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| U.S. Warns Apple, Publishers on e-book pricing in forum [NotSoBreaking]
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Spence
Posts: 2547
Incept: 2009-09-11
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http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424....Quote:The Justice Department has warned Apple Inc. and five of the biggest U.S. publishers that it plans to sue them for allegedly colluding to raise the price of electronic books, according to people familiar with the matter.
Apple persuaded publishers to change how they price their e-books before the late Steve Jobs introduced the iPad in 2010.
Several of the parties have held talks to settle the antitrust case and head off a potentially damaging court battle, these people said. If successful, such a settlement could have wide-ranging repercussions for the industry, potentially leading to cheaper e-books for consumers. However, not every publisher is in settlement discussions.
The five publishers facing a potential suit are CBS Corp.'s Simon & Schuster Inc.; Lagardere SCA's Hachette Book Group; Pearson PLC's Penguin Group (USA); Macmillan, a unit of Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck GmbH; and HarperCollins Publishers Inc., a unit of News Corp. , which also owns The Wall Street Journal.
Spokespeople for the five publishers and the Justice Department declined to comment. Apple, which introduced a new version of its iPad tablet Wednesday, declined to comment.
The case centers on Apple's move to change the way that publishers charged for e-books as it prepared to introduce its first iPad in early 2010. Traditionally, publishers sold books to retailers for roughly half of the recommended cover price. Under that "wholesale model," booksellers were then free to offer those books to customers for less than the cover price if they wished. Most physical books are sold using this model.
To build its early lead in e-books, Amazon Inc. sold many new best sellers at $9.99 to encourage consumers to buy its Kindle electronic readers. But publishers deeply disliked the strategy, fearing consumers would grow accustomed to inexpensive e-books and limit publishers' ability to sell pricier titles.
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Etz
Posts: 13888
Incept: 2007-06-26
LA
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Never understood "The cult of Apple Bending-over"
When Amazon first came on the scene, it was selling new books at a tiny profit margin over the publisher's price or even at a loss to get folks interested in its Kindle readers – which the publishers weren't happy about at all.
Then Apple started building the iPad and suggested that ebook pricing should move to an "agency model", where the publishers set the price of the book and the retailer takes a 30 per cent cut. The problem was that Apple also said that publishers couldn't then let rival ebook shops sell the same book at a lower price.
Happier with this model, publishers pushed it out across the sector, insisting that other ebook retailers like Amazon accept it.
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Legal chicanery and beneficent darkness are the banker's stoutest allies - F.Pecora.
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Flaps10
Posts: 5147
Incept: 2008-10-17
seattle
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And Amazon changed their apps so you could no longer buy an ebook using your apple device.
You now buy through a web browser and push to your device
Slim profit margin -30% off the top = Are you ****ing kidding me?
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"Better to die on your feet than live on your knees"
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Mpilar
Posts: 5582
Incept: 2009-01-05
Nashville, TN
Online
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Quote:The Justice Department has warned Apple Inc. and five of the biggest U.S. publishers that it plans to sue them for allegedly colluding to raise the price of electronic books, according to people familiar with the matter. How dare they speak to each other about pricing? And how many need to speak to each other before it's 'collusion'? Personally, I hate Apple...but if several companies get together and decide to raise their prices on ****ing books...why is the federal government involved? Charge what people will pay...when they stop buying, you've gone too far...tough concept.
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Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin to slit throats. H. L. Mencken
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Bicycle
Posts: 2395
Incept: 2008-09-05
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Dear Apple,
Please deploy your cash pile, or else.
Signed,
DOJ
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Peterm99
Posts: 4981
Incept: 2009-03-21
SoCal
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Mpilar wrote... . . several companies get together and decide . . . This was made illegal back in the days of Teddy Roosevelt's "trustbusting" attempts. While I don't believe that it's an explicitly defined power of the feds per the constitution, it can be argued that, unlike most other usurpations of fed power, at least this prohibition actually benefits the system as a whole. The textbook "perfect competition" model specifically requires that there be no collusion among either buyers or sellers.
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". . . the Constitution has died, the economy welters in irreversible decline, we have perpetual war, all power lies in the hands of the executive, the police are supreme, and a surveillance beyond Orwell’s imaginings falls into place." - Fred Reed
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Duc888
Posts: 7368
Incept: 2008-11-06
CT, the UNconstitution State
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Government shakedown. I love it.
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...burp
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Mpilar
Posts: 5582
Incept: 2009-01-05
Nashville, TN
Online
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Peterm99...when the government mandates that you buy a product or service...THEN, I can understand the 'collusion' charge...however, nobody MUST buy their product, so if they charge too much, people will simply not buy it. If they do...then the price is valid.
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Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin to slit throats. H. L. Mencken
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Gizmodo
Posts: 2952
Incept: 2009-04-15
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I really have to wonder why they're going after Apple so soon after Jobs' death. (Disclosure: not an Apple fan.) They released his FBI file, this thing now... a few other things too that I've forgotten, I guess the Foxconn controversy. Is someone at Apple forgetting to pay their bribes to Fedzilla or something?
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"Shut up. You don't get a lawyer!" -Senator Lindsey Grahamnesty (and the United States government) on the civil liberties of indefinitely detained American citizens
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Magus
Posts: 1966
Incept: 2008-05-04
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Mpilar--I'm ok with what you suggest as soon as copyright, patent, and other laws are more in line with a true free market and of course the system isn't geared towards large corporations. Economics only works when both the buyer and seller have a large # of players, "perfect" information among both, and substitute products.
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"There is no means of avoiding the final collapse of a boom brought about by credit expansion. The alternative is only whether the crisis should come sooner as a result of a voluntary abandonment of further credit expansion, or later as a final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved."
-~~Ludwig V
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Magus
Posts: 1966
Incept: 2008-05-04
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Gizmodo--yep--and I still think Obama is*****ed about his conversation with Jobs about off shoring and US competitiveness. Many people forget that the US goes after every company that gets near this size in market cap, power, and dominance. See MSFT in the late 90s for a perfect example.
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"There is no means of avoiding the final collapse of a boom brought about by credit expansion. The alternative is only whether the crisis should come sooner as a result of a voluntary abandonment of further credit expansion, or later as a final and total catastrophe of the currency system involved."
-~~Ludwig V
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Ben
Posts: 6182
Incept: 2009-10-09
The Distant, Glorious, Past
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"Many people forget that the US goes after every company that gets near this size in market cap, power, and dominance."
Ding ding ding!
And people, too.
Bill Gates got up to 160 Billion in personal wealth, which just so happened to be a non-rounding error in total stock wealth. IOW if you looked at 16,000 B in total stock market valuations, 1% would be 160B. You get that big, and everyone else decides to pull you down to size.
Apple is scaring all of the other Big Boys who don't want one of their own to get so big as to dictate the terms of The Game. They had dirt on one man - Jobs - but he's gone and now they are dealing with many people, or an organisation. Thus they are going after them.
I think it has to do with leverage or margin. If you have 1% of market assets in liquid, you can lever up (albeit massively) and control the system. That's a no-no, so they cut you down to size.
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"Why are you going to learn French?"
"Because I'm going to France," says Joe.
"I'm from the future. You should go to China."
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