I should think that were Apple to do this that the product that saw the light of day would have any such issues addressed.

As I mentioned recently in a podcast, I’m often asked about Apple rumors by friends, family, and acquaintances. A lot of those question about the iPhone and more recently the tablet have centered around reactionary doubts, concerns, and “I don’t see how [insert various and sundry comments].”

My mantra since the iPod’s release has often been that I wasn’t sure how Apple would address such an issue or concern, but that if the product sees the light of day, they likely will have found a way to do so.

It all comes back to that philosophy of being almost as proud of the products they reject as the products they ship.

Lala has nothing to do with cloud computing.

Except that it has everything to do with cloud computing.  Selling Web songs that are then served through the browser and are not downloaded, and scanning your drive for songs you already own and then allowing you to listen to those songs through the same browser-based interface (matching your library to the songs served by the service) are both precisely what cloud computing is about.

Hosting and streaming music is one of the very first examples of practical cloud computing. The same thing is true for such things as browser-based e-mail. It’s not rocket-science cloud computing, but both cases were important first steps on the evolutionary ride towards cloud computing.

As for your other point, Ben, I think you have it exactly wrong: Lala scans your hard drive and matches your library to those of your songs in the company’s catalog of songs. It’s not uploading them from your drive at all.  Lala’s point was to make it easy to listen to your entire library from the same source as your Web-only purchases, Lala’s player.  That, they hoped, would result in customers buying more Web-only songs.

So, this turns your entire music catalog - including songs you buy elsewhere or rip from CDs - into a browser-accessed and managed listening solution served entirely from Lala’s servers.

That is, as I understand it, the very definition of cloud computing.

So, the Journal‘s point, based on industry sources, is that Apple wants to leverage those technologies (and Lala’s engineers who have experience in this area) to turn iTunes into a a true cloud-computing service.

I should think that Apple’s end-goal will be far bigger and grander than Lala’s existing business model.