Steve Jobs Questioned In iTunes Monopoly Suit

An anonymous reader writes "Twelve years ago Bill Gates had to deal with lawyers questioning him in regards to the Microsoft antitrust case. Now it might be that other tech mogul's turn. Steve Jobs has been ordered to answer questions regarding Apple's iTunes music monopoly. From the article: 'US Magistrate Judge Howard Lloyd, based in San Jose, California, ruled on Monday that lawyers representing the plaintiffs in the antitrust lawsuit may question Jobs for a total of two hours. Apple may appeal the decision. A company spokeswoman declined to comment, while attorneys for the plaintiffs did not respond to requests for comment.'"

Comments

Re:Unlike Gates

[jijok]

If Windows wasn't a good OS, why are everyone using it?

Re:Unlike Gates

[Jafafa Hots]

I never realized that "good" was a synonym for "buggy, bloated, restrictive piece of shit."

Re:Bad guys

[ePhil_One]

Exactly, that bastard Steve forced the record companies to accept his tyrannical 99 cent pricing policy and allow me to burn purchased songs to CD's where they can be ripped back to MP3 free of the restrictions! We must end his monopoly on rights restricted downloadable music for the iPod! Other companies MUST be free to sell us restricted license music & video for our iPods! Unite!

How is iTunes a monopoly?

[thetoadwarrior]

Are people dumb enough not to be using Amazon for music? Even then what actually ties you to buying music from iTunes? Hell what ties you to using iTunes to get music on your iPod? I'm doing quite well without it on my Linux machine.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[ePhil_One]

Only iTunes can place rights restricted music using the native "Fairplay" DRM on the iPod. That is how it is a monopoly. Everybody else has to use unrestricted formats.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[Mr. McGibby]

Only iTunes can place rights restricted music using the native "Fairplay" DRM on the iPod. That is how it is a monopoly. Everybody else has to use unrestricted formats.

Yeah, wow. That's really stifling competition.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[Bobfrankly1]

In your haste to comment, you failed like so many others to READ.

At issue is a piece of software called Fairplay that allowed only music bought on iTunes to be played on the iPod, according to the complaint.

One competitor, RealNetworks Inc, responded in 2004 by introducing a new technology that would allow customers to play music downloaded from its site on their iPods. But Apple quickly announced a software upgrade to iTunes that once more blocked music from RealNetworks, the complaint charges.

Lloyd said the deposition of Jobs would be limited to questions about the back-and-forth with RealNetworks in 2004.

It's not about buying music from iTunes. It's about Apple killing music from a competing retailer on the iPod.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[TheFlamingoKing]

That sound you hear is the woosh of ePhil_One's comment going over the heads of most of these respondents. Must we actually use sarcasm tags?

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[sockonafish]

That's just Apple refusing to support a DRM scheme other than their own, especially one that essentially broke Apple's DRM.

Unencumbered media would still have loaded onto an iPod just fine. If Real weren't so incompetent, they would've pioneered DRM-free music sales, and might have saved themselves from becoming irrelevant.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[Bobfrankly1]

Only iTunes can place rights restricted music using the native "Fairplay" DRM on the iPod. That is how it is a monopoly. Everybody else has to use unrestricted formats.

Yeah, wow. That's really stifling competition.

If you want to purchase music from an artist or label that refuses to sell in an unrestricted format, then the iTunes store is your only avenue, short of (illegally?) ripping the music from a CD. Need an example? Try buying a Beatles MP3 on Amazon. It's all cover bands.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[krizoitz]

Ripping from a CD is not illegal in any way shape or form if you own the CD and rip it for your own use. Apple has supported this method for a LONG time. iTunes isn't a monopoly. 1) You can get music off CD's and rip it 2) You can get Mp3's off Amazon 3) You can put music from either source (or any other compatible, i.e. non-DRM'd MP3, AAC, WAV etc.) on your iPod 4) You can put non-DRM'd iTunes music on other devices 5) The only reason music on iTunes was ever/is now DRM'd is because the labels demand it, Steve Jobs has been very vocal about non-DRM'd music being the right choice.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[Americano]

The suit stems largely from the Apple / RealNetworks dispute regarding the Harmony service Real tried to offer, allowing people to buy music from Real, and load it on iPods by re-DRM'ing the track as a "FairPlay-compatible" track. Apple made changes that (deliberately or not) stopped Harmony-purchased tracks from working on an iPod.

