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Only hours ago, AppleInsider uncovered a patent filed by Apple Inc. that would allow iPhone/iTouch users to wirelessly stream music from their iTunes libraries to their iPhones/iPod Touchs.

One of the major kinks that Apple encountered when developing this technology was the fact that the actual music files (.mp3, .mp4, etc) were way too large to be transferred in large quantities (e.g. an entire iTunes library.)

New versions iTunes and the iPhone Software could theoretically eliminate this problem by syncing only the metadata — or tiny files containing the barebones attributes of each media item or playlist but not the content itself — from a user’s iTunes library to their portable devices.

This means that you wouldn’t have the actual music files on your iPhone/iTouch, instead you would have a "key" so to speak that would unlock the song, which would of course be stored on your PC/Mac.

Not only would this new technology allow you to play music from your iTunes library in its entirety, it would also eliminate the need for more storage capacity (smaller iPhones/iTouchs anyone?)

In addition to being able to communicate with PCs/Macs, this new technology might also allow iPods/iTouchs/iPhones to communicate with one another, utilizing the same features as mentioned above.

"This type of communication can be referred to as peer-to-peer interaction. In this regard, one mobile device can communicate directly with another mobile device" or " to a plurality of other mobile devices," Apple said. "In the peer-to-peer environment, one mobile device can communicate with one or more other electronic devices (whether mobile or stationary) in the immediate vicinity. Data sharing can be performed when such communication is available."

[AppleInsider ]