theregister.co.uk— The Norwegian Consumer Ombudsman has ruled that the Apple iTunes service breaks the law, and has given the company two weeks to fix the problem.
Jun 7, 2006View in Crawl 4
Yea well Apple could just as easily say "meh, one country... not worth it. lets just stop selling there alltogether..."I'm not an Apple fanboy, but really... sometimes it's just too much of a PITA to deal with a particular market, and it's time to say "sorry, we don't want your money that much".
I'm no lawyer, but I can tell you that "English law" is the correct term here. If you are doing business internationally, the two parties must agree which legal system will be followed for those transactions. Apple are demanding that the Laws of England and Wales should be used, whereas Norway (on behalf of its people) are disagreeing.
This ruling is unjustified. You make a song file that only your player can play. So what? I'm sure they sell Xboxes, PlayStations, and GameCubes in Norway. Do they force Microsoft, Sony, or Nintendo to make their games compatible with each other? Sure there are 3rd parties that make titles for all 3 systems, but none of them are forced to make them cross-compatible. What the other companies should do is ask Apple to allow them to make their MP3 players compatible with Ipod and give Apple a royalty.
Disclaimer: I am a Norwegian who does not live in Norway, and I like Apple computers and even Apple iPods, but I am not in favor of iTunes nor any sale of compressed music files with DRM attached.The most interesting points of the Norwegian Ombudsman's complaint against iTunes is:(1) Whether Apple can use DRM to limit their Itunes Music Files to be played on only their iPods: This is interesting because also computer software and game software are usually limited to only be useable on one type of compatible machines. If you want another version of the same software (if availlable) for another type of machine, you need to make another purchase for the other machine. It is also worth noticing that Apple's agreement with the record companiesand/or owners of the rights to the music is based on the fact that the music should be confined to use on only this one type of player. Also in this connection it is worth noticing that it is in the record companies' interest that the same music (same artist, same song) is sold as many times as possible on as many media as possible so it creates the greatest total revenue to the record companies.As seen from Apple's (and the record companies') point of view, removing the DRM (or making it playable on any MP3 etc player, it would violate the original agreement, and the entire business model would collapse. So the Norwegian legal attempt could make a domino effect of detstroying the entire business model.On the other hand, the Norwegian Ombudsman's attempt to protect the consumer against iTunes would be much better served by announcing to the same consumer that the same music is availlable in uncompressed form (1411kbps vs 128kbps) without any restricting DRM at roughly the same price if you buy the CD versus buying the compressed files with DRM from iTunes. Who in their right mind is wasting their money on this. The answer is: The same consumer who the Ombudsman is trying to protect. Moral: The Consumer obviously needs protection against his own stupidity.(2) The restriction of consumers right to compensation.If the Norwegian Ombudsman gets through with his demand that the software supplier (in tghis case a music file) is to be responsible for the hardware if damaged by a virus who presumeably got through a security hole in the software, we will see a gigantic can of worms open up making every computer software manufacturer responsible for any possible hardware damage caused either directly or indirectly by the software itself (the legal system would get very busy and tied down if this was made into law). This works against common practise in the entire software industry, and I suspect it would seriously reduce the amount of availlable software and slow down to the extreme any development of new software.I seriously do not think the Norwegian ombudsman understand the implications of his demand, especially if this became the worldwide norm.(3) Application of cooling off period to electronic sales of music and other software.This is an extremely shortsighted and ignorant demand from the Ombudsman, since obviously returning a (by that time copied) music and/or other software to the seller for a monetary refund would make it entirly unintersting for any electronic reseller of music and/or other software to operate at all.Maybe Norway will become the first entirely commercially software free country in the world!*************This much said; I agree with many other commments herin (Digg.com) that the inteligent consumer should be more than capable of buying music in a form that has no DRM attached and also is not compressed (like various downloadable music files, not only iTunes). It is simply STUPID to buy them when the same music is availlable on CD (and also sometimes LP and other formats) for pretty much the same money.And I remind you that iPods from Apple (that I personally like, and have bought several) can very well be used for playing uncompressed music files ripped from my own (and paid for) CD's. I do not have a single DRM file on any of my iPods, and they sound a hell of a lot better than any compressed iTunes file with DRM (I have tried other friend's players with such files).Cheers!
A trade agreement with a consumer must be balanced, also in the digital sphere. The Consumer Council has seen a trend where terms of agreement, technical blocks and their legal protection have led to a reduction in the rights of consumers and their opportunities to use cultural material,” Waterhouse saysI can say this in another way if you've got a windows vista system and for no reason starts to "work" and it's no virus or anything and you still have a guarantee on it and you get a new windows vista on the computer or a new pc whereas, is Microsoft fault but in the TOS saying "We are not responsible for any damages" same thing you HAVE the right for any DAMAGES caused by Microsoft to be fixed by Microsoft they can't just say : We are not responsible for any damages whereas they have done it mostly this only will work if it's in the "Time frame" by then I mean how long the guarantee is on it same thing with iTunes, the damage caused by iTunes is, you can't have their "DRM" Audio on any other Music player, mp3 due to the DRM audio, which clearly breaks norwegian law because you've bought it and have all the rights to use it on any other Music Player and should not be DRM.Most of these problems are in the digital world.
