The CO and the Market Council have the authority to issue decisions banning unlawful marketing and contract terms and conditions in standard contracts when deemed necessary in the interests of consumers in Norway. From Aftenposten:
The Consumer Ombudsman and the Market Council (CO) and corresponding groups in Sweden and Denmark agree that local laws are violated by Apple protectionism
I will eat my hat if the CO's ruling is overturned in court.
The Ombudsman isn't empowered to "declare" anything illegal and that's the end of it, despite your apparent misunderstanding to that effect. The office of the Ombudsman is a regulatory body that can, at its option file a legal proceeding in the absence of a voluntary agreement. That proceeding will ultimately determine the outcome of a given case, if a voluntary agreement cannot be reached. You seem to misunderstand what makes an action illegal.
Suppose you run a factory and you're violating some kind of pollution control law, and I'm the head of the environmental regulation agency. I can look at your actions, then refer to the law, and conclude that your actions are prohibited by that law. I might then approach you and say "Look, we both know you're breaking the law, so you can either stop now or I can take you to court". If you stop immediately and we don't go to court, that doesn't mean your actions weren't illegal; they were. It only means I didn't have to invoke the court system to get you to comply.
Similarly, if Apple's actions are prohibited by Norway's consumer protection laws, they are illegal. Period. If Apple voluntarily brings iTunes into compliance with the law before the ombudsman takes them to court and has a judge force them into compliance, then good for them; I'm sure the ombudsman would prefer it that way too.
My argument has been explained again and again. You, on the other hand, act as though you're unaware of the most basic premise of the article (i.e. iTunes having been declared illegal) and you accuse me of saying things that I haven't said.
Tip for the future: if you don't want to be called a troll, stop behaving like one.
It has yet to be determined that iTunes DRM is illegal anywhere. Calling it illegal now is just more evidence of anti-Apple bias. I guess you didn't RTFA, because you'd have to be totally ignorant to say this. Here, let me spoon-feed it to you:
Apple was dealt a blow in Europe on Wednesday when Norway's powerful consumer ombudsman ruled that its iTunes online music store was illegal because it did not allow downloaded songs to be played on rival technology companies' devices.
The decision is the first time any jurisdiction has concluded iTunes breaks its consumer protection laws and could prompt other European countries to review the situation.
The ombudsman has set a deadline of October 1 for the Apple to make its codes available to other technology companies so that it abides by Norwegian law. If it fails to do so, it will be taken to court, fined and eventually closed down.
The consumer ombudsman interprets and enforces consumer protection laws. He isn't just some dude with an opinion; his job is to make rulings like this, and he's done it.
Show me evidence, please, for the case you're making (that Apple's actions make it deserving of market regulation): show me where Apple has prevented iTunes purchases from being converted to a non-DRM format (they haven't). I never said they prevented anyone from converting their purchases, only that the conversion process is so inconvenient that it serves as an artificial cost. Did you really not understand that, or are you just trolling?
Forcing users to go through a conversion process that'll cost $600 worth of time is just as bad from the POV of a customer as making conversion impossible and charging $600 a fee for the ability.
Nothing Apple has done to date fits any reasonable definition of consumer harm. Then I suggest you run for office in Norway, because they seem to think it does.
You claim that time spent is money lost for consumers looking to switch platforms, and indeed, it is, but in the real world we recognize that Apple is a business, not a charitable organization and that any time I spend doing anything at all could be equated to money... And if Apple imposes artificial costs on you to keep you from switching away from their products, that's anticompetitive behavior. Period.
You've made that argument several times. You've yet to demonstrate that that constitutes harm. That's the point you keep trying gloss over. It isn't harm just because it may present an inconvenience to me at an unspecified future time. An inconvenience is a waste of a time, and a waste of time is equivalent to a waste of money: if your 30GB iPod is one-third full of iTunes tracks, and you could be earning $30/hr, then you'd lose over $600 in the time it takes to convert your songs. The cost of sticking with an iPod in the face of superior competition is more subjective, depending on the price difference and the value you place on whatever features the competing player has over the iPod, but the cost still exists.
