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Sony UK and Sony France have lost a case against The French consumer protection association UFC Que Choisir because they did not inform the consumers about the lack of interoperability of their products and services to other devices.

The decision taken by the Nanterre Tribunal has found Sony liable for misleading the consumers by "the fact that Sony did not explicitly and clearly informed the consumer that the music players sold could read only the music files downloaded on the only legal site Connect." The decision also considered that Sony UK had not explicitly stated in its contract that the music files downloaded from the Connect website could be read only by the music players dedicated for the Sony trademark.

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2007 has started with news showing the fading away of the DRM systems that have created many problems with consumers and interoperability without having clear results in the actions against illegal copies.

Thus, one of the biggest record companies, EMI, has announced at the beginning of the 2007 that it will no longer produce DRM protected CDs. EMI considered that the technology was not efficient enough for the CDs. However, the decision was limited to the classical CDs and was not related to the distribution of online music in an MP3 format.

But the major record companies have started a serious discussion regarding also selling music online with DRMs. It is expected that in 2007 the music

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On 3 October 2006, the first Anti-DRM day, a new collaborative information platform about the potential dangers of Digital Restriction Management (DRM) was launched. The DRM.info was initiated by the Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) and is supported by a group of organisations and authors.

The main message of the new website is 'Your devices don't trust you!' as Joachim Jakobs, FSFE's media coordinator explains: "In fact they trust you so little that they will not even tell you that they put you under surveillance." DRM.info wants to inform and involve people in decisions that will affect them on a very personal level. All the contributors to the new platform have a shared concern about the lack of a social debate on issues

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The French Constitutional Council ruled on the most controversial copyright and related rights law, known as DADVSI law, concluding that some provisions of the law "violated the constitutional protections of property".

The Council has considered as unconstitutional several provisions adopted by the French Parliament that were meant to balance the initial text which was too much in favour of the industry, thus making the law even stricter.

One of the aspects considered by the Council as against the equality principle was the gradual system in the application of fines for making works available on P2P networks, which was ranging from 38 to 150 euros. Under the circumstances, the penalties remain at the level of 3

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The most controversial DADVSI Law, now colloquially known also as "iTunes Law", was finally adopted in the French Parliament with a compromise allowing Apple to continue operating as before.

The law was adopted by the Parliament under emergency regime, which ended with a mixed commission, normally made of 7 senators and 7 deputies, from both the majority and the opposition. But the opposition left the commission, after 55 more amendments were brought to it by the rapporteurs at the very final step

The most controversial provision was that of interoperability. In a previous draft, the law imposed measures to allow interoperability, obliging thus Apple to give up its DRM system that made "iTunes" products strictly related

Following a complaint made by the Norwegian Consumer Council in January this year, Bjorn Erik Thon, the Norwegian Consumer Ombudsman has ruled that the Apple iTunes service breaks section 9a of the Norwegian Marketing Control Act.

The Consumer Ombudsman considers as unreasonable that the agreement the consumer must accept is regulated by the foreign law and that iTunes disclaims any liability for a possible damage the software may cause.

He also thinks that just like Apple requires an iPod for songs via iTunes, other companies producing music, book or film could restrict their products to specific players as well and believes that this could be an infringement of rights.

"You will have a difficult situation for the consumer ... the consumer has to have four or five gadgets to have the availability of the content that he

The issue of the private copy remuneration system is becoming a subject of debate for interest groups from all over the world. L'AEPO-ARTIS grouping 27 associations of artists of Europe, the International Federation of Musicians and the International Federation of Actors took a stand in the support of the present private copy levy system.

According to the artists associations, the present private copy system "significantly supports the cultural domain" as "a flexible system combining freedom for consumers and legitimate revenues for the copyright owners" being "vital for interpreters in the exploitation of their interpretation". Replacing the fees on private copy, which brought income to the artists, with DRM, which allows copying only within a system approved by its producer, is profitable only for the industry selling DRM systems and not to

On April 6, the Swiss copyright office launched a discussion on the proposal for the revision of the copyright law in Switzerland at its media event in Berne. The Swiss copyright office presented a pocket guide as well as a website and commented on the most important changes. The primary goal of the copyright revision is the ratification of the two WIPO Internet Treaties.

A crucial point is the legal status conferred to technical copyright protection measures, such as Digital Rights Management (DRM), and ensuring prohibition of their circumvention. However, in contrast with copyright laws passed in other countries, circumvention would be allowed for uses authorized in general by copyright law (personal copies, fair use). File downloading will remain legal, because users cannot be required to decide