I'm not certain that this rises to the level of "antitrust" for several reasons:
1) They weren't under any obligation to license their FairPlay technology to other vendors, and in fact VirginMega actually got shot down by a court in 2004 for that very reason;
2) It's possible that turning a blind eye to how easily FairPlay was reverse engineered by Real could have put Apple afoul of its agreements with the record labels;
3) iPods have *always* allowed (and played) non-DRM'ed MP3/AAC tracks - Real could have sold non-DRM tracks if they wanted to sell for the iPod - eMusic has been doing it for a while now;
4) Real could have built their own iPod competitor, and had a run at the market that way; Microsoft's Zune and Sansa's various portable models both did this;

In short, there was enough competition and choice for consumers on the market that Apple's product decision didn't reasonably constitute "monopolistic" behavior.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[GrumpySteen]

No, of course not. Slashdotters have no trouble understanding sarcasm.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[GrumpySteen]

How many commercial applications can copy songs to an iPod?

There aren't many, but there are some. Winamp has been able to since the 5.55 release in March of 2009. It works well, too, I might add.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[Master Moose]

Are people dumb enough not to be using Amazon for music?. .Hell what ties you to using iTunes to get music on your iPod? I'm doing quite well without it on my Linux machine.

Avoiding apple at all costs, my son was gifted a iPod by a family member a few weeks ago. One of the latest 4G devices. Without Jail Breaking the device, there is no way (that I have found) that I can get this to sync to my Ubuntu PC. I have searched forum after forum after forum.

I tried to purchase an Mp3 from amazon, it wanted me to use their default downloader. Which was not compatible with 64 bit linux

So while I don't have to use itunes specifically to use the IPod. . Linux is not an option for it at present

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[node 3]

Only iTunes can place rights restricted music using the native "Fairplay" DRM on the iPod. That is how it is a monopoly. Everybody else has to use unrestricted formats.

During the time in question, there were multiple DRM restricted music stores. Apple is the sole source of FairPlay DRM, but that's not a monopoly. That's having control over one's own product, which is generally how things are expected to work.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[node 3]

Just because it makes no sense doesn't mean he didn't mean it. You have read the posts here, right?

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[node 3]

It's not about buying music from iTunes. It's about Apple killing music from a competing retailer on the iPod.

This assumes Apple has any obligation whatsoever to support third party DRM'd music stores on their iPod. I see no reason why that should be the case.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[foniksonik]

So a band you care about has an exclusive agreement? BTW there's nothing illegal about ripping your CDs and you can certainly buy those on Amazon. maybe you should boycott The Beatles for signing a digital downloads only agreement with the #1 music store in the world.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[EXTomar]

How is Amazon's inability to secure The Beatles proof that iTunes has a monopoly? Hell a year ago iTunes didn't have The Beatles either where I find it hard to believe Apple Records suddenly went "Now that iTunes is a monopoly on the download music market, we will jump in!"

On the other hand, Apple Records has a history of shrewdly protect their rights on The Beatles and has rejected many deals as along the way where it appears that Apple Computer Inc kept negotiating till they got a deal Apple Records agreed too. Added to this nothing is stopping Amazon from making similar concessions where it is only up to Amazon leaders to decide if The Beatles library is worth suspected cost.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[Bobfrankly1]

In your haste to comment, you failed like so many others to READ. You must be new here. If you're looking for commentary based on actually based on TFA, than perhaps slashdot is not for you...

Not new, I simply choose not to tolerate willful ignorance when source material is literally one click away.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[jo_ham]

Yes, but there is no DRM on any music on the iTunes Store any more, and it's been that way for some time. Fairplay was never designed to be something that would spread - Apple had it out of necessity, but didn't want it to become a de facto standard.