Lock-in artificially forces you to pay one of those costs when you'd prefer to switch away: either the cost of converting or the cost of sticking with the inferior product. If you don't think having to pay extra artificial costs is harmful, then why don't you just send me all your money right now, since it won't harm you?
That's not lock-in, no matter how many times you make a claim that it is. It may be inconvenient, and none of the other players or music stores currently on the market may justify the time and effort on my part to re-rip my library, but that's a personal decision for me to make, not a compelling argument for Apple to be forced into a money-losing business position. What's this "money-losing" BS... do you really think Apple will be unable to make a profit now that their scheme has been recognized as illegal? That their products have to be tied together because they can't compete on their own merits?
Come up with an example of actual harm and I'll likely agree with you. Sorry. The harm is obvious to any rational observer: iPod customers with a large library of iTMS music are forced to choose between giving up their music libraries, converting them at great expense, or continuing to buy iPods even if they'd prefer another player; this situation is not caused by some unavoidable technical mismatch (i.e. vinyl records not playing in a CD player), but by deliberate actions and choices on Apple's part.
I have no idea which part you're failing to grasp. Do you think there are no iPod customers with a large library of iTMS music? Or that it's somehow convenient to convert hundreds or thousands of songs, one CD-RW at a time--that the difficulty of doing so couldn't possibly influence anyone's decision? Or do you just think that no one with an iPod would ever want to buy a competing music player?
If Apple held a monopoly position in the digital music market, your criticism might be valid, but they don't. You can choose a different player, and you can choose a different DRM scheme (or none at all) if you shop around. The myth you keep promoting here is that iTunes is the only game in town -- they're not, either in the US, or in Europe. The existence of alternatives before you buy any digital music product is irrelevant here. What matters is that once you buy an iPod and a library of music from iTMS, you're stuck with FairPlay. You're locked in to buying more Apple products unless you want to pay the "termination fee" of a few weeks spent loading and unloading CD-RWs.
Your entire argument rests on sticking it to Apple and proving how evil they are Again with the persecution fantasies. You fanboys are so predictable. It's not my fault Apple is the company pushing this scheme.
"Let's just get rid of all the trade regulations while we're at it - who cares about monopolies? So what if you have to pay more for stuff? I now realize that as long as you aren't physically poisoned, it's OK. Thanks for enlightening me."
You can backpedal now, if you like, and try to pretend that wasn't an attempt to class Apple as a monopoly. It's not backpedaling, it's just good old reading comprehension. In that sentence, "monopolies" and "pay[ing] more for stuff" serve as examples of the sort of other trade regulations which we might as well get rid of if we're only going to worry about physical harm.
...because customers aren't "locked in" to anything. If the only format the iPod played was protected AAC, you might have a point, but of course the iPod plays a half a dozen audio formats, only one of which employs DRM. The iPod plays a few other formats, but if you want to download major-label music, your only choice is to get it from Apple in a format that'll only play on the iPod. Apple encourages their customers to build up a library of music in that format, and the more they buy, the more difficult it will be for them to switch brands when something better comes along.
You own a Mac and an iPod? So what? Singling out Apple for special ire here is silly, and doesn't have a legitimate defense. That's what's so hilarious about your little theory: I'm not singling Apple out for special ire. You claim that I "just don't like the choice most of the market has already made", but the claim is baseless, because I made the same choice.
The ire is directed at the lock-in scheme, not the company itself. Show me someone else running a similar scheme and I'll say the same things about them; show me someone else running a similar scheme on a larger scale, and I might even agree that Norway's consumer ombudsman should focus on them first.
You've already tried to describe Apple as a monopoly, here. No, I don't think I have. I've used monopolies as another example of abuse that justifies government intervention.
