The European Commission is investigating Apple and its good buddy EMI, along with the rest of the Big Four (Sony BMG, Universal and Warner) for antitrust violations because iTunes charges different prices in different countries. British folk, for instance, apparently get a sweet €0.17 discount per track for not living in mainland Europe. The EU thinks that’s a load of crap—anticompetitive crap, to be precise—and wants the price to be the same in every EU country.
https://gizmodo.com/official-emi-to-release-music-drm-free-248836
For its part, Apple’s saying that they too, wants identical pricing across the continent from the very bottom of its heart, but those damn record labels won’t let them. Where have we heard that before?
https://gizmodo.com/steve-jobs-on-drm-it-must-die-234448
To cut them some slack though, as Ars does, dealing with legal labyrinths that cut across national borders undoubtedly causes quite the headache, and practically it would probably be easier for Apple to just offer one store for everyone, regardless of location, simply slightly localized. So we’ll take Apple at their word, for now.
EU investigating Apple, Big Four labels over country-specific pricing [Ars Technica]
