First of all, when I was growing up, I was taught that if you take something that doesn't belong to you, it's called stealing. There were no exceptions for things the owner wouldn't miss or things you wouldn't have bought anyway.

Geez, if it isn't worth $0.99 to own it, how much of a sacrifice is it not to be able to hear it from someone else's Mac across the web?

Instead of bashing Apple, try to understand their position. The deal they struck with the record companies to do this was the first of its kind, and I suspect Apple has to police this kind of thing pretty carefully or the record companies could bail out or be less willing to provide popular titles. Apple isn't the only one involved in all of this. There are many areas in our lives where we're limited in some way in response to the inappropriate actions of others. Have you flown anywhere lately? Ever since we've had computers we've had people who apply their skills without regard to how they will hurt others. Does anyone really think the people who wrote the stream-stealers didn't think something like this would happen? Sure they did, they just didn't care, just like dishonest people never care. It's really not Apple's fault.

If you want to sell your Mac and get a PC because you can't stream Music from playlists over the web, please, be my guest.