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You'd almost think Apple was a music company, rather than a tech company with a neat sideline in audio innovation.

So it was odd that Steve Jobs did not make a single reference to the delay in setting up a European version of its acclaimed online music download service, during his keynote address at last month's Apple Expo in Paris.

Maybe the Dear Leader just doesn't do bad news during his pep talks to the Mac faithful. But given the fact that he was addressing a European audience, the omission of any reference to the delay was conspicuous by its absence. The launch of a Windows-based download service similar to iTunes Music Store by Microsoft and Peter Gabriel's OD2 (which does not serve Mac users) has made the delays all the more galling for both Apple and European Mac users.

In defence of Jobs and Apple, the mind-boggling complexities of licensing and territories that afflict the European music business are probably behind the delays, rather than any incompetence on the part of

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Apple.

Or could it be that Apple's management finally got cold feet at the thought of selling music in the UK, home of the Beatles, whose own record company, Apple Corps has a big problem with Apple's musical output?

As Jobs' Paris keynote approached, Apple Corp sued Apple Computer in the High Court in London and papers were served to Cupertino just a few days before the Expo started. The timing might have been coincidence, but it seems unlikely. Just before his speech attendees were treated to a recording of the late Johnny Cash singing a cover of the Beatles' In My Life. A tribute to the man in black from the man who dresses in black turtlenecks? Or two fingers to Apple Corps?

Apple has already lost two legal cases in 1976 and 1989 and paid a total of $50 million in compensation to Apple Corps over trademark infringements. The trouble is that Apple Computer has at heart never accepted that it doesn't have a right to be involved in music distribution or sales. The old Mac OS sound alert, Sosumi, was, so legend has it, a dig at Apple Corps.

'Apple Corporation and Apple [Computer] signed a legal agreement more than a decade ago. I wasn't there, and it says what each company can do with their trademark,' said Jobs answering questions about the dispute in Paris. 'I inherited that, and right now there's a disagreement about this. We might have to get a judge to decide on it.'

But you have to wonder how Apple will fare in the latest round with Apple Corps now that it has entered the music business, rather than putting a few samples on its computers.