US Patent 10945027 Systems and methods for networked music playback

An example zone player is configured to receive, from a cloud-based computing system, (i) an instruction for the zone player to accept playback responsibility for a remote playback queue, and (ii) data for retrieving at least a first media item identified in the remote playback queue from a cloud-based media service. The zone player is also configured to retrieve, from the cloud-based media service, the first media item and begin to play back the first media item. The zone player is also configured to request at least one additional media item from the remote playback queue and then (i) receive, from the cloud-based computing system, data for retrieving at least a second media item identified in the remote playback queue from the cloud-based media service, (ii) retrieve from the cloud-based media service, the second media item, and (iii) begin to play back the second media item.