ITMS Faces Complaint From Norwegian Ombudsman

Whiney Mac Fanboy writes "Following the French Bill that threatened Apple's iTunes service in France, the iTunes music store is facing more uncertainty in Scandinavia. According to a report in Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten, Norway's Consumer Ombudsman has filed a complaint with Apple's music download sales service iTunes, arguing that the transaction terms violate Norwegian law. The Register is also reporting this story:, saying a contract cannot be regulated by English law, rather than Norwegian law, so iTunes must accept responsibility for damage its software may do, and said it is unreasonable to alter terms and conditions after a song has been sold. Consumer Council told the Reg: 'The Consumer Council has asked Apple to respond as to whether iTunes should work on other platforms - they have until 21 June to respond. After that the Ombudsman is likely to set another deadline and then start fining the company.' The BPI (Britain's RIAA equivalent) has also called upon Apple to license Fairplay."

Re:Foriegn Laws For US Companies?

[famebait]

I don't understand how Norway can say that if one of the parties is Norwegian (or in Norway) that only the laws of Norway can control.

They don't. They say that when a business which has a norwegia branch operates a norwegian-language e-shop explicitly directed at the norwegian market, distributed through a .no site, and in every way strives to come across as a local shop, then it is no longer an import scenario: they are operating in the norwegian market, and are subject to norwegian trade law, and just claiming they're not doesn't make it so.

Supported by others in Scandinavia

[Jugalator]

ITMS Faces Complaint From Norwegian Ombudsman

... and the Swedish, and the Danish, according to a Swedish newspaper.

So I think this is a problem with laws common to a number of Scandinavian countries, and in short they dislike that Apple is writing themselves free of so many things upon signing up; e.g freedom of changing the license agreement without warning and with immediate effect.

Re:Don't like Norways laws?

[TexasDex]

Easier said than done. If Norwegian residents can browse the internet then they can buy from the iTunes store. When two businesses in different nations decide to make a deal the laws of both nations can't both apply at once. If Apple had a server in Norway that served iTunes then perhaps they might have some legal grounds, but it seems to me like Norwegian residents should be free to enter into agreements with parties in other countries. Norway has no jurisdiction in the U.S., only in their own country. If Norway wanted to prevent its citizens from using iTMS then it could make it illegal to be a customer of them, but their goal is to protect the people not confine them. That's where this gets complicated: it's an agreement between parties in different nations. iTMS isn't "operating there" AFAIK, the people there are essentially meeting in international waters to exchange goods/services. So if either party happened to break the contract, and sue over it, which country would you sue in? Apple would probably have to sue in Norway, Norwegian citizens probably in the U.S. That means Norwegians don't have as much recourse as they would if iTMS was stationed in Norway, and the Norwegian government isn't exactly thrilled at the thought. I say: get used to it. Such is the Internet. Disclaimer: IANA international law expert, just somebody who has hung out on Slashdot enough to sound like one.

Re:Foriegn Laws For US Companies?

[famebait]

You must be talking about some other country. Here in Norway, your corner shop can't claim to operate under the law of some foreign country in order to escape the law, even with the use of a contract, and neither can Apple when they operate as a local business entity.

If the customers were dealing directly with Apple in the US, things would of course be different.

Re:Don't like Norways laws?

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

Easier said than done. If Norwegian residents can browse the internet then they can buy from the iTunes store.

Incorrect. Apple divides the market up. Try buing from the US itunes with a British Credit Card.

Re:Apple + Interoperability = Ha ha ha ha ha

[xenolon]

I'm a little curious where you're getting these sales figures?

From this TIME article [time.com]:

...For every 99 Apple gets from your credit card, 65 goes straight to the music label. Another quarter or so gets eaten up by distribution costs. At most, Jobs is left with a dime per track, so even $500 million in annual sales would add up to a paltry $50 million profit...

and this NARIP document [mit.edu]. (Sorry, direct link to a PDF.)

If you insist on making spurious claims about Apple, or any other company for that matter, don't try to disguise them as facts please, that's all we ask. They're certainly not the kings of interoperability, but I can't think of any OS/company that is. no, not even *nix.

