ITunes Spying on YOU!

Is Apple's ITunes music player spying on you? This is a huge issue for people who use ipods because in order to get the most out of your player you have to keep the firmware and software updated. If the spyware behavior that Cory Doctorow is talking about is a mandatory piece of the updates then Apple is saying that if you bought and use the ipod with ITunes then they have the right to spy on you. And apparently their End User License Agreement says nothing about whether or not they gather the information and what they would do with it if they do. Here is an excerpt from the article on Boing Boing:
Boing Boing: iTunes update spies on your listening and sends it to Apple?: "I love iTunes because it's a clean music player. But no amount of clean UI is worth surrendering my privacy for -- I wouldn't buy a stereo that phoned home to Panasonic and told it what I was listening to; I wouldn't buy a shower radio that delivered my tuning preferences to Blaupunkt. I certainly am not comfortable with Apple shoulder-surfing me while I listen to digital music, particularly if they're doing so without my meaningful, informed consent and without disclosing what they intend on doing with that data."

If this is true, it is a very good reason to consider switching music players. There is nothing more annoying to me thant to think that I would spend hundreds of dollars on something and then have the company that I bought it from use it as a surveillance device on me or treat me like I am renting the equipment rather than purchasing it.

Apple could do a much better job. I was actually considering getting an ipod, but now that they appear to be flexing their EULA I am not so sure.