Really, what this boils down to, I think, is less an altruistic desire to see consumers protected from mean old Apple (because it has yet to be demonstrated by anybody that Apple is harming consumers), and more a desire to put Apple back in its place. That's fine, as long as you're honest about it. An amusing theory, but wrong nonetheless. This is about putting a stop to the kind of lock-in practices that are bad no matter who does them.
They've made those products successful by competing openly in the market (unlike Microsoft) and giving (most) people what they want. How can they be "competing openly" while at the same time locking their customers in? Open competition would be "here's our music player, use it with any store you like" and "here's our store, use it with any player you like", allowing both the store and the player to stand on their own merits, and allowing their customers to switch away from either if something better comes along without holding their data hostage.
Apple's anticompetitive tactics aren't exactly the same ones that MS has used, but they're still anticompetitive.
To dress up your complaint as some kind of defense of consumer choice ignores the crucial fact that you just don't like the choice most of the market has already made. Please, you're embarrassing yourself with these fantasies. I own an iPod and I'm typing this on a PowerBook.
I don't really follow the DRM market, but I'm sure you could find various products that are produced with vendor-specific DRM. Then I suggest you bring them to the consumer ombudsman's attention, and maybe he'll deal with them in due time.
So tell me, how are closed systems harmful to consumers? Just asserting it isn't enough. If you haven't figured it out by now, there's no hope for you. Sorry.
Also, wouldn't all DRM methods be "closed systems"? How do you implement a form of DRM that is "open"? By doing what was suggested in this case, which is what Microsoft is already doing with PlaysForSure: licensing it to anyone who wants in.
And if closed systems are inherently harmful to consumers, shouldn't they be banning proprietary car parts, proprietary razor blades, proprietary kitchen appliances, and so forth? Not unless the manufacturer is actually preventing competitors from making interoperable parts. You can buy third party parts for your car, and nothing's stopping Chevrolet from making a car that accepts Ford parts - they just choose not to. You can buy generic replacement razor blades and appliances too. In cases where the original manufacturer makes it impossible to make interoperable parts (e.g. printer cartridges that authenticate themselves), then yes, those should be banned.
Of course, they can't tackle all these things at once. If you disagree with the order in which the Norwegian government is pursuing abusers, then maybe you should run for office there.
Doesn't seem you read the article, but just the slashdot summary. One person in Norway has offered his opinion that iTunes should be banned. Can you show me the actual article of law in Norway that Apple is violating? Talk about projection! If you had read the quotes I posted and the original articles, you'd know that this "one person" is the consumer ombudsman, who is in charge of consumer protection laws. His declaration that iTunes violates Norwegian law isn't just some random dude's opinion; it's legally binding. You might as well complain that the Supreme Court is just "nine people in Washington".
Nope. Look, just because abusive business practices applied to luxury items aren't as harmful as those in other industries doesn't mean they shouldn't be stopped.
So, if Apple isn't being singled out, then can you please show me similar attempts to outlaw other DRM providers that don't license their DRM? Can you please list the other DRM providers that don't license their DRM?
Also, why should companies using DRM be forced to license it? Because closed systems are harmful to consumers. I think we've been over that.
Why is it illegal? Can you show me that law that says that this is illegal? RTFA. From the submission: "European legislators have been giving DRM considerable attention for a while, but Norway has actually gone so far as to declare that Apple's iTunes store is illegal under Norwegian law".
From the original MSNBC article linked through TFA: "Norway's powerful consumer ombudsman ruled that its iTunes online music store was illegal because it did not allow downloaded songs to be played on rival technology companies' devices. [...] The ombudsman has set a deadline of October 1 for the Apple to make its codes available to other technology companies so that it abides by Norwegian law."
And from this Aftenposten article: "The Consumer Ombudsman and the Market Council (CO) and corresponding groups in Sweden and Denmark agree that local laws are violated by Apple protectionism".
I think I'll take their word for it, since they're the ones in charge of interpreting/enforcing the law.
