Norwegians outlaw iTunes. Could EU be next?

Steve Jobs may not want to fly to Oslo anytime soon. So angered by the restrictive nature of the iTunes DRM, Fairplay, the Norwegian Government this week has done something extraordinary about it -- they declared it illegal.

Consumers have been grumbling for years that Fairplay hardly lives up to its name, restricting iTunes purchases to Apple's ubiquitous iPod and not allowing it to be played on any other portable device. The Norwegian Government, followed by the Norwegian Consumer Council, condemned this lack of choice, demanding Apple open iTunes by October 1. Likewise, French and German consumer groups are calling for Apple to do the same. Ditto for Denmark and Sweden.

Will all this sabre-rattling finally result in a free and open iTunes? It's doubtful. What would really need to happen is an EU-wide probe, taking Apple to account for breaching Europe's competiton rules, just as Brussels has done with Microsoft. But, as competition experts point out, this is still something of a long shot. The market for digital music is still but a sliver of the overall music market, and while iPod sales are impressive, it's not a foregone conclusion that Jobs & co. has wrapped up the market to the exclusion of all competitors. As these same experts point out, Microsoft could prove to be Apple's greatest legal defence. As long as Microsoft makes an honest attempt to unseat the iPod with Zune, Apple has little to worry about in Europe. With the launch of Zune (and remember the Sony Walkman?), Microsoft is proving that the market is not controlled by a monopolist.

We could be living with a restrictive Fairplay for a long time to come.