Seems like the Norwegians could be getting more than they asked for.

Somebody buy me a ticket to Norway and I'll show those ole Viking legislators how to take a $0.15 CD and use Apple's own iTunes to create files that you can play on any player you want to.

I agree..but does anyone still think this is about DRM? Its about hating Apple plain and simple.

Yep. This won't be the last court battle over Apple's successes, either. That's the curse of being the top dog in a very lucrative market.

It'll be interesting to see how all this pans out compared to the court battles over Microsoft's dominance a few years ago (remember how they were talking about forcing MS to split into multiple companies?). The two situations seem to be similar in some ways.

Looks like someone always brings this up, and I guess I've taken the job putting this in perspective... You aren't completely wrong, but you might not be as right as you think.

Once you burn DRM-protected iTunes music to CD, you are now limited to CD players as a playback device. If you want to open up the use of other non-Apple devices, like other portable players, car MP3 players, SoundBridge, Squeezebox, etc., or if you simply want to use Apple hardware and not have the hassles of authorizing and deauthoring systems, you have to re-rip the CD you burned.

What happens then? (1) You lose sound quality, a lot in fact if you compress your re-ripped music back down to 128 AAC kbps just like your original purchase, (2) you lose no sound quality, but have to deal with a MUCH bigger file (about 6 times bigger if you use Apple Lossless or FLAC), or (3) some in-between compromise, like re-compressing back down to 192 kbps -- a 50% larger file, not so much loss of sound quality.

The very fact you have to burn a CD and re-rip it to get portability across devices, even apart from the above sound quality/file size penalties, creates an artificial barrier to competition. The DRM which is supposed to serve the purpose of protecting copyright of the content being sold -- the music itself -- is being misused to protect a particular line of products and a particular distribution method.

The DRM is not all of the problem as far as I got it. At least the Swedish agency are reacting to the freedoms Apple are taking in the EULA which says that they might change the contract at any time without prior notice, and the fact that Apple takes no responsibility for direct damages caused by the iTMS and the media.

Glad to see an unbiased opinion. I for one hope that Apple loses. I will not buy products with DRM on them, because many have clauses that allow them to change the license restrictions at any time in the future even if you bought the product previously, I personally see this as unacceptable that a company can change it's agreement after you've already purchased a product. While Apple offers one of the better DRM's it still has that option to change it's terms later on. DRM isn't about stopping illegal file sharing it's about having to rebuy all of your media every time you want to use it on a different player.

This is a pretty important point. The EULA allows Apple to change the terms after purchase without recourse, which Apple has done. That gives me another reason to not use their service, because I don't think that is something a legitimate or ethical business would do.

Wrong! You need to get your facts straight.

Apple is not "top dog" in Europe; the iPod and iTMS don't have anywhere near the dominance that they do in the U.S.

Also, this is not just about DRM (and it creeps me out a little how much Apple fans seem to have no problem with DRM), it is also about Apple being able to change the terms of use of the product (iTMS tracks) after you've bought them, and that they disclaim any responsibility for iTunes causing damage or data loss.

Are any other companies selling DRM-encumbered files being questioned as well? Or are there no other online stores in these countries? Surely the terms and conditions have more to do with the record companies interests, and hence all online stores would have similar conditons