Even when they were selling music with Fairplay DRM they included a feature in iTunes to strip it off (burn to audio CD) if you wanted it (although this meant quality loss if you then re-encoded it). The fiarplay converter isn't strictly needed, if you have any old files left over that have DRM - Apple has two methods to remove that DRM, one of which has always been there (burn audio CD), the other offered at the time they swapped to non-DRM files (a $0.20 per-track upgrade to download the new files).

But since they removed all the DRM, it is no longer an issue - the lawsuit seems to be about Fairplay, which hasn't been in use for some time, for this exact reason. They never wanted DRM in the first place, but had no choice due to the content owners demanding it. They removed it as soon as possible and made it extremely weak and trivial to defeat *within their own program* from the outset, strongly encouraging that you did so when you purchased music back then.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[jrumney]

Leveraging a monopoly in one market (MP3 players) to gain a monopoly in another (online music stores) is a violation of antitrust law. The problem no longer exists, so damages will be limited, but if Real want to continue to pursue this based on the situation 5 years ago, then that is between them and the lawyers on both sides, who will likely be the only winners here.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[Anonymous Coward]

As with any antitrust analysis, if you define the domain narrowly enough, then you will find a monopoly.

Only McDonald's makes Big Macs. It's obviously a monopoly on Big Macs...

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[wvmarle]

At the time non of the major labels would have accepted non-DRM sales. Many of the smaller labels would also have required DRM. The non-DRM movement started only recently. While yes Real could have tried to pioneer non-DRM music, they would have been limited to unknown artists that were just desparate to become known, only to be abandoned by those same artists when they did become known and would start requiring DRM on their music. The time wasn't there yet.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[centuren]

iTunes controls 64.5% of the online movie market.

I'll just quote the first sentence from that article:

"Despite intensified competition from fierce rivals including Microsoft Corp. and Wal-Mart Stores Inc., Apple Inc.’s iTunes store in 2010 managed to hold onto its dominance in the U.S. market for movie electronic sell through (EST) and Internet video on demand (iVOD), new IHS Screen Digest research shows."

Wait, one more quote from the 3rd paragraph:

“The iTunes online store showed remarkable competitive resilience last year in the U.S. EST/iVOD movie business, staving off a growing field of tough challengers while keeping pace with an dramatic expansion for the overall market,” said Arash Amel, research director, digital media, for IHS. “Apple faced serious competition from Microsoft's Zune Video and Sony Corp.'s PlayStation Store, as well as from Amazon and—most significantly—Wal-Mart."

Remember, when you're talking about a monopoly, you're talking about competition in the market. If iTunes has managed to attract a majority of consumers in a market rife with competition, then one can only cry monopoly after digging up anti-competitive practices that specifically play a larger factor than normal consumer choice.

 

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[Celarent Darii]

You don't need to throw it out, send it to me !

If you find the ipod so bad, I'm sure I'll find someone who will take it.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[Xest]

How is Microsoft a monopoly?

Are people dumb enough not to be using Apple for their OS? Even then what actually ties you to buying an OS from Microsoft? Hell what ties you to using Microsoft to get an OS on your laptop? I'm doing quite well without it on my Apple machine.

Hopefully this will give you a big hint as to the fact you don't understand that it's marketshare that determines monopoly, not amount of competition. There's always been many many competitors to Windows, yet Microsoft had a monopoly because of the marketshare, not the lack of competition.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[osu-neko]

If you have an Ipod, throw it out. The cheapest MP3 player they sell at Walmart will be superior in every way, I guarantee it. Stop drinking the coolaid, get away from apple... you'll be much happier.

I went through four different MP3 players before settling on the iPod. The most expensive player they sell at Walmart is still inferior in every way that actually matters. The only thing I regret at this point is the money I wasted on the other crap, rather than doing the smart thing and buying an iPod in the first place. You get what you pay for...

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[smelch]

Ok, warning, I'm about to be kind to Microsoft. Further warning, its about the Zune.

iTunes completely blows, which we all know. However Microsoft's Zune gets blasted all the time for the hardware, which I won't argue, though I do own one (and thought it had a slight edge over the iPods that were out when it came out, thickness aside). But has anybody used the Zune software? Its really pretty good, especially when next to iTunes. Now that they've discontinued the hardware, I hope they don't end up scrapping the whole music library altogether. My instinct is that if I ever used Rhapsody or the new Napster that I would probably like their software as well. Does anybody know how they all stack up against each other when running on windows?

