French iTunes law now, um, law; Apple takes stand against Scandis

Last we heard, the France's Constitutional Court had approved the iTunes law -- altered, mixed up a bit, but still generally intact -- for the final signature by President Jacques Chirac. The President, of course, has now signed the bill, which among other things now effectively mandates a regulatory committee to oversee DRM issues in the country when formed this fall. According to USA Today, Apple appears to have fallen silent on France for now, but they certainly weren't entirely reserved on one of the other FairPlay-challenging motions in the region. In a 50-page statement released to the public by Norway's consumer agency, Apple appeared rather vocal with regard to the Scandi iPod regulations and laws currently being erected. Their take? You guessed it. Apple was described as "defiant," and apparently appeased few of the demands made by the consumer ombudsmen attempting to bring order to the situation, only causing further frustration and vexation for consumer advocates and, well, consumers. In a nutshell, Apple expressed their disinterest in changing their business model to accommodate Scandinavian consumers' demands; if you found anything in this post at all surprising, you probably haven't been reading long or paying much attention, but if there's any one thing that's clear, it's that things are going to get much harder for Apple Europe before they get any easier.

Read - iPod law now law
Read - Apple defends selves against Scandinavian consumer groups

[Revrant @ Aug 4th 2006 8:54AM]

Apple and Microsoft in Europe, well, I suppose they DO have something in common then, don't they?

[Poopmaster @ Aug 4th 2006 9:15AM]

Do you really think that European governments reflect the wishes of the citizenry? Honestly? Do you really think that the citizens of Europe thought that giving up their currency, their borders, their weights and measurements was a good idea? Do you really think that Denmark citizens hate the iPod? Or could it -- no, of course not -- be another attempt at extortion from the government? (Apple doesn't have years of illegal activities under its belt like Microsoft does. Don't forget, PC drones, we know our competitor!)

Perhaps the Danish government should go talk to the music labels and get them to agree to their rather demands. Of course it's just much easier to go after Apple who's done all the heavy lifting and then excoriate them for being "difficult". It's politics and analysis as usual.

The only point they have is Apple's ability to change the terms of the license after the product is sold. That's B.S. Everything else they want is just more extortion.

[rich @ Aug 4th 2006 9:20AM]

The only solution I see is to make all DRM, Apples, Microsoft, Sony.. etc. compatible with all media players and OSes.

You must remember that Apple OS users cannot use Microsoft's DRM, but the Apple DRM can be used by MS OSes.

[Ihar `Philips` Filipau @ Aug 4th 2006 9:30AM]

Might such law accidentally force M$ to disclose its restrictions management scheme? After all M$ and Apple are the same as DRM concerned: closed, proprietary technology made to please RIAA execs.

[Ihar `Philips` Filipau @ Aug 4th 2006 9:53AM]

M$ remark. I much more concerned about M$ licensing terms which are exclusive: once vendor signs into M$ DRM, it can support only MP3 & WMA, leaving aside alternative formats: OGG/Vorbis, MPEG4/AAC, Ape, Flac.

Before that madness with subscription services, it was possible to buy a player with bunch of formats supported. Now as "progress" goes on, the choices are becoming few. And not because some format become both standard de jure and standard de facto, but because of (again) exclusive deals.

[inlogic @ Aug 4th 2006 11:15AM]

"Do you really think that European governments reflect the wishes of the citizenry? Honestly? Do you really think that the citizens of Europe thought that giving up their currency, their borders, their weights and measurements was a good idea? Do you really think that Denmark citizens hate the iPod? Or could it -- no, of course not -- be another attempt at extortion from the government? (Apple doesn't have years of illegal activities under its belt like Microsoft does. Don't forget, PC drones, we know our competitor!)"

I am a citizen of one of the countries that belongs to the European Union, and I DO THINK it was a good ideia. And if you are a citizen of one of those countries in the European Union, you have no Idea of the developments through the entire European Union in the last 15 years and you certainly are disconnected from reality, plus I don't see what you are whinning about EU and Apple since these questions are being raised by member-states and not the EU comission.

Regarding Microsoft, in case you didn't knew, the whole deal with EU vs. Microsoft, surged when Sun Microsystems, an American Firm too, presented a complaint against Microsoft. You can read the whole thing here:

http://ec.europa.eu/comm/competition/antitrust/cases/decisions/37792/en.pdf

I Don't know how you see it, but to me it seems that things are working, since they don't look afraid of these kinds of companies and protect the consumer and developers inside the EU. I would seriously recommend you to read the stuff in this website http://europa.eu/ so that you don't say more gibberish like that.

