By: Spacelab Research Staff

Apple has dropped the prices on music downloads for British music fans after the European Commision and Steve Jobs reached a deal to lower the price of downloads by 10%. Apple will make this happen over the next six months to bring its U. K. pricing inline with other European countries.

Steve Jobs has said that the higher price was due to music companies charging more for the distribution of their music in the U. K. than in other countries, which lead Apple to the higher price in the first place, saying "This is an important step towards a pan-European market-place for music. We hope every major record label will take a pan-European view of pricing."

The European Commision did not make a change to the way that songs bought on iTunes only work on the iPod and iPhone, even though the issue had been raised by british consumers. The Commision favors interoperability of music, meaning people can buy a song and use it on any device they like, giving them freedom over how they play the music.

"The Commission is very much in favor of solutions which allow consumers to benefit from a truly single market for music downloads," said European Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes.

As a result, the European Commision will drop its antitrust lawsuit against Apple, which was started by complaints from the consumer group Which?

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