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E-Books Judge Pledges to Avoid Unnecessary Intrusion Into Apple's Business
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If that's all the evidence the DOJ had on their case, it would've...
A. Never been brought to court.
and...
B. On the off chance it were, the lawyers would've laughed in Cotes face then walked out the door, slamming it on the way out.
The last thing the publishers would've done was settle on such flimsy evidence. It'd be like me saying you murdered someone in Sibera based on the single fact you had snow on your shoes one time, and you settled because you could face life in prison on the off chance you lose in court.
Read through the evidence. I haven't gone through the whole list (that'd be way too obsessive), but from what I've seen, it's hard to deny that a good deal of it doesn't sound pretty hinky. Just from glancing through it, it's obvious the whole thing isn't just Apple dealing with individual publishers on a case by case basis, but all these publishers coming together to set prices across the entire market.
Case in point.
Or this.
It doesn't paint a pretty picture. On that last one, why would Apple, a reseller themselves, be talking about setting all other resellers under the agency model?
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Don't know how old you are but I remember back when the Clinton DOJ was all hot and bothered about Microsoft. It was a major priority to take them down on charges of monopoly. When Bush came in his DOJ put the case on the back burner and eventually it went away. Different administrations have different people in charge and different people have different priorities. When Eric Holder is out of office the DOJ's priorities will likely change. This will happen after Nov. 2016. Even if Hillary comes in things won't be the same at the DOJ.
Might be worse, but I doubt things could be much worse than the current fiasco. The odds are things will be better after Nov. 2016 (actually Jan. 2017)
Of course the worst case scenario would be if Hillary came in and asked Holder to stay on at the DOJ.
Yeah? What about it makes it a "fiasco" in your opinion? What proof do you have that Apple is being treated unfairly, besides a vague gut instinct and the fact you like your iPad a whole bunch?
Are you happy to have GIANT large scale land owners ruin and destroy all the tiny farmers, as they knock down hedges, buy million pound machines and destroy any home of the small family farmer ever making a living, due to their greed to make more and more money?
How about Apple being able to use it's power to drive down prices on components as they buy in such bulk they can say sell us them as this price of we shall find someone else and you will loose millions of $ of orders.
Even food retailers do this to farmers also, demanding lower costs otherwise they will go to a different supplier.
That how they make money and deliver food to the shops you buy from at low prices on a massive scale.
It may not be nice, but that's the western way.
Don't know how old you are but I remember back when the Clinton DOJ was all hot and bothered about Microsoft. It was a major priority to take them down on charges of monopoly. When Bush came in his DOJ put the case on the back burner and eventually it went away. Different administrations have different people in charge and different people have different priorities. When Eric Holder is out of office the DOJ's priorities will likely change. This will happen after Nov. 2016. Even if Hillary comes in things won't be the same at the DOJ.
Might be worse, but I doubt things could be much worse than the current fiasco. The odds are things will be better after Nov. 2016 (actually Jan. 2017)
Then Nov 2016 can't come soon enough
.
Don't know how old you are but I remember back when the Clinton DOJ was all hot and bothered about Microsoft. It was a major priority to take them down on charges of monopoly. When Bush came in his DOJ put the case on the back burner and eventually it went away. Different administrations have different people in charge and different people have different priorities. When Eric Holder is out of office the DOJ's priorities will likely change. This will happen after Nov. 2016. Even if Hillary comes in things won't be the same at the DOJ.
Might be worse, but I doubt things could be much worse than the current fiasco. The odds are things will be better after Nov. 2016 (actually Jan. 2017)
Ein? The Microsoft - USA case, including the appealing happened under the Clinton presidency. Just the final settlement came in the same year that Bush was elected.
I've looked at other cases the DOJ have done. In detail the Zimmerman & Martin trial. One case they should of never brought to court and lost miserably. Showing, just because they bring something to court does not mean they should.
Apple discussing the agency model to Random House is not illegal. It has to be proven all the publishers got together, specifically publisher to publisher, to set pricing all the same. Don't see it in the evidence you have shown.
