By Jo Best, 12 June 2006 14:50
NEWS
Apple's DRM has drawn the ire of three Nordic countries, which are accusing the Mac maker of operating illegally by making its music player and iTunes download service incompatible with rivals'.
Denmark, Norway and Sweden have all agreed to tackle the issue of the lack of interoperability between Apple's DRM, known as Fairplay, and copy protection systems used by rivals such as Microsoft, for their MP3 players.
The three countries will now be taking Apple to their respective ombudsmen to review the iPod maker's DRM practices. Its licensing agreements will also come under scrutiny, as some elements are written in English rather than the appropriate Nordic language, and are therefore against the law.
Norway's consumer ombudsman has already ruled that Apple must change the terms and conditions in its licences this month, or risk being fined.
The decision marks a growing tide of discontent within Europe around Apple's DRM, which ensures consumers can only play songs downloaded from iTunes on the iPod.
France has been debating legislation that will force Apple to open its DRM to rivals if it's passed. Apple has threatened to pull its iTunes service out of the country rather than become interoperable.
According to JupiterResearch analyst Mark Mulligan, Apple has to stop taking an ostrich's approach to the DRM objectors.
He wrote in his blog: "Apple really needs to start formulating its Plan B now so that it is best positioned in any potential transition of terms. Otherwise it could find itself watching European countries falling like dominoes."
It's not just the Old World that has been getting hot under the collar: US consumers took to the streets today to protest about Apple's take on DRM. A group calling itself Defective by Design protested outside Apple stores in a number of US cities, calling for an end to DRM.
Comments
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1. Simon
It's all very well knocking Apple - after all, it does have top spot in the market. I'm all for opening these things up, but it needs to be done across the board - Microsoft is playing exactly the same game, the only difference is that third parties make the hardware that Microsofts DRM runs on.
2. anonymous
This is mostly nonsense. Music is available in many formats. iTunes downloads go to a Mac or PC; they can be written to a CD, and imported back free of DRM if you want to transfer them to a non-fairplay player, or simply bought on CD in the first place. Playsforsure downloads require you to have Microsoft Windows (no Mac or Linux), and to have a tethered Playsforsure player that checks in regularly to keep the music alive.
Apple doesn't own the music, it merely resells licences. If the publishers want to open the Apple licence, they, not Apple, can simply announce a licence extension. This shows they don't actually want to open the licence, but to cripple it (because Apple would then have to renegotiate).
Apple can resell a better licence because their proprietary system gives the publishers better protection. The music biz supports opening the licence by force, so they can change the licence terms to the end user's disadvantage.
As to the English language thing, if contracts written in another language cannot be enforced in Nordic countries, then many more than just Apple will disable access from Nordic countries.
3. eddie rainford
Drm is old hat,
it's been cracked for both music
and movie's.