>In other words, what’s the value of the cloud when the cost of storage is declining
>precipitously? Or, conversely, what’s the point in buying lots of storage — however
>cheap it is — when we all have access to the cloud pretty much whenever and
>wherever we want?)

I think it’s easier to see the benefits of each when you consider things other than music. The value of the cloud is the dealing with the syncing problem. Personal storage is great for music and distrust of the cloud. The biggest problem I see with the cloud is bandwidth and latency. US home bandwidth is pretty pathetic still. But whether distributed computing usage patterns are any different in Japan or South Korea, I don’t know.