[Fred_og_ro @ Aug 4th 2006 2:50PM]

Hm. I'm a Norwegian and have followed this in the news regularly. It's not a matter of anti-Apple or anti-anyone. The reasoning is that you buy the music, not the format! With the current model the consumers are forced to use iPods only.

Now, how they can get around the DRM and still keep it un-shareable is another matter. Maybe its time for Apple to release the format to other players?

[TurboFool @ Aug 4th 2006 2:59PM]

I really don't care about what the government is or isn't getting out of this. The main reason I can't stand iPods is that if you wish to legally purchase music for one via download, you're left only with iTunes as an option. And subsequently, if you then wish to purchase another brand of player, you're left without all that legally-purchased music.

Now personally, I don't buy music downloads (except the latest Barenaked Ladies release which was 99 cents for three songs in MP3 format), but instead buy the CD and rip it to the format I want. But many people are enchanted by the convenience of this concept and spend a lot of money on it. Considering there are frequently better options than the iPod for hardware, these people are now left with choosing between a better player, or the possibly hundreds of dollars they've spent on music. When compared that way, most are going to settle for the potentially-inferior iPod in order to hold onto the music thye've purchased. Seems almost like extortion to me.

If this bill and concept became common, and suddenly music purchased for one player or another was compatible, I'd actually be slightly MORE likely to buy an iPod. It's only Apple's severely-limited format support and closed-off DRM that makes me ignore even their best players (although right now my Creative Zen Vision: M bests them in nearly every way). If they actually made a unit that managed to be the best hardware available and didn't close off my options, I'd be all over it. At least until their competition managed to one-up them again.

[Myles @ Aug 4th 2006 4:01PM]

"Now personally, I don't buy music downloads...But many people are enchanted by the convenience...Seems almost like extortion to me."

The aptly named TurboFool expresses the opinion that is at the root of most of the world's problem today: (paraphrase) "I'm a smart guy, and it is my duty to protect fools from themselves. If only they would wise up and see things my way, then the world would be a better place."

[Xavier Caine @ Aug 4th 2006 10:04PM]

Some points to remember:
One, Norway is not part of the EU, and as basically all members have at one point or another shown, you can ignore the central EU legislation.
Two, this is not only about Apple iTunes, every online store with a license and ALL media stores with DRM. The thing is that Apple have such a large part of the marked with iTunes/iPod that it is natural for a consumerombudsman to go for them first.

The fact is, if you read the text from Apple, the license will change on several points. They stress that all changes on the license is for future purchases and that pointing this out is one of the changes that will be made. The DRM will probably survive, if there laywer is correct, because of the fact that intellectual property laws supersedes consumer laws!
This may be a point that norwegian consumers can ignore: iTunes Store License does not allow the use of any other player than iPod, but, allows for the consumer to burn the songs on to a CD.
The question is wether this CD is then to be seen as a protected CD, because of the contents DRM. If this is the case norwegian consumers can "brake" this protection and tranfer the music to whatever MP3 player they want.

Sorry for the long post, but..

[Revrant @ Aug 5th 2006 4:58AM]

Indeed, you ARE the Master of Poop production.

After all, Apple has never done anything unsavory, say being a hypocrite in the way that they would constantly moan about the lack of innovation, and when they become the top dog, what do they do?

Sit on their asses while the competition, much like Apple did to Microsoft, touts superior *everything* and yet remains the minority.

What else?

Oh, let's not forget their bullying of the Flash market, jacking up the prices for the consumer(STILL being bested by other players after so many years in price), while they reap an extremely comfortable profit due to decreased Flash prices.

Don't feed me the many Microsoft illegalities, every corporation has some, or will, eventually, there's no Corporate purity, no matter how White and Pure the plastic on the outside is.

PC Drones, Yeah, Mac Sheep.

Myles: You take someone's point, as laden as it is with proper logic, and essentially call them an idiot, takes one to know one might apply here.

Despite a few mistakes, exactly Xavier, those claiming extortion of Apple need to plop the Cud from the mouths, stop Baa-ing with cute earphones on, and look at the details instead of crying out without thinking, this move is for the consumer, and in no way benefits the governments associated with it.