This article is more than 1 year old

Steve Jobs must face the music in court

Two hours' questioning for Apple boss

Lawyers will get two hours to question Apple supremo Steve Jobs as part of an anti-trust case brought against Apple and iTunes.

Judge Howard Lloyd of US District Court for Northern California said Jobs could only be questioned on relevant changes to software made in October 2004.

The case is a class action suit. Plaintiffs claim the changes made to Apple's iPod software in 2004 stopped the devices playing Real music files.

Judge Lloyd said: "The court finds that Jobs has unique, non-repetitive, first hand knowledge about Apple's software updates in October 2004 that rendered the RealNetworks's digital music files once again inoperable with iPods", according to Reuters.

Jobs said in January that the board of directors at Apple had granted him a further medical leave of absence.

In 2009 he received a liver transplant during a six-month absence from the company.

Updated (an earlier version of this story wrongly said RealNetworks were involved in this court case):

A spokeswoman for Real sent us the following: "RealNetworks is not involved in any way with the class-action lawsuit against Apple regarding FairPlay and Harmony. There is not, and has never been, any formal legal dispute between Real and Apple relating to FairPlay or Harmony. Further, Real’s consumer music division has been separated from Real’s business and operating as an independent company (Rhapsody International) since April 2010."®

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