Reselling and sharing iTunes songs

Published on:

Apple has sold 10 million songs since the launch of its iTunes Music Store, and partially answers the question of reselling iTunes songs on a "first sale" basis.

"Apple's position is that it is impractical, though perhaps within someone's rights, to sell music purchased online," Peter Lowe, Apple's director of marketing for applications and services

Impractical because of the DRM barrier, since Apple does not provide any mean to transfer the song from one account to another, and because of the low price tag (would you work out a legal way to lift all the technical barriers for 50 cents?)

This leaves a few questions unanswered. We still don't know if this would be against Apple's Terms of Use (which, I guess, have been negotiated with the majors and artists). And, if we suppose that this is how we will access music once the CD has disappeared, how are we supposed to lend on favorite songs and albums to friends, like we can legally do with CDs today? Can I burn a compilation and lend it? Will I have to lend my iPod?