Despite pressure from some member states, European Commission officials are wary of forcing Apple to open up iTunes.The European Commission’s director general of competition, Philip Lowe, told Reuters yesterday: “We wouldn’t at this stage regard iTunes’ inability to play back on devices other than the iPod as an instance of major concern until we’ve seen further market developments.” He also observed that Apple has built its dominant market position in a fair and open competitive market. “Apple obtained its strong market position in open competition with many similar players, including some with their own websites,” he observes. The statements emerge as Apple faces pressure from France and the Scandinavian states to open up iTunes song downloads to play on non-Apple music players. In the United Kingdom, consumer groups have begun campaigning against certain iTunes features while record label trade body the BPI also voices its concerns. Norway’s consumer ombudsman, Bjorn Erik Thon, says he will act soon against Apple, citing consumer law, but not before he has received a letter of explanation from the company. Thon faces cooler heads in the Norwegian legislature. Norway’s director general of competition, Knut Eggum Johansen, describes the local market as “emerging,” warning: “This may be an argument for competition authorities to have a somewhat more hands-off approach.” Meanwhile, U.S. intellectual property lawyer Richard Neff has observed that the digital music market must be seen as including piracy, warning that doing so shows a truer representation of the market. He told Techweb: “I don’t see in this market, which is in complete state of flux, with piracy probably as high as legitimate sales, I can’t see how Apple can be considered to have the dominant position,” he said. “It depends on how you define the market.”-Macworld staff, Macworld.co.ukRelated Links: Apple’s iTunes Found Guilty of Violating Norwegian Law CBS, iTunes Offer TV Shows for Computer, iPodsCheck out our CIO News Alerts and Tech Informer pages for more updated news coverage. Related content opinion Website spoofing: risks, threats, and mitigation strategies for CIOs In this article, we take a look at how CIOs can tackle website spoofing attacks and the best ways to prevent them. By Yash Mehta Dec 01, 2023 5 mins CIO Cyberattacks Security brandpost Sponsored by Catchpoint Systems Inc. Gain full visibility across the Internet Stack with IPM (Internet Performance Monitoring) Today’s IT systems have more points of failure than ever before. Internet Performance Monitoring provides visibility over external networks and services to mitigate outages. By Neal Weinberg Dec 01, 2023 3 mins IT Operations brandpost Sponsored by Zscaler How customers can save money during periods of economic uncertainty Now is the time to overcome the challenges of perimeter-based architectures and reduce costs with zero trust. By Zscaler Dec 01, 2023 4 mins Security feature LexisNexis rises to the generative AI challenge With generative AI, the legal information services giant faces its most formidable disruptor yet. That’s why CTO Jeff Reihl is embracing and enhancing the technology swiftly to keep in front of the competition. By Paula Rooney Dec 01, 2023 6 mins Generative AI Digital Transformation Cloud Computing Podcasts Videos Resources Events SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER From our editors straight to your inbox Get started by entering your email address below. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe