iTunes Match on iOS 6 Beta Enhanced

iTunes in the Cloud, aka, iTunes Match.

Remember iTunes in the Cloud? Remember Apple praising it for being something that would both revolutionize cloud storage of music and transform your life? Well iTunes Match since its inception has been a mixed bag of results depending on who you talk to. For me personally, iTunes Match as been great, I store all my songs in the cloud and they no longer took up space on my iPhone.

This praise cant be said for all. Many people, including friends of mine complained about iTunes match because of missing album art work, slow at playing music from song to song, and eating through data because iTunes Match downloaded each song to their iPhone or iPad. The question became, if Pandora basically preforms the same functions of iTunes Match, why does iTunes Match suck so much? Why can't iTunes Match stream faster much like Pandora?


Well, on iOS 6 Beta 1, iTunes Match is now a full streaming As noted by Apple 'n' Apps, in the iOS 6 beta. Songs can be downloaded or streamed, with streaming being the default playback option:

"iTunes Match has become a streaming service in the beta. We confirmed it, by playing a few songs, then turning off iTunes Match, and seeing that the music folder then had no music. In iOS 5, the few tracks you listened to are stored. The various playlists, artists, and songs also drop the cloud icon next to them, and those are reserved for the album view, and a little bit off to the side."








You can purchase iTunes Match for $24.99 a year from iTunes if this intrigues you. However, I would hold off until iOS 6 when Apple officially makes changes to iTunes Match.