So, I guess the GPL should be made illegal, because it doesn't allow users to modify the program without providing source code, thus limiting the freedom of end users. Again, if you think every concept that can be described by the noun "freedom" is equally important, I can see how you might reach that conclusion. Few sane people, if any, actually think that way, though.
And when buying DRM music in iTunes causes measurable *human harm* in the same way that working for poverty wages, taking dangrous medicines or eating poisoned meat do, then Apple will deserve to be regulaed. It's not really that difficult to suss out the difference here, is it? Gosh, when you put it that way... you're right, economic harm has no impact on humans whatsoever. If a company holds your data hostage to get you to keep buying their products instead of cheaper or better alternatives, that's no big deal.
Let's just get rid of all the trade regulations while we're at it - who cares about monopolies? So what if you have to pay more for stuff? I now realize that as long as you aren't physically poisoned, it's OK. Thanks for enlightening me.
Well, they could, but why should they be forced to do this? I'd like to see one good reason why. After all, other companies are not forced to license their products to other companies. Why is Apple so special that it deserves unequal treatment? They aren't. All companies promoting DRM should be forced to license it. FairPlay is just the most visible example, but I wouldn't be surprised to see similar sanctions against other companies... if indeed there are any other proprietary DRM schemes worth noting. (Zune hasn't been released in Europe yet, AFAIK.)
And it's not a long-shot or "baseless" that other companies would screw with Apple's model. It's very much based on what has actually happened historically. When Apple has licensed its technologies before, it resulted in nothing but grief. That's because Apple's business model is based on using lock-in to get people to buy their hardware at a premium price. The grief in the MacOS licensing days came from the fact that it was too successful, and customers bought cheap hardware from licensees instead of expensive hardware from Apple.
If Apple is unable to sustain a business without using illegal lock-in schemes, then I'll have no more sympathy for them than for any other company built on an illegal scheme... but I think they're stronger than that; their products will be able to survive on their own merits.
It's not really much different to saying that the GPL should be banned because it disallows proprietary forks without offering source code. Well, I suppose if you can't see the difference between using an illegal scheme to keep your customers dependent on you, and allowing end users the freedom to use and modify software, then you might think that.
But for some reason "I don't have an iPod, so FairPlay doesn't work on my MP3-Player" isn't false, despite the fact that you can simply re-rip the tunes. The reason must be that that solution is free, while yours costs a couple of hundred bucks. Re-ripping a large music library takes so long that it's simply impractical to do. Virtual PC, OTOH, only has to be installed once, and it doesn't take long. I, for one, would be much more willing to buy an emulator and set it up than to spend several days or weeks changing CD-RWs.
The keys are stored and used entirely within a single IC; the only way to extract one would be, in theory, to examine the IC directly (with an STM, for example), or somehow gain access to the master copy held by the manufacturer (and risk violating trade-secret laws). And as long as you're risking violating the trade secret laws, why not go all the way? I'd love to see a few dozen guys with machine guns just break down the TCPA's front door and steal the damn keys the old-fashioned way.
Besides, how would Apple supporting playsforsure address the Norwegian's concerns about iTunes songs not playing on other portable players? The debate is not about what formats the iPod can play, but whether iTunes purchases can play elsewhere. Well, Apple could sell tracks in PFS format, or allow the downloaded tracks to be converted to PFS or MP3. But PlaysForSure isn't the only solution here. A much better solution would be for them to just license FairPlay to other stores and hardware manufacturers.
But can they? Their contract with the record companies probably states that they can't open up Fairplay. [...] Other companies would probably screw up Fairplay More baseless speculation. Why are you wasting my time and yours with this?
No, I'm not. When you take a position that is antithetical to freedom, why shouldn't I ask if you hate freedom? Because you'd have to be a dishonest troll to interpret my position as "antithetical to freedom", and you know it. Supporting one regulation does not mean opposing all freedom.
