It is a Goliath versus Goliath contest. On one side is the European Commission, which acts as the European Union's antitrust watchdog. On the other is a collection of US technology giants. Last Monday, the Commission issued formal charges saying the agreements underpinning music sales through iTunes broke competition rules. Just a couple of days later came news of plans in Brussels for Microsoft to hand over to rivals technical information about its Windows operating system for little or no compensation. The Commission's critics are dusting down charges of a vendetta. This would be unfair.

These high-profile cases do not all belong in the same category. The focus of the iTunes inquiry is that some EU versions of iTunes are more expensive than others, and that users in one EU country cannot shop around and download music from a website intended to serve users elsewhere. The charge against Intel, the world's biggest chipmaker, is that it used illegal means to encourage computer makers not to use products made by Advanced Micro Devices, its only rival. The long-running dispute with Microsoft centres on a ruling that it abused its dominant market position.