Take a deep breath, Apple: Europe snaps on gloves for vigorous iTunes stream pat-down

Re: Not a surprise

> It's pretty hard to be more scummy than Microsoft, but apple have achieved it.

I think you'll find that part of the music industry has a far longer history of scummy abuse of consumers and artists than Apple or MS does.

In any case, all this article is about is the European Commission asking some questions to see if a investigation is required into a service Apple hasn't even launched yet.

Re: Not a surprise

"For years apple have using their market position to get labels to sign exclusivity in the contracts"

How has this manifested exactly? There doesn't seem to be any evidence for it!

Re: Huh?

"Apple Beats" sounds more like some new cereal and/or fruit rollup product than a streaming music service. Beats from Apple? I'll let the marketing geniuses, to use that qualifier very loosely, figure that one out. As for how it'll work? Controlling the hardware and going vertical with the content works very well for Apple. Look how the rest of the industry has conceded to their App market models. They'll figure this out as well and the labels will do their level best to force it on the rest of us. That's reality... even if I hate it. And no, I don't do Apple nor "digital content" beyond the books I've been collecting for the ages.

Re: "The Cupertino idiot-tax operation"...

Well, the normal laws of economics don't seem to be able to explain Apple's margins, so it's at least a feasible hypothesis. But if you genuinely find Apple products blissful, then perhaps the plastic gives off some kind of happy gas. More research is clearly needed - as long as someone else pays for the kit...