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[Americano]

They could be, if not doing it would be enough to leverage their monopoly on MP3 players to gain an advantage in the digital music market.

They have not been declared to have a "monopoly" on MP3 players. They would first have to be declared a monopoly before we can say that they then used that monopoly to unfairly limit the competition. Alternative hardware exists: Sansa players, Zune, and numerous other iPod work-alikes. Alternative music stores existed: Amazon, eMusic, Zune Marketplace; Any MP3 purchased without DRM, any MP3 purchased via iTunes, and any MP3 ripped from your own music sources will load on an iPod just fine. Consumers had plenty of alternatives, and Real could have easily gone out and negotiated DRM-free sales.

From a good overview of the VirginMega decision in France:

It may be implied from that decision that the owner of intellectual property rights has no general obligation to grant a licence to its competitors even if these intellectual property rights may confer a dominant position on the concerned operator. Competition law can limit the exercise of intellectual property rights only where such exercise prevents the development of competition between undertakings. When these intellectual property rights are not essential to access the relevant market, their owner, even if in a dominant position, remains free to refuse to grant a licence.

In other words: Apple's refusal to license FairPlay does not prevent people from competing in the MP3 download market, OR the MP3 player market. It is therefore not an essential facility that people are being denied the use of, and it therefore does not follow that Apple is unfairly limiting competition. The existence of multiple competing MP3 retailers and MP3 player manufacturers is evidence of this.

Irrelevant, simply having a contractual obligation to do something doesn't make it legal (hitmen are still accused of murder).

Entirely relevant. Apple is under no obligation to destroy its own business because Real couldn't develop a viable business model. There is no obligation on Apple's part to provide a platform for its competitors to access a market - the existence of numerous competitors suggests that there is nothing essential about FairPlay that makes it a necessary element of competition in the MP3 or MP3 player market.

But it was an advantage to be able to put DRM-protected music on iPods, so the monopoly on MP3 players was leveraged to gain an advantage in the digital music market.

You have it exactly backwards. If the monopoly on MP3 players were leveraged to gain an advantage in the music market, then they would have said "You may not load any tracks on the iPod EXCEPT for tracks bought through the iTunes store. *That* would be using your size advantage in the MP3 player market to unfairly limit competition in other markets. In fact, there are numerous other ways to purchase music to load on your iPod - Real's complaint is that Apple declined to *help* them become middlemen growing fat on taking a cut of sales of music they did nothing to produce to a device they also didn't produce. I'd love a piece of that racket too, but I would never suggest that Apple declining to help me secure that position is an "antitrust" violation.

This is irrelevant, Apple had a monopoly. If this was a valid counterpoint, it could be used in any anti-trust suit. Microsoft: You could just have coded your own OS, Bell Systems: You could just have laid your own telephone cables, etc.

And if Microsoft hadn't been abusing its position as the dominant OS to prevent alternative OS'es and browsers from being loaded by OEMs, then they probably wouldn't have been penalized. Bell Systems was a government-sanctio

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[node 3]

Sure they can deliberately kill it on the iPod itself. Real circumvented Apple's DRM. Apple fixed their DRM. Your assertion that it's illegal to fix your own DRM is amazing.

Real can sell music for the iPod in supported formats all they want. Apple did nothing to stop this.

Re:How is iTunes a monopoly?

[node 3]

Am I the only one which sees a difference between "not supporting" and "actively working against"?

There's a difference, but it doesn't change anything. Apple is under no obligation to keep from breaking Real's breaking of Apple's DRM. In fact, they are likely under contract to do so.

Apple never did anything to prevent Real from selling music to iPod owners in MP3, AAC, WAV, AIFF, or other officially supported formats. They just prevented Real from using Apple's own, proprietary DRM format. This is not illegally anti-competitive. If it is, please be sure to let GeoHot know. I imagine such a fact would be quite useful to him at the moment, where it actually true and not just geek fantasy.

