And so it begins. Universal Music Group exec Doug Morris told the Reuters Media Summit that his company is interested in receiving a cut of the profits from each iPod sold.

"It would be a nice idea. We have a negotiation coming up not too far. I don't see why we wouldn't do that... but maybe not in the same way," Morris said. His "same way" comment is a reference to the Zune, which Universal already gets $1 from after signing a deal with Microsoft.

Universal believes that much of the music on portable players is illegal, and the company argues that it deserves a share of the profits from such devices in order to make up for the money lost in album sales. Microsoft's decision to cut a deal seems to have been driven by its need to launch with a large music store for the Zune—and Universal is one of the biggest players in the game. The Microsoft deal will clearly set a precedent for other music labels, who will no doubt try to squeeze cash from both Microsoft and Apple in the coming years.

From one perspective, this looks like an obviously bad thing for consumers, who are being "taxed" even if their music collections are fully legal. But looked at from another way, this could also be seen as a positive move that could open the door to the sort of levy that could legalize file-swapping in the US. Sure, it's not going to happen anytime soon, but it does show that the labels understand the concept of being paid a flat fee to cover file-swapping. How great would it be to pay an extra $50 for an iPod, but be able to legally download all the music you want?

Economists and activists have both suggested such a system be implanted on a national scale in order to solve the "file-swapping problem," but the music industry will probably resist a full-blown levy, and neither Apple nor Microsoft would be too excited about it. By making it legal to swap music, a levy would also remove the need for most DRM and the need to use one company's music store.

It's nice to dream about the possibilities, but the reality is that the music labels now want both things. They want a levy on each player sold, but still want the long arm of US law to reach out and pluck thousands of dollars from file-swappers' pockets.