Both the French and Yahoo get it wrong!

Talk about biting the hand that feeds you; me thinks France is an expert at it! France's trade Minister Christine Lagarde is quoted by Yahoo as saying:

"Any time a company restricts competition in a market, it gets the attentio
of regulating agencies. We have to play by the rules of the game," she said."

Apple? Restricting competition? I think the French have forgotten who created that market. If it were not for Steve Jobs doing the hard grunt work and getting his hands grimy dealing with the music industry executives adn the likes of the vultures at the RIAA, there would be no real legitimate music market.

Truth be told the real monopolists are the players in the music industry who have all but been caught price fixing in at least 3 countires I can think of off hand. Ask yourself why it is that all CD's seem to cost the same (or virtually the same) in any market you might think of?

Why, when the cost and end retail price of everything related to computers has dropped preciptously in since the mid-eighties has there been no price reduction at all until the last year or so? Price fixing and monopoly? Virticle monopoly, the music industry controls the whole game from the beginning production, recuitment, promotion, distributrion or music products except for the end retailer.

I dont' know of another industry in which that would be allowed. But perhaps this just another volley in the Great French Frie Debacle purpetrated by a U.S. politician a while back. (Americans are so over the top with the meldrama! They try to turn everything into a daytime soap opera!)

Now for Yahoo; later in that report they state:

"Apple Computer Inc. has always refused to allow its paid-for musc files downloaded via iTunes to be converted into another format, which would allow them to be listened to on a music player other than its iPod."

Not so, you can listen on your Windows PC, you can shuffle the audio off to your home stereo system, you can even use Airport Express to run an Optical connection out to your surround sound system and use the ADDA converters to convert the digital signal into electrical impulses for your amplifier. As well, you can always burn the tracks purchased at the iTunes store to CD. Now if that isn't transfering from one format to anohter I don't know what is. As soon as they are on an audiio CD, you can do what you want with them.

It may be a circuitous route, but none the less, the method is there and should be well known... everyone does except the press!

Thanks to Ars Technica for pointing me to the Yahoo story!

Odd, isn't it, that I seem to be able to take my CD's almost anywhere and play them. I can play them in a car, in a personal player with earplugs, I can take them to a friends place and play them. I don't though, you see, people want to "borrow" them and they have a way of not coming back to me. So those completely portable shiney discs never leave my apartment!