Re:Unlike Gates

[Seumas]

Then you are free to use Amazon's service (and I guess there may be others).

I'm not really sure how they have a monopoly, when it's dead simple to opt for Amazon, instead. I use iTunes as my player and it's the most convenient podcast client I've found (because I listen to a lot of them), but I've never bought a single song on iTunes. I save that for Amazon. Better quality. Better prices. Re-downloadable. No DRM.

They may have some shitty business practices, when it comes to the operation of their app stores and itunes stores, but they have almost single-handedly kept music from being tied to nothing more than CDs for another twenty years, which is what would have happened if they hadn't leveraged against the music industry to strong-arm them into the 21st century, as they bit and kicked every inch of the way.

Re:Verb conjugation

[Anonymous Coward]

How will you expect the editors to took the time to conjugated verbs properly, when there's flamebait to will have been posted?

Ad revenues, man! Slashdot needed / needs / will need / will have needed / had needed / is needing / to need them!

Editing Needed...

[Bobfrankly1]

Steve Jobs Questioned In iTunes Monopoly Suit

Steve Jobs has been ordered to answer questions regarding Apple's iTunes music monopoly.

It wouldn't be a Slashdot headline if it didn't contradict itself in the summary. He is ordered to answer questions. He hasn't been questioned yet.

Re:Unlike Gates

[TheFlamingoKing]

Wait, are we talking about Microsoft or Apple now?

Re:Unlike Gates

[uniquename72]

mostly a public who know no better.

I would argue that this applies to iTunes as well.

How is Windows a monopoly?

[Sycraft-fu]

Please remember when all that was happening Apple was alive and well selling desktop computers, and Linux had a huge share of the server (particularly web server) market and a sliver of the desktop market.

Yet, MS was still nailed for being a monopoly. Reason is you do not have to have 100% of a market, just the lion's share.

Re:How is Windows a monopoly?

[Americano]

And technically, just having a "large market share" doesn't mean you're subject to penalties, either.

You have to *abuse* that large market share to unreasonably restrict competition. If you're simply better at what you do than anybody else, and people overwhelmingly choose your product/service, then there's no basis for an antitrust suit. Once you use your dominant position to harm Gateway's or RealNetworks' business, as Microsoft was found to have done.

Antitrust law is intended to encourage competition by making it painful for the big guys to stomp on the little guys who are competing well; it's not intended to punish someone for succeeding in a *legitimate* competition. It's possible to have a large market share without abusing it, though I'm sure it must be awfully tempting.

One of my favorite quotes...

[Rooked_One]

In a movie, a kid asked the question "What makes America great?"

"Our endless appeals system."

This was the tobacco lobbyist in Thank You for Smoking.

The whole apple music thing has always confused me. Why didn't they go with something already existing? This would make sense, but we know Apple is out to make dollars. By whatever means possible of course.

Re:ridiculous

[fean]

OK, because everyone seems to forget this, every time the 'monopoly' work is brought up.

It is not illegal to have a monopoly. It is illegal to abuse a monopoly.

They are not being sued because everyone uses them, they're being sued because they used their monopoly status to limit competition.

Re:Bad guys

[TheSeventh]

Or how about Apple's monopoly on the iPhone/iPad apps?

Want to develop software that the iPhone already provides? Good luck. Your own browser version? It's possible, but it'll be slow because only Safari can be fast, and that's how Jobs wants it. Your own email client? Maybe, maybe not. Their rules for letting apps competing with stock applications into the App store aren't really that clear, regardless of what their criteria actually says.

Haven't they learned anything from all of Microsoft's troubles? Or does Jobs think he's immune to all of that nonsense because Apple Lovers don't complain much. Whatever Apple does is the right way to do it. Pass the Kool-Aid please.

