Opinion: March 2006 Archives

A Reuters article reveals that the French are after Apple for its closed, proprietary system. The proposed law would make it legal to crack digital rights management schemes to enable conversion from one format to another.

The merits of an open format for music purchased from iTunes is certainly worthy of discussion. However, that decision rests exclusively with Apple, which alone has the moral right to decided on what terms it will sell its products.

The law also provides new fines for piracy. According to the article, “Vanneste said the draft law aimed to fight piracy, encourage the development of the online digital music market in France and benefit legal online music retailers.” This is the part that really grabs my attention. “Benefit legal online music retailers”? Who is the biggest of these? Well it’s iTunes, of course. How can a law targeted at iTunes benefit iTunes?

Moreover, who exactly is the beneficiary of legalizing DRM cracking? The most popular by far online music store (iTunes) is fully compatible with the by far most popular music player (iPod). Indeed, the seemless integration is part of Apple’s success. Apple sells them as an integrated solution.

Furthermore, iTunes is not itself a profitable venture for Apple. After giving the record companies their 70% share, and covering the myriad costs of actually storing over one million songs and serving over one billion downloads, plus various other costs, iTunes just beats breaking even. The iTunes store exist for the sole purpose of driving iPod sales (where Apple makes a very handsome profit). Those iPod sales are also helping drive computer sales, which are likewise profitable.

Again, I get back to the theme of Apple’s integration of its hardware, software, and services. It’s a beautiful system that has made the company worth more than Sony (based on market capitalization). France is meddling with this system, and it has no right to. Thankfully, Apple seems likely to show more backbone than most businesses, and may very well withdraw iTunes from France, to the detriment of the French people. If you cannot accept the terms of a sale, you simply decline. The French people are free to buy their music from other sources, but if they want to use iTunes, they must adhere to the license they agreed to when they signed up.

Here’s an excerpt from the iTunes France terms of service:

Vous comprenez que le Service, de même que les produits achetés via le Service, tels que des enregistrements sonores, des vidéos et les illustrations qui leur sont associées (“Produits”), met en œuvre un système de sécurité reposant sur une technologie qui protège les informations numériques et limite votre utilisation des Produits à certaines règles d’utilisation établies par iTunes et ses concédants de licences (“Règles d’Utilisation”). Vous acceptez de vous conformer à ces Règles d’Utilisation, telles qu’exprimées ci-après, et vous vous engagez à ne pas enfreindre ni tenter d’enfreindre aucun élément de sécurité. Vous vous engagez à ne pas essayer (ni aider une autre personne) de contourner, accéder au code source, décompiler, désassembler, ou d’interférer de quelque façon que ce soit sur les éléments de sécurité liés à ces Règles d’Utilisation, pour quelque motif que ce soit.

And here’s the same excerpt from the US iTunes terms of service, which has the exact same stipulations:

You understand that the Service, and products purchased through the Service, such as sound recordings, videos and related artwork (“Products”), include a security framework using technology that protects digital information and limits your usage of Products to certain usage rules established by Apple and its licensors (“Usage Rules”). You agree to comply with such Usage Rules, as further outlined below, and you agree not to violate or attempt to violate any security components. You agree not to attempt to, or assist another person to, circumvent, reverse-engineer, decompile, disassemble, or otherwise tamper with any of the security components related to such Usage Rules for any reason whatsoever.

The Bloomberg headline, "Hamas Refuses to Recognize Israel After Moscow Talks" reveals the absurdity of the entire Palestinian movement. Hamas is a terrorist organization, recently elected as the goverment of the Palestinian Authority. Israel is a real state. It has a stable government and, more importantly, protects individual rights. As a result, it is fairly affluent. "Palestine" is utterly destitute. Individual rights, such as property rights, are not respected, and the region lives off donations from the West. The political organization Hamas now controls is like a mosquito: small, parasitic, and ultimately ephemeral. And yet it has the audacity to refuse to even recognize Israel. It's mind-blowing.

The article tells us that "Putin last month invited Hamas to visit Moscow and said the international community should recognize the Palestinians' choice of Hamas to lead their next government." Indeed, the Palestinians freely chose a terrorist organization to lead it. What does this tell us about the legitimacy of Palestine? What about the "innocence" of the Palestinian people? I'm not saying that all Palestinians are evil and deserve to die. I am, however, saying that everyone who voted for Hamas is evil.

Israel should not allow this charade to continue. It ought to unilaterally destroy the Palestinian Authority. It should loudly proclaim its moral right to exist, and to aggressively defend itself against those who seek its destruction.