Geez, is anyone else picking up on a pattern, here? First Napster announces that it's going to go live in the UK by the end of the summer, and then it springs a surprise launch on us all before spring is even over. And just earlier this month, the company announced that its service would become available in Canada "this summer"... so, um, given that it's not summer yet, guess what just happened?

No, it's got nothing to do with crabcakes. Geez, learn to take a hint.

That's right, as faithful viewer Mike Lush tells us and the San Francisco Chronicle confirms, Napster went Canadian yesterday, marking "the second time in a week the online music service has ventured outside the United States ahead of major competitors like Apple Computer Inc." Oooo, burn.

We have no idea what's up with Napster beating projected ship dates left and right, but clearly Apple needs to floor it if it wants to avoid choking on any more international dust. When Napster was first into the UK, we were able to rationalize the situation by reminding ourselves that while Napster went for a UK-only launch, Apple was holding out for Europe-wide licensing and a Europe-wide store, which was bound to take longer. But Canada? Unless there's been a series of secessions and the formation of a loose coalition of independent provinces that we never heard about, it sounds like this time Apple just got whipped, plain and simple.

Well, we don't know what's up with Apple in Canada, but let's trot back to Europe for a sec, since that's where Apple's even further behind, and lagging more and more by the day; faithful viewer Frank Davis tipped us off to a Reuters article reporting that Sony just signed deals with "independent record labels in the UK, France, and Germany," and it plans to launch Sony Connect in those countries on June 7th. Meanwhile, Apple is still only publicly committing to a Euro-iTMS launch by the "end of this year." Here's hoping the company pulls a major Napster and gets the store off the ground in Europe well in advance of its self-imposed end-of-year deadline, because otherwise, we believe the phrase is "wuh-oh."

The good news is that the odds of an imminent Euro-iTMS launch appear to be improving; as faithful viewer Bob Gulien notes, The Register is reporting that "Apple could be ready to launch its iTunes Music Store in Europe by the middle of June"-- which is just what previous rumors have stated, although The Reg claims to have a bit of reasoning behind the date. Apparently "sources said to be familiar with the company's plans" are insisting that Apple has finally scraped together the licenses it needs to get the Europe store up and running, and if that's true, then the mid-June launch date sounds pretty reasonable.

And that's when the real race will start. We've been hearing over and over again that the only reason Apple is selling so much more music than its competitors here in the U.S. is because it got a head start; well, let's see what the Europe numbers look like six months after Euro-iTMS opens. We suspect that Apple will still do quite well, despite the iTMS opening after Sony Connect, Napster, and all those OD2-based sites like MyCokeMusic.com. Heck, we'd even bet all our Star Wars action figures on the outcome. Well, except Boba Fett. No matter how sure we are, we never risk the Fett-man.