Palm WebOS 1.2.1 opens up iTunes to Pre users again

So Palm announced that the 1.2.1 version of the WebOS software was again going to allow Palm Pre owners to have access to their music collections on iTunes 9.0.1.  From the bugfixes page:

Resolves an issue preventing media sync from working with latest version of iTunes (9.0.1).

What's disturbing about this is that it is still an issue.  And, just to get this out of the way, I am not on Apple's side on this one.

Let Palm Pre users have access to their music.  What's the big deal Apple?

Imagine if Microsoft stopped letting iPhone users have acess to their Outlook contact, calendar and email information?  Or what if they just blocked the iPhone from having access to Windows entirely?  By the same method that Apple is blocking the Pre - the USB information.

What if Verizon stopped letting devices with iPhone and iPod touch Wireless MAC address from having access to their networks?

They could easily do this - and use the same justifications.

Would the Apple fanboys get upset about that?  Is this the kind of closed ecosystem Apple wants to be known for? 

Sure Apple "invented" iTunes and technically should be allowed to do anything they want with it. Sure people will say that a bunch of rogue Apple engineers went to Palm and broke into their software.  But did Apple really invent iTunes?  No, it bought it and innovated it using a lot of stuff that was already out in the market and added some of their own features.

  

 Jeez Apple, give us a a break, why not put those engineers that are spending time trying to block Palm on some QA work with AT&T?