The judge should intrude as much as needed, this is about correcting and punishing Apple's wrongdoings so not hurting their feelings is irrelevant.
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Gee what about if a 100 said guilty and 9 said not guilty, or 245 guilty and 754 not. I guess you can see where I'm going with this, we can throw out imaginary lineups all day but it won't change the fact that this time they have been found in the wrong.
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Gee what about if a 100 said guilty and 9 said not guilty, or 245 guilty and 754 not. I guess you can see where I'm going with this, we can throw out imaginary lineups all day but it won't change the fact that this time they have been found in the wrong.
Should Amazon be in Court?
The DOJ has accused Apple of collusion because they had concurrent discussions with 5 or more publishers, in an attempt to change the pricing model. They changed the pricing model from a fixed price, dictated by Amazon, to a price set by the publishers and ultimately controlled by the market.
If this new model, inflated consumer prices, wouldn't consumers flock to the fixed price model of Amazon?
It seems to me that if anyone should be court, it should be Amazon. By dictating prices to publishers, they have in effect, become a publisher; a publisher with the largest distribution infrastructure on the planet. A writer should write, a publisher should edit/distribute/price, and a distributor should sell.
I am an Amazon fan and have nothing, but good, to say about them. However, it does seem that the investigation is misguided.
The DOJ has accused Apple of collusion because they had concurrent discussions with 5 or more publishers, in an attempt to change the pricing model. They changed the pricing model from a fixed price, dictated by Amazon, to a price set by the publishers and ultimately controlled by the market.
If this new model, inflated consumer prices, wouldn't consumers flock to the fixed price model of Amazon?
It seems to me that if anyone should be court, it should be Amazon. By dictating prices to publishers, they have in effect, become a publisher; a publisher with the largest distribution infrastructure on the planet. A writer should write, a publisher should edit/distribute/price, and a distributor should sell.
I am an Amazon fan and have nothing, but good, to say about them. However, it does seem that the investigation is misguided.
No one is asking Apple to put an Amazon link in the iBooks app. They want the Amazon link put back in the Amazon app.
Nothing is stopping Apple from making an iBooks app for Android and allowing people to install that on their Kindle Fire, or other Android device. Apple will never do that though, because they want you locked into their ecosystem forcing you to use an iOS device to access your content, where as Amazon encourages you to read Amazon books on Kindle, Android, iOS, Blackberry, Windows Phone, Windows 8, OS X, etc.
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Again, no one is trying to get an Amazon link in the iBooks app, just let the store link exist in the Kindle app.
Can you imagine if Apple blocked website store links in Safari, and only allowed you to buy online from Apple.com?
There never was an Amazon link in a released Kindle app on IOS. Its been illegal to put such links in any app, since the app store came out. Thats long before iBooks came out and the iPad etc. Its much more likely Apple would remove the Kindle app then change how the app store works for every single app on the app store.
So selling books below cost is OK for Amazon?
And isn't anti-competitive?
What is really crazy is how physical books can cost LESS than eBooks.
Yes there are "base costs" no matter what the delivery mode is (editing, proofing, typesetting) but when there are no inventory, delivery or returns then someone is profiteering.
And isn't anti-competitive?
What is really crazy is how physical books can cost LESS than eBooks.
Yes there are "base costs" no matter what the delivery mode is (editing, proofing, typesetting) but when there are no inventory, delivery or returns then someone is profiteering.
Using the farmer analogy with me as always is funny but I promise it has alot more to do with tax policy in the US, then price fixing. Also Apple doesnt buy most of their parts, their manufacturer does (Foxconn mostly now, though in the past they have used others including my employer), and again you are missing the point. Amazon was selling below their cost to increase their market share. Do any of your examples have someone buying a product and selling it at a lower price then they bought it at? No, yeah I didn't think so.
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Buy removing entire lines of books from their online store including physical copies if their prices were not met for digital copies. They did it a number of times, some companies folded, some did not. Google for more info.