Re:Foriegn Laws For US Companies?

[TubeSteak]

Nope, the GP has no clue what he's talking about, at all

In the U.S., if a company has a significant business presence* in a State, then they are subject to the laws of that jurisdiction.

If some cookie cutter EULA says "State of New York"... well, that doesn't mean shit, unless that company has no significant business presence in your state.

The second Apple opened a branch in Norway, their product became subject to the laws of that country.

Apple can either comply, change the laws of Norway, or take their shiny white iBall and go home.

*A significant business presence doesn't actually require significant business, it just requires a significant presence. Like a company store or corporate offices etc.

Re:Symptom of a wider problem.

[Awful Truth]

Not at all true. Typically contracts between parties in different legal systems (even between U.S. States) will explicitly state which laws govern disputes under the contract. That way there's less of a chance of conflicting legal systems, though it can happen -- for instance, if party B agrees to use party A's legal system and do something legal in A's jurisdiction but not in B's. I work in the Financial industry; almost all derivatives contracts (for instance) specify English law governs the parties. If they use U.S. law, they specify New York State. It's not really that financial firms think they can get the best deal in those places, but rather that the law is most well developed for this industry there, and so there are more precedents and less ambiguity. So no, it's probably not a case of U.S. Centrism as it is a desire to work under a predictable legal framework. If you're rolling out a service to customers in many different countries, you don't want to have to retain lawyers in each, and customize your product.

EU consumer protection to the rescue

[andersh]

I'm sorry but you seem to forget that Norway is subject to the same laws as EU member states due to the extensive EEA agreement. Of course you can agree to resolve issues in a foreign court of law. The issue is not simply a matter of EU membership or not. The real issue is one of consumer protection not commercial contracts. In fact according to a European Union directive consumers can actually choose to invoke their local legislation when shopping from a European website. Yes, this directive is also valid in Norway. And under Norwegian law when a website is reachable and targes Norwegian citizens it's also subject to local law.

Re:Don't like Apples DRM

[esper]

itunes.no is in Norway. Oslo, to be exact, according to their whois records.

Re:Symptom of a wider problem.

[Pofy]

>Not at all true. Typically contracts between parties in different legal systems (even between
>U.S. States) will explicitly state which laws govern disputes under the contract.

Yes, but if someone in, say, Norway buys from a shop in Norway, norwegian laws applies, period. In this case, it is about Apple's Norwegian store, not if someone from Norway goes to some site in another country and buys from there. Still, at most you will end up with the possibility of the country you buy from having its law apply.

Do note that we talk about consumer sales here, which in most cases are conducted in the country you also live in (or is visiting). For such cases, there is no room or need for specifying laws to govren the purchase. The fact that companies themselves buy and sell between them across boarders is a different bussiness and such sales are typically governed by far less laws and there is much more roof for contractual agreeements on most things, while for consumer sales, the laws are usually not possible to override by contracts, including spcifying another law.

>If you're rolling out a service to customers in many different countries, you don't want to
>have to retain lawyers in each, and customize your product.

On the countrary, at least for consumer sales, if you want to be present in different countries, you MUST know the laws and adjust to them. With your proposal, each consumer would instead have to emply a laywer for each country when he goes shopping instead, obviously a horribly bad situation. It would basically be chaos, imagine going to your grocery and having 10 different laws apply to your purchase!

Re:English Law = England, not US

[Pofy]

>That said, if Norway was part of the EU this would not be a problem for Apple as I think that
>they would be able to choose any particular EU member states laws (in this case England) to
>apply

Not completely true, you can't chose law at will inside EU, especially if both the seller and buyer is in the same country. Even if you are buying from another country than your own inside EU, the seller can't chose arbitrary laws of a country of choise, at most you can end up with the laws of the country in which the seller is doing his bussiness, however, there are still restrictions in the unfair terms used so that they can't be worse than in the buyers country. Here is a good link to an EU directive on the issue:

http://ec.europa.eu/consumers/cons_int/safe_shop/u nf_cont_terms/index_en.htm [europa.eu]
Click on link in second paragraph, or chose another language if you like.