And people can run iTunes on Windows with no emulation and listen to iTMS songs...so Norway's full of crap, right? iTunes is still an Apple product. Norway's objection is that you're locked into using Apple products, not that you need to buy a Mac.
Sure, you have your choice of manufacturers, but you're still under the control of Microsoft. So if countries like France and Norway want to force Apple to open Fair Play, they also need to force Microsoft to really open Playsforsure. How much more "open" can it possibly get? Seriously, what do you have in mind when you say that? All Apple is being asked to do is license FairPlay to others, which Microsoft already does.
Yes an agreement was made between the two parties (society/artists). It's called copyright, and by wilfully gaining use from the copyrighted material you have indeed agreed to the terms. Bullshit. It's not an agreement if both parties don't agree to it, and you can't just claim that an arbitrary action (like "willfully gaining use from copyrighted material") represents agreement.
If you believe this, then I should probably inform you that by putting on pants tomorrow, or at any time in the future, you agree to pay me $100,000. If you decline this agreement, then you must refrain from ever again wearing pants.
See slashdot has this persistent myth that the only contracts are the ones that have a signature to them. Myth? Try fact. You have no moral obligation to abide by a contract that you never agreed to.
The fact that the artists didn't get your permission to create doesn't entitle you to anything no matter how you argue it in the court of public opinion. I am entitled to remember, record, replay, and share any information I happen to receive, unless I explicitly promise not to. That entitlement doesn't come from the artist's behavior, but from my existence as a human being. Just as we all have the right to use language, math, and science, so do we all have the right to share information.
We can go back to the patron system (which is what your really arguing for) but we'll never have the scope and depth that we have now. What I'm arguing for is that artists work for their money, just like everyone else. My employer pays me to work - does that make him a "patron"?
As for "scope and depth", I'm afraid those aren't worth much when you can't do anything with the works. Who cares if you can go to the store and buy copies of a thousand items for $20 apiece; what really matters is how free you are to use them, share them, and build upon them. Shakespeare's works are more valuable than Toy Story precisely because we're free to use them.
One could argue that since open source meets your "unsolicited" criteria, anyone is free to do whatever they want with it irrespective of what the GPL (copyright) has to say. Indeed, one could. In a world without copyright, we wouldn't need the GPL - the GPL gives back the freedoms that copyright law takes away.
I agree, third parties should be able to produce and sell competing consoles that play the same games, and to the extent that DRM prevents them from doing so, it should be legally circumventable or simply outlawed.
Of course, it'd be foolish to start a campaign against the Xbox 360 or PS3 for this reason, because the main thing keeping competitors from producing compatible hardware isn't DRM, it's the hardware itself. If even Sony can just barely get the PS3 working (at great expense and low yield), what chance does a competitors have? OTOH, PS1/2 games, Xbox games, Dreamcast games, etc. can probably be played under emulation on newer hardware, and in those cases DRM might present a real barrier.
And what does that emulator run? A whole other operating system called Windows. Likewise for Parallels and Boot Camp. You'd might as well say: "Mac users can use PlaysForSure, as long as they don't use a Mac." Wow, do you really not understand how emulators work? You don't have to uninstall MacOS or stop using a Mac to run Virtual PC. You are, in fact, running the emulator on top of MacOS.
You might as well argue that Mac users are locked out of running Java programs, because Java runs in a virtual machine. Just because it isn't native code doesn't mean you can't run it.
If you ban the less restrictive DRM model, you've only succeeded in eroding the consumer's rights in favor of artificially inflating the demand for more restrictive DRM. This is a curious way of representing the people's interests. This particular government, like most governments, has decided that a competitive market is more important than the set of actions consumers are allowed to take with regard to their purchased media. I don't entirely agree with that, and I'd like to see them ban all forms of DRM, but this is at least one step in the right direction: a competitive market is, itself, in the people's interests.
