More news from China – a market coveted and feared by music firms in equal measure for its size and piracy – with Google apparently about to launch an MP3 search engine to compete with local search site Baidu. Reports in the Chinese press say Google’s service will go live within the next fortnight, but only if it gets approval from record labels. Music search is a controversial subject in China, where Baidu has been repeatedly sued for the way it links to pirated music. However, it’s seen as one of the reasons for Baidu’s popularity in China, where it has a 70% market share of internet search, compared to Google’s 20%.
Google launching MP3 search engine in China