quaitempJun 7, 2006
Thank you! :D
vorpalkJun 8, 2006
Yea well Apple could just as easily say "meh, one country... not worth it. lets just stop selling there alltogether..."I'm not an Apple fanboy, but really... sometimes it's just too much of a PITA to deal with a particular market, and it's time to say "sorry, we don't want your money that much".
simonjpJun 8, 2006
I'm no lawyer, but I can tell you that "English law" is the correct term here. If you are doing business internationally, the two parties must agree which legal system will be followed for those transactions. Apple are demanding that the Laws of England and Wales should be used, whereas Norway (on behalf of its people) are disagreeing.
sithlord78Jun 13, 2006
This ruling is unjustified. You make a song file that only your player can play. So what? I'm sure they sell Xboxes, PlayStations, and GameCubes in Norway. Do they force Microsoft, Sony, or Nintendo to make their games compatible with each other? Sure there are 3rd parties that make titles for all 3 systems, but none of them are forced to make them cross-compatible. What the other companies should do is ask Apple to allow them to make their MP3 players compatible with Ipod and give Apple a royalty.
tokioJun 14, 2006
Disclaimer: I am a Norwegian who does not live in Norway, and I like Apple computers and even Apple iPods, but I am not in favor of iTunes nor any sale of compressed music files with DRM attached.The most interesting points of the Norwegian Ombudsman's complaint against iTunes is:(1) Whether Apple can use DRM to limit their Itunes Music Files to be played on only their iPods: This is interesting because also computer software and game software are usually limited to only be useable on one type of compatible machines. If you want another version of the same software (if availlable) for another type of machine, you need to make another purchase for the other machine. It is also worth noticing that Apple's agreement with the record companiesand/or owners of the rights to the music is based on the fact that the music should be confined to use on only this one type of player. Also in this connection it is worth noticing that it is in the record companies' interest that the same music (same artist, same song) is sold as many times as possible on as many media as possible so it creates the greatest total revenue to the record companies.As seen from Apple's (and the record companies') point of view, removing the DRM (or making it playable on any MP3 etc player, it would violate the original agreement, and the entire business model would collapse. So the Norwegian legal attempt could make a domino effect of detstroying the entire business model.On the other hand, the Norwegian Ombudsman's attempt to protect the consumer against iTunes would be much better served by announcing to the same consumer that the same music is availlable in uncompressed form (1411kbps vs 128kbps) without any restricting DRM at roughly the same price if you buy the CD versus buying the compressed files with DRM from iTunes. Who in their right mind is wasting their money on this. The answer is: The same consumer who the Ombudsman is trying to protect. Moral: The Consumer obviously needs protection against his own stupidity.(2) The restriction of consumers right to compensation.If the Norwegian Ombudsman gets through with his demand that the software supplier (in tghis case a music file) is to be responsible for the hardware if damaged by a virus who presumeably got through a security hole in the software, we will see a gigantic can of worms open up making every computer software manufacturer responsible for any possible hardware damage caused either directly or indirectly by the software itself (the legal system would get very busy and tied down if this was made into law). This works against common practise in the entire software industry, and I suspect it would seriously reduce the amount of availlable software and slow down to the extreme any development of new software.I seriously do not think the Norwegian ombudsman understand the implications of his demand, especially if this became the worldwide norm.(3) Application of cooling off period to electronic sales of music and other software.This is an extremely shortsighted and ignorant demand from the Ombudsman, since obviously returning a (by that time copied) music and/or other software to the seller for a monetary refund would make it entirly unintersting for any electronic reseller of music and/or other software to operate at all.Maybe Norway will become the first entirely commercially software free country in the world!*************This much said; I agree with many other commments herin (Digg.com) that the inteligent consumer should be more than capable of buying music in a form that has no DRM attached and also is not compressed (like various downloadable music files, not only iTunes). It is simply STUPID to buy them when the same music is availlable on CD (and also sometimes LP and other formats) for pretty much the same money.And I remind you that iPods from Apple (that I personally like, and have bought several) can very well be used for playing uncompressed music files ripped from my own (and paid for) CD's. I do not have a single DRM file on any of my iPods, and they sound a hell of a lot better than any compressed iTunes file with DRM (I have tried other friend's players with such files).Cheers!
kanonkasFeb 21, 2008
A trade agreement with a consumer must be balanced, also in the digital sphere. The Consumer Council has seen a trend where terms of agreement, technical blocks and their legal protection have led to a reduction in the rights of consumers and their opportunities to use cultural material,” Waterhouse saysI can say this in another way if you've got a windows vista system and for no reason starts to "work" and it's no virus or anything and you still have a guarantee on it and you get a new windows vista on the computer or a new pc whereas, is Microsoft fault but in the TOS saying "We are not responsible for any damages" same thing you HAVE the right for any DAMAGES caused by Microsoft to be fixed by Microsoft they can't just say : We are not responsible for any damages whereas they have done it mostly this only will work if it's in the "Time frame" by then I mean how long the guarantee is on it same thing with iTunes, the damage caused by iTunes is, you can't have their "DRM" Audio on any other Music player, mp3 due to the DRM audio, which clearly breaks norwegian law because you've bought it and have all the rights to use it on any other Music Player and should not be DRM.Most of these problems are in the digital world.