While most of the tech world was focused on the Apple event yesterday, Sony announced expansion plans for its streaming media service, Qriosity. Qriosity’s been around in the US for a few months, offering on-demand movie titles to consumers who own Sony connected devices. This week’s announcement adds five European countries to the distribution list, and includes the debut of a new “cloud-based” streaming music service, Music Unlimited powered by Qriocity.
If you’re wondering what the Qriosity expansion means, well, you’re not alone. In theory, Sony is taking on the iTunes ecosystem, but its approach is underwhelming. The company’s on-demand video library consists only of films (no TV), and while Sony has been talking about eking out a space in the home entertainment platform business (beyond hardware) for years, it’s had relatively little traction. On the music side, Sony is up against serious competitors, not only from the likes of networked music providers like Apple and Sonos, but also potentially from those in the Internet radio space, including Slacker, Pandora, and Last.fm. And it’s been a long time since Sony’s Walkman dominance.
The crazy thing about Sony is that it has all the pieces to be a major media service provider. It’s got Sony Pictures and Sony Music on the content side, and CE gear for virtually every facet of your digital media life. But having all the pieces doesn’t mean you can make a coherent whole. And I haven’t seen convincing evidence to date that Sony can put its pieces together.