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Apple Files Formal Appeal in E-Books Antitrust Case
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Not currently. When they were operating under agency pricing.
Exactly. I should be able to read the book I buy however I want, and I shouldn't be forced into using an alternative set of services just to get a reasonable price. If it's one or the other (which I'll admit it does not have to be), I'd rather there be competition in services than in price.
Are you saying that prices have to be the same in ALL the stores?
Where is the competition then?
They ARE trying to hide something - like every product in their pipeline as you should probably already know.
In the platform and services. I thought I made that clear when I said competition via services instead of price.
I'm obviously only talking about ebooks. If they were all sold in a non-DRM format that I could take to any platform I chose, THEN I would say it is fair, reasonable, and in fact more logical to instead compete on price. Until that day, it's absolute nonsense that I can't buy an ebook on the platform of my choosing without being financially penalized.
Perhaps the one that must be blamed is the platform you choose and not force all other platforms not trying to compete.
I'm not sure I understand you. Do you mean that there should be no competition between platforms?
No, those that don't want competition are the ones that one the same price in all of the stores
Yep. They had to play the game according to the prescribed steps and have. This was the next one. If need be they will go all the way up to the USSC if possible.
It's telling to me that Cote ruled that two of their tactics were totally legal and yet, without clear cut proof that Apple was the ringleader from day one, nailed them for collusion. And yet no one in the DOJ etc has ever looked at Amazon's tactics and whether they were anti competitive. The DOJ made this all about that $9.99 price point,which was created by Amazon.
I'm all for some new rules, for this and for the whole Tax game. It's well past time. But they need to be rules that apply to all players, not just Apple. in both matters. And in this one, not just books. There have been many cases of Amazon getting stuff yanked from services like Hulu, Netflix etc with 'exclusive deals' that run for months. Meaning I'm being forced to sign up for Amazon if I want access. How is that consumer friendly. I can go with 'exclusive for the first month' for a movie, tv show ep or a book but then let it go wide. Getting to keep it for months, even a couple of years and yank back items, no way.
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They were't moaning about him so much as moaning about him going beyond the rules that were set up. He was asking to speak to folks that have nothing to do with any thing in the iTunes stores much less the books, about unrelated things. He was attempting to deny them their legal right to a lawyer being in the room.
He got hand slapped by the Appeals court over these issues.
There is also the issue that he knows nothing about anti trust law himself and hired lawyers to consult with and is charging their rather high fees to Apple which is just unreal in anyone's eyes. If someone is hired as an antitrust monitor it would make sense that they actually know the laws
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We likely haven't seen ALL of the evidence presented as none of us were in the room during the trial.
But even what was reported doesn't paint a clear and firm picture of guilt, despite the evidence Cote cherry picked for her ruling seeming to do so.
Which is why Apple filed the appeal. Cote made biased comments in favor of the DOJ before seeing any evidence and it appears, ignored any evidence that weakened that statement. Not cool. Apple wants that called out and they have a right to ask for such an action
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Something illegal between the publishers is NOT the same as Apple knowing about it or leading it as the DOJ claims.
If they really want to help consumers they need to rewrite the laws so that publishers can't go to bozo with pricing, retailers can't get near permanent exclusive deals on any form of media and yet can still do limited special offers etc to attract buyers. There are already laws prohibiting things like in store rebates from running over X period of time. Work that into the electronic laws as well. So that, for example, Apple can make a certain title free exclusively but only for say a week. After that, Amazon and the rest can do the same. Or Hulu can have exclusive rights to stream the new episode of Downton Abbey for a week but after that anyone can have it and anyone can have past seasons. And so on.
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Sometimes. Sometimes they don't have a choice in where they buy it because the rules allow one company to have exclusive rights to a title. Even now I don't think you can buy the separate books for the Hunger Games trilogy in ebook anywhere but Amazon, cause they got an exclusive deal on those titles. Apple got around it when the publisher released a 3 in 1 edition because that one wasn't in Amazon's contract.
Price competition still existed between publishers during agency pricing.
Again, retail price competition is not the only form of competition.
This was certainly about the 9.99 price point for most best sellers as that was the primary source of the price increase.
Certainly not. Cote made assertions of Apple's guilt during settlement talks with the publishers. More than a year before her famous pre-trial comment where she said the same thing.
Yes, it's hiding the next product it is working on, which Bromwich was trying his best to get information about, likely under Google or Samsung's request.
Correct
Most likely they are. That does NOT mean they are doing anything unlawful though. There are many perfectly legal things Apple could be doing that they don't want anyone outside the company having access to. This "monitor" has already overstepped bounds. I can understand Apple is not going to trust him.
