[MW Forums]

Apple and four of the biggest record companies have until Wednesday to respond to antitrust charges that they restricted sales of online music in Europe. more

[horvatic]

Apple claims it has always tried to operate a single pan-European iTunes store accessible by anyone from any member state but has been prevented from doing so by the record labels and publishers.
I have no doubt that the above is true and I would hold the record labels and publishers accountable for this violation. It would certainly seem easier if Apple had straight across the board pricing instead of each European country having different pricing.

[ajhoughton]

Frankly though, at least some part of the problem has been created by the fact that the European "Single Market" exists in name only. There is a great deal of complicated and sometimes contradictory legislation still in place in many member states (for instance, the glorious quagmire that is VAT law), which makes it very difficult for companies to operate under terms that consumers would find reasonable (e.g. charging the same price everywhere).
There is also the issue of the fact that many member states are not using the Euro, but have retained their historic currencies, which means that fluctuating exchange rates must be taken into consideration, and in particular in the context that companies and consumers wish to have their pricing well-known and clearly advertised. It is no good, for instance, telling a British customer a price in Euros, or telling a French customer a price in Sterling. And it is no good telling a customer that the price was 79 pence yesterday, but today it's 72 pence and tomorrow it could be 83 pence. Customers don't want that complexity; they want the price to be stable so they know how much they will be spending.
So I think it's a bit rich the European Union making a big song and a dance about this, when quite frankly it has yet to get its own house in order on the matter of the single market. (I'm not defending the idea that songs should be licensed per-country, or that music should cost more in the U.K.; what I'm saying is that even if they were licensed Europe-wide, there are still problems in the way that the market is set up that would create price inequalities, and I think, therefore, that it's dishonest of the politicians to try to put all the blame for any current differences on Apple and its licensors).