Google users who put the name of a song into the search engine will get, as the top result, information about the musician and an opportunity to stream the song from one of two services, Lala and MySpace Music. People who click on that link will, in most cases, get a pop-up window that allows them to play the full song once, free, and a link to buy the song.
Entering an album name or band name into Google yields similar free listening opportunities.
No money is changing hands in any of these deals, and Google is not trying to create a free music buffet on its site. While there will be text ads in the right-hand column against the search results as there is with any Google search, there are no ads in the OneBox.
The goal, said R.J. Pittman, Google’s director of product management, is to better answer music queries, which routinely account for two of Google’s top 10 searches in the United States. “The intention is not to turn the partners on Google into a free streaming music service. This is about providing a richer experience for users looking for a particular song,” he said.
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