Most likely they are. That does NOT mean they are doing anything unlawful though. There are many perfectly legal things Apple could be doing that they don't want anyone outside the company having access to. This "monitor" has already overstepped bounds. I can understand Apple is not going to trust him.
You forgot to add the sarcasm symbol after your post because no one could actually believe that.
No matter how Apple apologists try to spin this, the fact remains that because Apple rigged the market so it can sell its iPad, we are all paying higher prices now.
A lot of smaller entities went under as a result of Apple's manipulations and the market has not recovered since.
Apple should have been punished more severely, IMO.
That's not so much a fact as a loaded statement and opinion.
Source? Everything I've seen points to more competition while the agency pricing agreements were in effect.
You seem to have a tendency to accuse Apple of all the evil in the world, without any actual justification.
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I think you are misinterpreting what Bromwich does. He hit gold by getting a job that is supposed to pay him $1200 per hour (plus another 15% of that just for sending the bill), even though he is so unqualified for it that he has to hire another lawyer to do the actual work. So of course he tries his best to create as many billable hours as he can. That's what any corrupt lawyer would do. He doesn't need any outside encouragement for that.
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Just saying: When a publisher submits a book to the Apple store, they fill out a form where they set the price, and whether the book will be published with or without DRM. If you got an Apple eBook and it has DRM, it's not because Apple decided that, but the publisher.
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As you said, they didn't admit any wrongdoing. And since Cote convicted Apple as it seems purely based on her prejudice and without any evidence, it may have been wise of the publishers to settle instead of risking a lawsuit with a judge who was hell bent on propping up the Amazon monopoly. And at least one publisher offered to appear in the Apple court case to say that they didn't conspire with anybody, and therefore Apple couldn't have witnessed and conspiracy, but that publisher wasn't allowed to speak by judge Cote.
You should be able to name one specific example of your assertion--please do so.
If anything, Amazon has been driving brick and mortar booksellers out of business for years.
A program called Calibre is useful for moving e-books between the different formats.
First, there is a 160 pages ruling, the only way you say that there is no evidence would be if you have not read it.
Second, publishers settlement was a whole year before the Apple trial started, do you people really know what the case was about?
Or... if you disagree that the evidence referenced in the ruling proves the charge.
In your opinion, what specific evidence proves that Apple was aware of the alleged collusion between publishers?
It's not about wanting the same price in all stores
Amazon severely hindered competition because they were selling new & popular books at a loss to snuff out any possible competition
The publishers hated this because other vendors expected publishers to sell books to them at a price point where the vendors could compete with Amazon, but that was impossible since Amazon was buying high volumes cheap and still selling books at a loss
Apple wanted to allow the publisher to set the minimum selling price and prevent vendors from selling at a loss. This immediately made the ebook market more enticing for all possible ebook vendors and created a world where people could more easily choose based on the vendor they liked instead of just price instead of everyone simply choosing the cheap and unmatchable prices at Amazon. People might pay more for the vendor they like occasionally but not if one vendor consistently has drastically lower & unmatchable prices.
Basically this would allow all vendors to compete and still make a profit, which was more likely creating different prices among competing vendors.
The ebook market was finally profitable and sustainable under Apple's suggested model, creating much more activity & innovation from vendors and publishers in the ebook business.
Walmart killed toys r us (and all smaller toy stores) and never made money directly from toys. Walmart simply thought hey if we buy high volumes of toys and sell them for no profit, parents will come here to buy toys for kids and theoretically buy other non toy items while they are here, and it killed the toy store industry.
While you may call what Walmart did the way of the free market, Amazon took it a step further and with less justification. They sold for a loss (not just 0 profit), and on a website people aren't nearly as likely to say hey I should grab a few more things while I am here. Not to mention that toy stores were already well established and possibly had the means & time to find ways to be competitive with Walmart's practices but Amazon was doing this when the ebook market was just beginning.
Apple chooses to set their price points, so you have similar selling prices for apple products everywhere and you don't see vendors refusing to sell apple products because they can't compete.
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Yes, it was about this
So, the way to kill Amazon is colluding and fixing the prices for all the stores, isn't?
Source?
Ah, Apple wanted not having to compete with other vendors, I see.
Ah, yes, was more enticing to vendors because the fixed the prices
Ah, yes, people had to pay the same higher price in all the stores
Really, how the heck could create different prices among vendors when the ****ing publishers set the SAME price for all the vendors
Ebook market was profitable before Apple entered it
This is a joke, isn't?