Re:Unlike Gates

[GIL_Dude]

You certainly make a good point about how there are a lot of devices that can / could handle general computing tasks that are not "PCs" (such as tablets and phones) and that those generally don't run Windows. However, today, most of those devices are still considered secondary devices - and many of them require a PC or Mac in order to get their updates. This will change, and not all of them require it. But - right now - most of them are ancillary devices. For example, most updates for the iPhone require it be tethered to a PC / Mac in order to get them. In the Android world, many phones do OTA updates (like my Motorola Droid), but my Wife's HTC Aria just got an update to 2.2.2 and it had to be applied tethered to a PC (not a Mac) and was a wipe and load. I do believe that it won't be too long before most of these devices dispense with that tethered connection. Today though I have to consider a lot of them as secondary devices - and unlike Steve Jobs I can't call them "post PC devices" when they still require a PC / Mac in order to get updates.

The article title is a troll

[sjdude]

The article title reads: "Steve Jobs Questioned In iTunes Monopoly Suit". QUESTIONED??? This hasn't happened yet, so Jobs has not been questionED. Bullshit troll article title.

Re:Verb conjugation

[dgatwood]

Obligatory HHGG reference: It wioll haven be posted?

Fairplay is no longer in use in iTMS music

[romanval]

If it's about Fairplay there's one problem: Apple's has removed Fairplay DRM for all iTunes audio for over 3 years now (5 years for EMI music). And there's never been anything that keeps any iPods (any version) from playing standard MP3's that were bought from other sources.

Re:Verb conjugation

[Pete Venkman]

They went ahead and put past tense for when the editors dupe this article in a month.

Re:Unlike Gates

[kevinmenzel]

How on earth was Windows "UNIX" based? Home windows (the line beginning with 1.0) certainly wasn't, and if anything NT was OS/2 based. If you are referring to the POSIX subsystem... you can still install the UNIX Subsystem in Windows 7... And you damn well can migrate to another OS easily, so long as your data is readible in both systems. Which largely is going to depend on software, but it's not exactly surprising if some niche software you depend on isn't avaliable. Especially if you're dealing with a closed-source blob, your rant on UNIX compatibility (assuming that you are talking about the same POSIX subsystem/UNIX subsystem that actually exists) wouldn't even help you because POSIX compatibility doesn't mean binary compatibility.

Re:Unlike Gates

[oliverthered]

Does iTunes ever get bundled with anything... e.g. a different piece of apple software or maybe some products?

And are you ever required to use the interface for anything to do anything even if it's free. say maybe a bit like internet explorer?

do they have any kind of exclusive deals with anyone, do they lock people in or out.

Do they in any other way abuse the trust of people?

Re:Bad guys

[chrb]

Exactly, that bastard Steve forced the record companies to accept his tyrannical 99 cent pricing policy and allow me to burn purchased songs to CD's where they can be ripped back to MP3 free of the restrictions

Points which are irrelevant to the antitrust case in question. Back in 2004, RealPlayer could be used to transfer FairPlay compatible music to the ipod. Apple said "We are stunned that RealNetworks has adopted the tactics and ethics of a hacker to break into the iPod, and we are investigating the implications of their actions under the DMCA and other laws." After that, Apple changed the firmware to break the RealPlayer generated files.

If the Zune had reached 74% market share, and Apple had responded by adding the capability to download itunes music to the Zune, and Microsoft then broke that and blocked Apple from the market, you would be outraged. This is no different.

Re:Bad guys

[ejtttje]

Also, while I'm no iTunes expert, I'm pretty sure that you can convert your Apple music to mp3s. My wife does it somehow.

Only because Apple was able to convince the RIAA to drop the DRM restrictions... Apple was certainly not alone in that, but they did fight the good fight for us in terms of removing DRM on music, even though the associated lock-in was working in their favor to keep people using iTunes/iPod. Unfortunately I see no pressure to do the same with TV/Movies they sell through iTunes, as much as I would like to buy TV a la carte and watch it on my Linux media center. (Hacked AirPlay developments not withstanding)

Overview of Antitrust Law Related to Bundling

[TheoMurpse]

People interested in this news item might be interested in this relatively brief overview (considering lawyers' tendency to logorrhea) of antitrust and IP rights bundling put out by the US government. Enjoy!

Re:Verb conjugation

[ColdWetDog]

Your English teacher is / was / will be disappoint.

Re:ridiculous

[node 3]

OK, because everyone seems to forget this, every time the 'monopoly' work is brought up.