To pretend that Apple is engaging in something harmful to consumers, here, is utterly silly. Consumers make the choice to buy an iPod, or not. So what? Trade regulations have always applied to voluntary actions. You can't choose to work for less than minimum wage. You can't choose to buy medications that haven't gotten FDA approval. You can't choose to buy poisoned meat.
Those voluntary actions are restricted, I suppose mainly to protect stupid people from themselves - the kind of people who would buy a steak that might not be sanitary just because it costs half as much, or an MP3 player that'll keep them shackled to one company for years just because it's the one that all the accessories are designed for.
Copyright law says that you may not copy an artist's work without the permission of the copyright owner. By living in a society which has copyright law you implicitly agree to those rules. Nah, I don't buy that nonsense. I believe actions should be guided by morality, not legality.
Choosing to live in the country where I was born is nothing like choosing to sign a contract; any implicit agreement would be made under duress, because there are significant barriers to moving away, and not many places with more agreeable laws.
Microsoft may be willing to license the technology - of course they want to make money from it. But would it be wise to hand Microsoft a monopoly for online music? WTF are you talking about? If you think that Apple adding PlaysForSure support to the iPod would give Microsoft a monopoly, you don't understand what a monopoly is.
So why don't they fucking do that, instead of going after Apple just because it is trendy at the moment - even though Apple does not have a monopoly, and has not committed fraud, and has not abused anything? This particular government clearly believes Apple's lock-in scheme constitutes an abuse. If you disagree, maybe you should run for office in Norway.
So, you're basically advocating screwing over existing users of iTunes, who voluntarily chose to use it - and giving them no choice at all? In fact, making their very purchases illegal? Not at all - maybe you should respond to what I actually write, instead of making up strawmen. Apple can alleviate this problem without screwing their existing users simply by opening up FairPlay, allowing customers to move their iTunes music to other players and other stores to sell DRM music to iPod users.
Do you hate freedom or something? Oh, I get it, you're just trolling. Fuck off.
Slashdot Mirror
Suppose you run a factory and you're violating some kind of pollution control law, and I'm the head of the environmental regulation agency. I can look at your actions, then refer to the law, and conclude that your actions are prohibited by that law. I might then approach you and say "Look, we both know you're breaking the law, so you can either stop now or I can take you to court". If you stop immediately and we don't go to court, that doesn't mean your actions weren't illegal; they were. It only means I didn't have to invoke the court system to get you to comply.
Similarly, if Apple's actions are prohibited by Norway's consumer protection laws, they are illegal. Period. If Apple voluntarily brings iTunes into compliance with the law before the ombudsman takes them to court and has a judge force them into compliance, then good for them; I'm sure the ombudsman would prefer it that way too.
My argument has been explained again and again. You, on the other hand, act as though you're unaware of the most basic premise of the article (i.e. iTunes having been declared illegal) and you accuse me of saying things that I haven't said.
Tip for the future: if you don't want to be called a troll, stop behaving like one.
Forcing users to go through a conversion process that'll cost $600 worth of time is just as bad from the POV of a customer as making conversion impossible and charging $600 a fee for the ability. Nothing Apple has done to date fits any reasonable definition of consumer harm. Then I suggest you run for office in Norway, because they seem to think it does.
Lock-in artificially forces you to pay one of those costs when you'd prefer to switch away: either the cost of converting or the cost of sticking with the inferior product. If you don't think having to pay extra artificial costs is harmful, then why don't you just send me all your money right now, since it won't harm you? That's not lock-in, no matter how many times you make a claim that it is. It may be inconvenient, and none of the other players or music stores currently on the market may justify the time and effort on my part to re-rip my library, but that's a personal decision for me to make, not a compelling argument for Apple to be forced into a money-losing business position. What's this "money-losing" BS... do you really think Apple will be unable to make a profit now that their scheme has been recognized as illegal? That their products have to be tied together because they can't compete on their own merits?