The publishers entire issue with all this is they believe the value is in the content and all the rest of it is just the cost of doing business. Publishers and authors alike didn't like their work being devalued and made into a commodity.
Amazon had boxed the entire publishing industry into a corner. Not every business is only focused on the short term. Amazon was not and the publishers took action in their own long term best interests.
Yes, actually, there was: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1197589/
Apple forced them to remove it back in June, 2011. Kobo also used to have a link to their store. https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1197499/
Sony was also coming out with an e-reader app which was rejected due to the link to it's store at that time: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1088981/
Pretty easy. Selling products below cost when holding almost the entire market share of an industry is something that is clearly against the law and something even a judge and DOJ prosecutor could probably see as a clear violation.
Sure they should. But I doubt Apple wants that, and I strongly suspect that Amazon would give them the ability to do it without a moment's hesitation. Exactly what good would it do Apple to have people be able to order iBooks on their Kindle?
Please point out the evidence where specific price point collusion took place. I am not familiar with it and would be curious to see it.
In many cases they likely marked the book prices at the msrp that came with the books already. Which means apple didn't change the price at all and there was no conspiracy to fix prices as all the books were already priced. Most books in the US have a price on them.
Also did every publisher agree to sell all their books for the exact same price? I find that highly suspect, which means they did not secretly collude to do anything.
All that actually happened is book publishers turned back the clock and operated like they had previously to Amazon. Nobody was screaming about price fixing then.
The problem with this whole case is they take several completely legal business actions and transactions and try to claim the sum of the legal parts is illegal but that is just not the case. That is where the clear ignorance of the judge and the prosecutors on operating a business create this huge mess.
You reading it wrong.
It seems that many believe on this forum - Amazon forced Apple to break the law and to collude with publishers to control prices.
I was not aware of any Amazon execs neither running Apple nor serving on Apple Board of Directors.
Lets not move blame of stupid conduct by Apple own executives and even more incompetent legal team @ Apple to somewhere else.
It seems that many believe on this forum - Amazon forced Apple to break the law and to collude with publishers to control prices.
I was not aware of any Amazon execs neither running Apple nor serving on Apple Board of Directors.
Lets not move blame of stupid conduct by Apple own executives and even more incompetent legal team @ Apple to somewhere else.
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In a perfect world that would be great, but one major detail that everyone is missing is that is Amazon comes out on top, then they will continue to lower the prices of Ebooks. With the prices of Ebooks very low and the fact that physical books are declining at an very fast rate. Where does the publishers and authors get their money from. The appeal of being an author or publishing company is going to greatly decline if they money to be made is on par with minimum wage.
I get that this is an Apple fan site but I'm still shocked by the amount of people taking Apple's side here. Do you guys like paying more money for an exact identical thing that is cheaper elsewhere? That's basically what you're saying by siding with Apple here. It's clear Apple broke anti-trust laws to increase ebook prices. Prices increasing is NOT good for consumers. If Amazon can sell a book for a loss, then good for them, that means consumers save money compared to what Apple and B&N charge for them. Maybe Apple and B&N should change their business model in ebooks to reflect this trend.
Random House was not involved in the collusion scheme. (Though as the #1 book seller, they just merged with the #2 seller, so now the DOJ says they can collude legally.
)Across the board? The 5 publishers controlled less than 40% of the market and continued to compete on pricing with each other after Apple entered the market. Amazon was setting prices for 90% of the market.
No need for conjecture. The final CEO to settle, Sargent of Macmillan, posted the exact reason. The DOJ extorted them with not only triple their own damages, but also triple the damages of all the publishers that did settle (minus their settlement amounts). It was too big of a risk, more than the entire equity of the company.
http://us.macmillan.com/uploadedFiles/MacmillanSite/Non-Menu_Items/From John Sargent 02-08-2013.pdf
They set retail prices for 90% of the market.
Because some of us choose books not on how cheap they are, but on their quality.