Parlez-Vous Apple?

Leave it to the French.

Lots of us may not like that iTunes songs we buy can only be played on iPods and not other MP3 players. Or that the songs we buy from other online song stores cannot be played on iPods.

But the French decided to pass a law against it. France's Senate and National Assembly approved legislation that could result in forcing Apple to make its iTunes online store and its iPods compatible with the competitors' products that it is beating in a free market.

Americans for Technology Leadership—a group of tech companies—said consumers are the ones who would suffer in the end if you over-regulate creative industries.

So far, Apple is quiet about the regulatory move, which is also afoot in Britain, Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Poland. The company is used to doing things differently than their competitors. Or at least saying they do. (Check out Christopher Null's Mac/PC comparison post.) But the AP story says some analysts believe Apple would close iTunes in France and remove its popular iPods from the country's stores before being forced by the government to change the way it does business.

If that were to happen, France's youth would really have something to riot about.

Where do you stand? Does any government have the right to tell companies to play nice and share?