It is not illegal to have a monopoly. It is illegal to abuse a monopoly.

They are not being sued because everyone uses them, they're being sued because they used their monopoly status to limit competition.

Apple never had a monopoly in music players or music downloads. They lead both of those markets, but never abused that status in any legally reasonable sense. Apple wasn't blocking Real from selling music. In fact, they weren't even blocking Real from selling music compatible with the iPod. They have no obligation whatsoever to allow third party music on the iPod.

Re:Bad guys

[Hatta]

allow me to burn purchased songs to CD's where they can be ripped back to MP3 free of the restrictions!

Free of high frequency components too! Plus bonus transcode artifacts!

Re:Unlike Gates

[ColdWetDog]

I never realized that "good" was a synonym for "buggy, bloated, restrictive piece of shit."

You must be new here.

Re:Legality of cd-ripping

[langelgjm]

So, I had to really cut down that quote to get it to fit in my sig. Here is the full quote.

There are those who confidently claim that making a copy of music on your hard drive is an act of space shifting protected by the fair use privilege. I'm sure that some people engage in such space shifting, for example by copying music files from lawfully purchased CDs onto their computer hard drives. But anybody why thinks that that is fair use is going out on a limb... I am not saying that it is frivolous to argue that space shifting is fair use. I am not saying that I would be shocked if some court were to conclude that it is fair use. But I don't happen to believe that it is, and I do happen to believe that anyone who makes such a a copy on a hard drive without the consent of the copyright owner is probably engaging in copyright infringement.

The citation is David O. Carson (former General Counsel for the US Copyright Office), "Making the Making Available Right Available", 33 Colum. J. L. & Arts. 135, 138.

Re:Unlike Gates

[Culture20]

Who's everyone? While Windows market share...

Dude, I started reading "Who's everyone?" and immediately thought that the next sentence was the catch phrase of MichaelKristopeitXXX

Re:Bad guys

[jmac_the_man]

Microsoft developed an OS which it sold to its consumers, who were primarily OEMs. This OS had features, one of which was "It works with almost all the software your customers will see for sale in the brick and mortar software shop down the street, so you can market your hardware to people who may not be familiar with computers." In order to ensure this feature, it made contracts with its OEMs, who were free to accept, decline, or negotiate parts of this deal. The deal exchanged discounts on the cost Microsoft would charge its customers (who, again, were willing participants) for guarantees that its customers would only sell Microsoft's product. In my view, the only difference between this and what Apple does is that Microsoft's customers (who, again, are predominantly OEMs) negotiated and agreed to their deal, whereas Apple's customers didn't have a choice.
The canonical example of an anti-trustworthy action would be if a car company decided to make a special connector between the fuel tank and the gas pump, so you would only be able to use the special gas station set up by the car's manufacturer. Meanwhile, you cannot (well, you can, but Apple says it's hacking and will try to block you) put songs on your iPod without using the special media manager that the manufacturer made. (Or alternately, you can't put media from your iTunes library on an MP3 player unless it's a special device made by the manufacturer.) Your car cannot accomplish its primary purpose (driving from Point A to Point B) without gasoline, and your MP3 player cannot accomplish its primary purpose (playing media) without a media manager, so this is probably a better analogy. It's EXACTLY what Apple is doing.
Finally, isn't this largely an Open Source/Free Software site? We demand APIs for everything else so that we can use a generic X with something else because the default solution doesn't meet our requirements. Why not for iTunes?

Re:Bad guys

[exomondo]

You're supposed to have a "monopoly" over your own products.

He was referencing the fact that not only does it bundle its own software but if you develop software that functionally duplicates on of their apps you likely can't even distribute that (according to the dev agreement). MS can't even bundle its own software on its product even though it gives you absolute freedom to install whatever other software you want.

So where apple can quite happily bundle safari with iOS and tell you what you can and cannot install MS can't bundle IE with Windows even though they impose no restrictions on what you can and can't install.

Re:Bad guys

[exomondo]

Or how about Apple's monopoly on the iPhone/iPad apps?

Uh, yeah, this argument doesn't really carry any water until you set your sights on Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft.

