touch owners must selectively sync content from their Mac or PC's iTunes library. This transfers those items to the mobile device for later playback. Apple is proposing that mobile device owners could instead access their entire collection over Wi-Fi or cellular networks:

New versions iTunes and the iPhone Software could theoretically eliminate this problem by syncing only the metadata -- or tiny files containing the barebones attributes of each media item or playlist but not the content itself -- from a user's iTunes library to their portable devices.

Only a directory of the content would be copied to the device itself. When selected for playback, the device would remotely access the owner's Mac or PC to stream the content.

Apple presently offers similar functionality through their Apple TV and Airport Express, but these are limited to local Wi-Fi networks only. As with all patent applications there is no word on when or if Apple will implement these features.

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[Khryz]

These things just keep getting better and better. Go Apple.

 

[TheSlush]

Storage capacity rendered meaningless! (For song storage at least.)

 

[sunfast]

Wow. This is superb news

 

[iOrlando]

If only Wi-Fi networks are more easily accessible. yes its easy to set up one at your house, or go to coffee shop/airport etc... but seriously its still so limited...

 

[Full of Win]

I was just thinking about how cool this would be, just a few hours ago. At the time, I also thought the power draw with the WiFi being in constant use would be just too much to make it uesful.

 

[heads up]

i would LOVE to see a cheap new ipod touch/iphone with no internal storage, because you just stream whatever you want to the ipod.

brilliant idea apple!

 

[Small White Car]

Storage capacity rendered meaningless! (For song storage at least.)

Yeah, who would have guessed that in the future (when fast, wireless networks really ARE everywhere) all iPods will only have 512 MB of memory and they'll wonder why ANYONE would have wanted a 32 GB cell phone!

 

[P-Worm]

This would be great. Although my 16GB Touch has enough space for me, I hate having to pick and choose what I take. The only problem is that there aren't enough Wi-Fi hotspots.

P-Worm

 

[nomadicon]

This would be a lot like SlingBox capability, would it not? I'm all for it, too, since I have, to date, been unsuccessful in my attempts to cram 59GB of music and videos onto my iPhone.

 

[zedsdead]

Hope it works better than back to my mac, which doesn't work.

This idea is really only great if it can work over the cell networks, as wifi is not widespread enough.

What would be also great is wireless streaming of content to the Apple TV.

 

[11800506]

that sounds very interesting but when I'm away from home it's hard to find wifi. Im assuming this system works only with songs you don't sync, not all of them.

 

[Yvan256]

Please also sync (or give the option to sync) the cover artwork (for music, movies, etc).

Coverflow on Wi-Fi/GSM/3G would be too slow IMHO.

 

[slu]

This would be awesome.

I really want a touch or iPhone, but I can't justify it because I can't fit my iTunes Library on it. If this were the case, I'd drop my 160GB classic and go straight to the iPhone.

 

[JAWWC]

Is this not just the same as PS3 and PSP remote play? except that can do games and dvds as well.

 

[Yvan256]

Yeah, who would have guessed that in the future (when fast, wireless networks really ARE everywhere) all iPods will only have 512 MB of memory and they'll wonder why ANYONE would have wanted a 32 GB cell phone!

Except that in the future, 512MB of 32GB will cost about the same.

 

[padrongus]

Remote Buddy does this already and it works very well.

 

[drakeshipway]

This would work if more wifi was out there. And iPods would be so much thinner, nice idea Apple

pcee

 

[Romanesq]

WoW!

Holy *****! That is off the hook.
My library is about 20K songs and I also keep about 300 on the iPhone 3G, most of it is uncompressed.

This would be insane. Insanely good.

 

[ModernDemagogue]

I don't know why people are so excited.

SimplifyMedia also already does this as well, and has been doing so for months. I can even access different iTunes libraries on different machines rather than tethering me to one library, plus it automatically pulls up band info, lyrics, etc...

 

[nilk]

Probably will need MobileMe for this

 

[collegedu3]

Holy eff! That's awesome. Hello awesomeness when I get to my completely wireless college campus!

 

[Orng]

I was just thinking about how cool this would be, just a few hours ago. At the time, I also thought the power draw with the WiFi being in constant use would be just too much to make it uesful.

It would be very useful if you drop it into a speaker dock that continuously charges the iPod.

 

[capoeirista]

Does this mean you would have to have your computer on all the time? Energy bills are getting expensive.


Nice idea though!

 

[BKF]

Is the idea that your computer would be on all the time for this to work? Sort of an energy sink, yes? Maybe instead the music could stream from your (dare I say it) .me account, or something like that.