Conventional wisdom holds that Apple will crush any attempt to break its hammerlock on iTunes device compatibility. However, there are a few good reasons for Cupertino to allow a competitor access at least for as long as it pleases them.

By now we’ve all heard Palm brag that its Pre smartphone syncs “seamlessly” with iTunes. We’ve even read DVD Jon explain how easily Apple could cripple this third-party functionality.

That said, who doesn’t believe Apple will quickly move to crush insipid Palm and its pathetic little smartphone?

Ed Hansberry of InformationWeek has an interesting take on this soap opera that doesn’t involve Cupertino exterminating the upstart. He suggests that may leave Palm to fail on its own while giving Apple anti-trust cover for its industry-dominating iPod-iPhone-iTunes combination.

However, Henry Blodget notes that analysts are now thinking Apple will just leave Palm alone on this issue. Could it be that Apple knows it cannot dominate the MP3 market the way it has forever and it thinking it is better to lose a device sale and still get the revenue from media purchases rather than lose them both? Blodget seems to think it is that Apple doesn’t consider Palm worth the legal fees.

Of course, Apple could still chose, at any time, to cripple the Pre just for giggles. Naturally, if RIM or Microsoft decide to emulate Palm’s iTunes sync functionality, all bets are off…

What’s your take?

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Entry was posted on Thursday, June 4th, 2009 at 11:47 pm under Legal, Opinion, iPhone, iPod Touch.  Print This Post

Read more entries by Ronald O Carlson.
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