I have no idea which part you're failing to grasp. Do you think there are no iPod customers with a large library of iTMS music? Or that it's somehow convenient to convert hundreds or thousands of songs, one CD-RW at a time--that the difficulty of doing so couldn't possibly influence anyone's decision? Or do you just think that no one with an iPod would ever want to buy a competing music player? If Apple held a monopoly position in the digital music market, your criticism might be valid, but they don't. You can choose a different player, and you can choose a different DRM scheme (or none at all) if you shop around. The myth you keep promoting here is that iTunes is the only game in town -- they're not, either in the US, or in Europe. The existence of alternatives before you buy any digital music product is irrelevant here. What matters is that once you buy an iPod and a library of music from iTMS, you're stuck with FairPlay. You're locked in to buying more Apple products unless you want to pay the "termination fee" of a few weeks spent loading and unloading CD-RWs. Your entire argument rests on sticking it to Apple and proving how evil they are Again with the persecution fantasies. You fanboys are so predictable. It's not my fault Apple is the company pushing this scheme.
You can backpedal now, if you like, and try to pretend that wasn't an attempt to class Apple as a monopoly. It's not backpedaling, it's just good old reading comprehension. In that sentence, "monopolies" and "pay[ing] more for stuff" serve as examples of the sort of other trade regulations which we might as well get rid of if we're only going to worry about physical harm.
...because customers aren't "locked in" to anything. If the only format the iPod played was protected AAC, you might have a point, but of course the iPod plays a half a dozen audio formats, only one of which employs DRM. The iPod plays a few other formats, but if you want to download major-label music, your only choice is to get it from Apple in a format that'll only play on the iPod. Apple encourages their customers to build up a library of music in that format, and the more they buy, the more difficult it will be for them to switch brands when something better comes along. You own a Mac and an iPod? So what? Singling out Apple for special ire here is silly, and doesn't have a legitimate defense. That's what's so hilarious about your little theory: I'm not singling Apple out for special ire. You claim that I "just don't like the choice most of the market has already made", but the claim is baseless, because I made the same choice.The ire is directed at the lock-in scheme, not the company itself. Show me someone else running a similar scheme and I'll say the same things about them; show me someone else running a similar scheme on a larger scale, and I might even agree that Norway's consumer ombudsman should focus on them first.
Apple's anticompetitive tactics aren't exactly the same ones that MS has used, but they're still anticompetitive. To dress up your complaint as some kind of defense of consumer choice ignores the crucial fact that you just don't like the choice most of the market has already made. Please, you're embarrassing yourself with these fantasies. I own an iPod and I'm typing this on a PowerBook.
Of course, they can't tackle all these things at once. If you disagree with the order in which the Norwegian government is pursuing abusers, then maybe you should run for office there. Doesn't seem you read the article, but just the slashdot summary. One person in Norway has offered his opinion that iTunes should be banned. Can you show me the actual article of law in Norway that Apple is violating? Talk about projection! If you had read the quotes I posted and the original articles, you'd know that this "one person" is the consumer ombudsman, who is in charge of consumer protection laws. His declaration that iTunes violates Norwegian law isn't just some random dude's opinion; it's legally binding. You might as well complain that the Supreme Court is just "nine people in Washington".
Nope. Look, just because abusive business practices applied to luxury items aren't as harmful as those in other industries doesn't mean they shouldn't be stopped.
From the original MSNBC article linked through TFA: "Norway's powerful consumer ombudsman ruled that its iTunes online music store was illegal because it did not allow downloaded songs to be played on rival technology companies' devices. [...] The ombudsman has set a deadline of October 1 for the Apple to make its codes available to other technology companies so that it abides by Norwegian law."
And from this Aftenposten article: "The Consumer Ombudsman and the Market Council (CO) and corresponding groups in Sweden and Denmark agree that local laws are violated by Apple protectionism".
I think I'll take their word for it, since they're the ones in charge of interpreting/enforcing the law. So, I guess the GPL should be made illegal, because it doesn't allow users to modify the program without providing source code, thus limiting the freedom of end users. Again, if you think every concept that can be described by the noun "freedom" is equally important, I can see how you might reach that conclusion. Few sane people, if any, actually think that way, though.
