Netherlands Joins iPod-iTunes Opposition

As some of you may be aware, I have been reporting on the
current copyright trials of Apple, and copyright issues in general.

The Dutch consumer protection agency became the latest in Europe on Thursday to pressure Apple Inc. into changing restrictions that tie songs bought on iTunes to its market-leading iPod players.

Consumentenbond spokesman Ewald van Kouwen said his group had filed a formal complaint with the Dutch antitrust watchdog NMa asking for an investigation into what he called "illegal practices" by Apple's iTunes online store.

"What we want from Apple is that they remove the limitations that prevent you from playing a song you download from iTunes on any player other than an iPod," van Kouwen said.
"When you buy a music CD it doesn't play only on players made by Panasonic.
People who download a song from iTunes shouldn't be bound to an iPod for the rest of their lives."

The Dutch complaints follow similar ones from consumer-rights groups in Germany, France and the Nordic countries.


Physorg.com

I am glad to see more and more countries getting behind this
movement.

I am especially glad the Netherlands is, as it is one of my
faovourite countries.


Comments, Opinions?

[edit on 1/25/2007 by iori_komei]

You know I really do love Europe. Lets just hope that most countries continue to lead the way in digital rights and hope the EU follows suit.

Btw theres a short list here where you can find information on DRM free music/movies/music players etc.

I've never downloaded any music from Apple, I use my iPod as a backup device for all of my CDs. Also, so I don't have to lug around my CDs,

But I believe the songs are downloaded as 128kb/s .m4a files (or AAC). Not the best quality, but the average listener probably wouldn't notice a difference.

But. m4a (also known as .mp4 or .m4u) has been around for YEARS!!! If other players cannot handle that format, then they're obsolete. But besides that, iTunes can reformat almost any file into another. From AAC (.m4a) to .mp3 to AIFF to WAV and back and forth again. Plus, I think the Windows version of iTunes supports the .wma extension as well.

So I'm not sure what the problem is? Unless they're somehow marked through coding that makes them unable to be converted using iTunes or another file conversion program, such s WinAmp, or whatever...Then I can see a lawsuit...but a silly one at that...After all, if you want to be able to play anything anywhere, buy the CD, rip it yourself at better quality, and go from there.