Edible Apple

CNET reports that Google has begun internal testing on its long rumored Google Music service, indicating that a rollout may be coming sooner rather than later.

Two weeks ago someone writing at the XDA Developers forum claimed to have accidentally discovered Google Music after installing the Honeycomb version of the Android operating system on a phone. Turns out, that was indeed a working version of the service, the music industry insiders said, adding that the final version could be much different…

CNET and others have reported that Google is negotiating for the right to store users’ existing music libraries on the company’s servers, the sources said. According to a report in Bloomberg this week, the labels are in similar discussions with Apple about cloud music, the term often used to describe computing done on third-party servers rather than on a local PC.

Google has been rumored to be working on an iTunes competitor for some time now, with reports from this past September hinting that the search giant was in serious negotiations with record labels to secure licensing rights for an online “download store.”

During Mobile World Congress this past February, Motorola CEO Sanjay Jha strongly hinted at an upcoming Google Music service, stating: ”If you look at Google Mobile services [via Android] today, there’s a video service, there’s a music service – that is, there will be a music service.” Expounding on that, Jha said that a benefit of upgrading to Android’s forthcoming Honeycomb OS will be the addition of video and music services.

And so now we wait.