Let's just get rid of all the trade regulations while we're at it - who cares about monopolies? So what if you have to pay more for stuff? I now realize that as long as you aren't physically poisoned, it's OK. Thanks for enlightening me.
If Apple is unable to sustain a business without using illegal lock-in schemes, then I'll have no more sympathy for them than for any other company built on an illegal scheme... but I think they're stronger than that; their products will be able to survive on their own merits. It's not really much different to saying that the GPL should be banned because it disallows proprietary forks without offering source code. Well, I suppose if you can't see the difference between using an illegal scheme to keep your customers dependent on you, and allowing end users the freedom to use and modify software, then you might think that.
You're right, what I meant is "only Apple is allowed to sell popular music to iPod users as downloadable files", but I think you knew that already.
If you believe this, then I should probably inform you that by putting on pants tomorrow, or at any time in the future, you agree to pay me $100,000. If you decline this agreement, then you must refrain from ever again wearing pants. See slashdot has this persistent myth that the only contracts are the ones that have a signature to them. Myth? Try fact. You have no moral obligation to abide by a contract that you never agreed to. The fact that the artists didn't get your permission to create doesn't entitle you to anything no matter how you argue it in the court of public opinion. I am entitled to remember, record, replay, and share any information I happen to receive, unless I explicitly promise not to. That entitlement doesn't come from the artist's behavior, but from my existence as a human being. Just as we all have the right to use language, math, and science, so do we all have the right to share information. We can go back to the patron system (which is what your really arguing for) but we'll never have the scope and depth that we have now. What I'm arguing for is that artists work for their money, just like everyone else. My employer pays me to work - does that make him a "patron"?
As for "scope and depth", I'm afraid those aren't worth much when you can't do anything with the works. Who cares if you can go to the store and buy copies of a thousand items for $20 apiece; what really matters is how free you are to use them, share them, and build upon them. Shakespeare's works are more valuable than Toy Story precisely because we're free to use them. One could argue that since open source meets your "unsolicited" criteria, anyone is free to do whatever they want with it irrespective of what the GPL (copyright) has to say. Indeed, one could. In a world without copyright, we wouldn't need the GPL - the GPL gives back the freedoms that copyright law takes away.
I agree, third parties should be able to produce and sell competing consoles that play the same games, and to the extent that DRM prevents them from doing so, it should be legally circumventable or simply outlawed.
Of course, it'd be foolish to start a campaign against the Xbox 360 or PS3 for this reason, because the main thing keeping competitors from producing compatible hardware isn't DRM, it's the hardware itself. If even Sony can just barely get the PS3 working (at great expense and low yield), what chance does a competitors have? OTOH, PS1/2 games, Xbox games, Dreamcast games, etc. can probably be played under emulation on newer hardware, and in those cases DRM might present a real barrier.
You might as well argue that Mac users are locked out of running Java programs, because Java runs in a virtual machine. Just because it isn't native code doesn't mean you can't run it. If you ban the less restrictive DRM model, you've only succeeded in eroding the consumer's rights in favor of artificially inflating the demand for more restrictive DRM. This is a curious way of representing the people's interests. This particular government, like most governments, has decided that a competitive market is more important than the set of actions consumers are allowed to take with regard to their purchased media. I don't entirely agree with that, and I'd like to see them ban all forms of DRM, but this is at least one step in the right direction: a competitive market is, itself, in the people's interests.
Those voluntary actions are restricted, I suppose mainly to protect stupid people from themselves - the kind of people who would buy a steak that might not be sanitary just because it costs half as much, or an MP3 player that'll keep them shackled to one company for years just because it's the one that all the accessories are designed for.
Choosing to live in the country where I was born is nothing like choosing to sign a contract; any implicit agreement would be made under duress, because there are significant barriers to moving away, and not many places with more agreeable laws.