Interview with the Creator of gMusic: A native Google Music player app for iPhone

Hopefully you’ve had a chance to read yesterday’s summary of the different Cloud music services. Currently, of the major 3 services, the Google Music one (which is still in Beta format) is the only free one with a ridiculous amount of storage – 20,000 songs. This is great for those Android phone fools users, who get free remote access to their Google Music library on their phones, but where does it leave us iPhone users, who want to tap into Google Music on their phone and not just the web? Well, thanks to the new gMusic: A native Google Music player app for iPhone, we’re not up shit creek without a paddle.

Developed by Interactive Innovative Solutions LLC (“IIS”), the gMusic app gives iPhone users the ability to stream their Google Music library to their iPhones wherever they have an internet connection. After purchasing the app for the introductory price of $1.99 (USD), PeteHatesMusic asked the IIS software developer, James Clancey, a few questions over email, and James was kind enough to give his insights in the Cloud Wars (trademark!) and how the gMusic process came about. Hint: alcohol demand.

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PeteHatesMusic (PHM): How did the idea of the gMusic app come about? Did you approach Google, then Apple? Or was Google searching for programmers?

James Clancey (JC): I am actually not affiliated with Google or Apple. The idea for gMusic came from a late night IRC chat with some friends. People were talking about the need for a google music app for the iPhone. The issue is there is no public API for Google Music. Another friend Frank Krueger wrote an unofficial API for google plus. That inspired me to write my own Google Music API. After a day or so I was off and running.

PHM: Are you surprised that Apple is allowing easy access to the Google Music “cloud”, when they themselves are trying to launch their own iCloud service?

JC: I am surprised. Apple actually rejected my app for a month straight before I was able to get it in.

PHM: How has the response to the app been? Any surprising comments, either positive or negative?

JC: Overall the response has been amazing. People have reported the bugs they have found. I am really happy with the community response.

PHM: How have sales for the app been? Are they higher than you expected?

JC: The app got popular way faster then I was expecting. There were a few articles that went around the internet. For a good 24 hours there was a tweet about gMusic at least once every 30 seconds. It was awesome.

(insert jealousy….)

PHM: Can you comment on the likely long term success of the 3 major competitors in the Cloud service market: Amazon vs Google vs Apple. What would make someone choose one over the other?

JC: Unfortunately only time will tell. All three are great services.

PHM: Do you see Google charging for their Google Music storage in the future? The Google storage of 20,000 songs far exceeds the 5GB that Apple’s iCloud offers, and over and above the 5GB is where the iCloud payment plans begin.

JC: Google tends to keep their products free as long as possible. So hopefully this will ring true for Google Music.

(note: PHM hopes so, too!)

PHM: I have been very impressed by the start up time of the gMusic app, as my songs played in less than 3-4 seconds, without any skipping or buffering problems. Do you think the success of the gMusic app and whatever success the iCloud may have will lead to a large decrease or elimination of physical media, and potential portable music players outside of smartphones?

JC: Google’s goal for a few years has been to move us away from physical media. The Chrome Net-book stores pretty much all of its information on the cloud. I do not see this trend going anywhere anytime soon.

PHM: How does the gMusic app differ from the web-based Google Music site? What do you see as the advantages that the app has?

JC: The most obvious difference is Native vs Web based. You really get a better experience and performance when things are native. Also with a native app you generally get a better user experience. One other major benefit to a native app is the ability to store music for listening offline.

PHM: Any planned upgrades or new features in the near future?

JC: There are lots of enhancements that are currently in the works. My priority list for enhancements is purely user driven. The goal is to build an app truly for the users. A few upgrades that I am working on right now are, Last.fm support, Album Cover flow, and an iPad interface.

James also pointed out that IIC made aMusic, the Amazon equivalent of the gMusic app. This actually started when James was having issues getting gMusic approved – that’ll show them! Both aMusic and gMusic share the same exact interface, which will hopefully giving the users the same exact experience regardless of which service they use. A version for MP3Tunes.com is in the works by IIC. It seems like they have the third party cloud market covered!

Check out the app and let us know your thoughts. My biggest problem was that there seemed to be an awful lot of Spice Girl songs on my Google Music – where the heck did THOSE come from…..