Apple seems to have found an ally in the person of Justice Department antitrust chief Thomas Barnett regarding the issue of iTunes' exclusive technology. Raising the issue in a speech at an antitrust law conference in Washington, DC, Barnett urged foreign governments to take caution before interfering with popular new technologies, such as the iTunes online music service.

Recently, Apple has been under fire as several European governments like Scandinavia and France were pushing for legislation that would compel Apple to permit iTunes music to play on devices other than its iPod. According to them, what Apple is doing is practically monopolizing the technology, which could be bad in itself, as they are limiting the multi-faceted benefits that they could all incur via the technology-sharing.

However, Barnett said the scrutiny of Apple "provides a useful illustration of how an attack on intellectual property rights can threaten dynamic innovation." Instead, he surmises, Apple should be commended for coming up with a "legal, profitable and easy-to-use system for downloading music and encourage rival companies to 'devote their resources to legal challenges rather than business innovation'."

Barnett's concern cannot be said to be unfounded. Seeing how Apple was revived as a top name in entertainment, it probably wouldn't do much good to see their efforts going to waste because other people wants to break their technology down. It's like punishing them for having a brilliant idea and actually bringing it to life. Given that it was their idea in the first place, I don't see why they can't be selfish about it. In fact, it can prove to be beneficial for the industry as other companies will be pushed to innovate on their own, thus starting a healthy competition. At the end of the day, it is not only the creativity of the industries that will boom, but more importantly, consumer-satisfaction. And isn't that what we really want?