Uh oh. Apparently the Justice Department is taking a closer look at Apple’s digital music tactics and practices. It’s just an inquiry at this point, but there’s talk that Apple’s been abusing its “dominant market position” and playing the bully.
https://gizmodo.com/in-case-you-were-wondering-how-amazon-and-apple-felt-ab-5484757
Supposedly some of the allegations being discussed are related to how Apple dealt with a recent Amazon music promotion:
In March, Billboard magazine reported that Amazon.com was asking music labels to give it the exclusive right to sell certain soon-to-be-released songs for one day before the songs go on sale more widely. In exchange, Amazon promised to include those songs in a promotion on Amazon’s Web site called “MP3 Daily Deal.”
Representatives from Apple’s music service, iTunes, were asking the labels not to take part in Amazon’s promotion, and Apple punished those that did by later withdrawing marketing support for those songs on iTunes, the magazine reported,.
We don’t know too many details about the Justice Department’s inquiry beyond that, but it certainly can’t be great news for Apple who is already under the Federal Trade Commission’s microscope after a complaint by Adobe. [NYT]
