It looks like Apple and Sony are about to fall out...good style.
Sony has let it be known that it's perfectly prepared to pull its music catalogue from iTunes in a tit-for-tat row that's been rumbling on for a few weeks.
It came to the surface when Sony's eBook reader app was turned down by the Apple App Store. Apple said it was simply enforcing already-existing rules that eBook apps must use Apple's in-app ordering system as well as Sony's own to give users a choice.
This may be true, but it's the first time Apple has actually enforced the rule. And it angered Sony.
It so happens that Sony is about to launch it's own streaming music service in Australia - no doubt with the intention of it become worldwide. And CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment, Michael Ephraim, made it clear that while there's no viable alternative to iTunes at the moment, that might change:
''Publishers are being held to ransom by Apple and they are looking for other delivery systems, and we are waiting to see what the next three to five years will hold.''In other words, push us around much more and we'll withdraw our music from iTunes.
(Via: TheAge)
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