Well it actually does, it's just that it applies equally to them as well. There's no rule that says you have to have a go at Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft before you're allowed to have a go at Apple.

Monopoly, you keep using that word

[mjwx]

It does not mean what you think it means.

That's not how the word "monopoly" works. If iTunes was the only place to buy music, it could be a monopoly. Just because some artists are exclusive to one store does not make that store a monopoly.

Actually you should have looked up the word monopoly in a dictionary before commenting on it. From Wikipedia

In economics, a monopoly [removed the phonetic stuff because /. wont render it] exists when a specific individual or an enterprise has sufficient control over a particular product or service to determine significantly the terms on which other individuals shall have access to it

It does not say 100%, it says "sufficient control". Apple has this in the digital music distribution market as it can, much like MS in the OS market dictate how other people can sell their products.

Now being a monopoly is not illegal, abusing your monopoly is, Apple's been skirting this for a long time but staying 1 step ahead of an actual investigation until now. Apple has enough sway that it gets to dictate what price other stores can sell at, that is a clear abuse, even if the publishers are in on it, it's still abuse.

Re:Bad guys

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

Or how about Apple's monopoly on the iPhone/iPad apps?

Uh, yeah, this argument doesn't really carry any water until you set your sights on Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft.

Well it actually does, it's just that it applies equally to them as well. There's no rule that says you have to have a go at Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft before you're allowed to have a go at Apple.

No, it just reeks of bias and damages your appearance of objectivity.

Re:ridiculous

[mjwx]

Apple never had a monopoly in music players or music downloads.

Yes it does.

Monopoly in economic terms does not mean 100% of the market, it means enough market share to "determine significantly on which terms" others can access that market.

MS has never had 100% of the OS market, but for a long time MS has had enough to prevent others from accessing it. By the same token, Apple has been using it's influence to make non-Apple MP3 players disappear from store shelves. To fix prices at which other stores can sell MP3's and prevent other stores from operating in certain nations (As an Australian the only digital alternative I have to ITMS is piracy).

Sorry but Apple is both a monopoly and abusing that position.

Re:Bad guys

[Anthony Mouse]

I don't see what the problem is. Yes, you should enforce the law against all of the companies that are breaking it.

Re:Verb conjugation

[Kitkoan]

Yeah, my English teacher is very disappointment in my grammer.

Re:Bad guys

[Anthony Mouse]

Exactly like Walmart.

Re:Bad guys

[exomondo]

Or how about Apple's monopoly on the iPhone/iPad apps?

Uh, yeah, this argument doesn't really carry any water until you set your sights on Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft.

Well it actually does, it's just that it applies equally to them as well. There's no rule that says you have to have a go at Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft before you're allowed to have a go at Apple.

No, it just reeks of bias and damages your appearance of objectivity.

Rubbish, if you have a problem with one company you don't have to go after every other company that could possibly have the same issue for the original argument to be justified, nor does that have any impact on your objectivity. Sure the same argument applies to many other companies, but the fact that he didn't seek out every other company that it could potentially apply to (and neither did you) doesn't damage his original argument or objectivity in the slightest.

Re:Bad guys

[ThePromenader]

Well, MS ~did~ manage to make most of the world addicted 'users' of their half-baked product, and XP ~did~ have a rather vamped-up 'Playskool' look about it...

Re:ridiculous

[marblesbot]

I thought the antitrust suit against Microsoft was ridiculous, too. I'm not a user of Microsoft products, either. I don't even think bundling IE with their OS is wrong. I would never use it! It seems to me that a monopoly is something where consumers don't have a choice and then the price fixing begins. It should also be something important, like telephone communications (ATT), and not a side note of the entertainment world. There are plenty of other mp3 players around. And, plenty of other software to use. And even more ways to get music. Apple didn't have good business sense not letting other companies write software to allow more use of their iPods, but they are not required to let others cash in on their hardware.

Re:Legality of cd-ripping

[Carewolf]

That is pretty stupid. Why would I believe this douchebag instead of using common sense, and basic concepts such as first sale? "Space shifting" was first explored with tape-recorders and was deemed legal.