DOJ
Briefings of the day: U.S.A. vs. Apple Inc.
May 15, 2013: 3:51 PM ETIn the DOJ's great e-book conspiracy, Apple is the sole defendant still standing.
FORTUNE -- The conspiracy case that the U.S. Department of Justice filed against Apple and five book publishers in April 2011 is finally coming to a head.
In the year that has passed, all five publishers have settled. Only Apple had the stomach -- or the wherewithal -- to take the case to trial.
It's scheduled to begin in a Manhattan courthouse on June 3. We plan to be there.
Links to the two sides' final briefings are attached below. A few excerpts:
From the DOJ:
"A preponderance of the evidence shows that Apple, Inc. conspired and agreed with [five publishers listed] for the purpose and with the effect of raising consumer e-book prices and restraining retail price competition... The conspiracy took root in publishers' disdain for $9.99 e-book prices and Apple's fear of having to compete with Amazon and other e-book retailers on price, and accomplished Defendants' goals of raising prices and limiting price competition'.. Because of its place 'in the center as the ringmaster' of a horizontal agreement among Publisher Defendants to fix the retail prices of e-books, Apple is liable per se under Section 1 of the Sherman Act."
From Apple:
"Apple did not conspire to fix e-book prices. The evidence proves that Apple acted independently, to further its own legitimate business goals, in negotiating agency agreements with the publishers to enter the e-book market. Plaintiffs can no longer rely on mere allegations, faulty assumptions, and unfounded conclusions. That time has passed. Plaintiffs must produce evidence at trial that Apple consciously conspired with the publishers. But plaintiffs fall well short of their burden; indeed, the evidence contradicts their key allegations against Apple."
Those PDFs
See also:
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Amazon throws its e-book weight around. Again.
More heavy-handed behavior from the book world's 500-pound gorilla
FORTUNE -- Publishers who have had to deal with Amazon's (AMZN) arrogant reps know first hand the contempt with which they hold folks in the business of printing books on paper.
Now that the company is in the media's spotlight following the Justice Department's ass-backwards antitrust suit, the rest of us are getting a taste for how the book world's 500-pound gorilla operates.
The MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Apr 30, 2012 12:44 PM ETPosted in: Amazon, Antitrust, Apple, Boobie Miles, Books, Buzz Bissinger, David Carr, DOJ, e-books, Friday Night Lights, Hunger Games, Justice Department, New York Times, Publishing -
Cocking the Apple slingshot
Why would a stock like Apple fall 10% just before quarterly earnings are due?
MONDAY 4:00 p.m. UPDATE: Throw another -4.15% on the barbie. One analyst called today's selloff "panic profit taking."
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I think it may be time once again to dust off Jason Schwarz' classic blog post: Apple: Seven Reasons Shorts Love It.
Apple's (AAPL) shares, in case you missed it, took a drubbing last week, falling $38.77 (6%) in MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Apr 16, 2012 7:40 AM ETPosted in: Antitrust, Apple, DOJ, e-books, Hedge fund, iTunes, Jason Schwarz, Quarterly earnings, Steve Jobs -
Apple keeps it simple: The DOJ's case is 'simply not true'
Cupertino breaks its silence, laying out its legal defense in four sentences
The company's response to US v. Apple Inc. et al., when it came Thursday evening, was as succinct and carefully crafted as any Apple (AAPL) marketing slogan.
What the Department of Justice characterized as a "per se violation" of the Sherman Antitrust Act, Apple is going to paint as an act of liberation.
We got our copy the company's four-sentence response to MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Apr 13, 2012 6:13 AM ETPosted in: Amazon, Antitrust, App Store, Apple, Department of Justice, DOJ, E-book, iBookstore, Publishing, Sherman Antitrust Act -
Why Apple is telling the DOJ: 'We'll see you in court'
The settlement the Justice Department is seeking could shutter the iBookstore
Reuters and Bloomberg have both reported -- citing a pair of unnamed sources -- that Apple (AAPL) and one or two major publishers are preparing to get sued for antitrust violations, perhaps as early as today.
Three of the five publishers accused of colluding with Apple to fix the prices of e-books have reportedly accepted deals offered by the European Commission and MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Apr 11, 2012 7:12 AM ETPosted in: Amazon, Antitrust, Apple, CBS, DOJ, European Commission, HarperCollins, iBookstore, Justice Department, McMillan, Pearson, Penguin, Simon & Schuster, Steve Jobs -
Apple mends a few fences
With partners, developers, competitors and maybe some regulatory agencies
One of Apple's (AAPL) weaknesses as a company -- as even Steve Jobs will admit -- is that it isn't a particularly good neighbor. Like its co-founder and CEO, it can be secretive, prickly and quick to take offense. Witness, for example, the 121 pending lawsuits that list Apple as a plaintiff or defendant.
So it's unusual and sort of refreshing to see MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Sep 19, 2010 8:27 AM ETPosted in: Adobe, Antennagate, Apple, Disney, DOJ, FCC, FTC, Google, Google Voice, Intel, Intuit, iPad, iPhone, iPod touch, Mobile, Steve Jobs, Tablets -
Apple needs to cool its rhetoric
No longer an industry underdog, the company must tread more carefully, says an analyst
In a note to clients issued Tuesday, Barclays Capital's Ben Reitzes has added his voice to the chorus of commentators with free advice for Apple's (AAPL) executive team, now that it's caught the eye of federal regulators.
The Federal Trade Commission has reportedly won the toss and is looking into two possible antitrust issues: Adobe's (ADBE) complaint MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Jun 15, 2010 11:12 AM ET -
Probing the Apple antitrust probes
Apple is likely to duck these bullets, say two analysts, but every case increases its risk
Absent a "smoking gun," neither the Federal Trade Commission nor the Department of Justice is likely to take Apple (AAPL) to court for antitrust violations, according to a note to clients issued Friday by Stifel Nicolas's Rebecca Arbogast and George Askew.
Apple has credible justifications, they write, for both complaints that have been lodged against it: MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Jun 11, 2010 10:15 AM ET -
iPadgate: The FBI is on the case
Targeting the hackers who pulled 114,000 e-mail addresses out of a hole in AT&T's network
Note to the guys (or gals) who call themselves Goatse Security: If you hack into an AT&T (T) network and discover a lot of Apple (AAPL) iPad e-mail addresses that end in @doj.gov and @us.army.mil, don't go bragging about it to the press.
That's what Goatse Security did, shopping the story, by one account, to Reuters, MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Jun 10, 2010 6:38 PM ET -
Feds eye Apple-Google ad war
A dispute that broke out Monday has already caught the eye of antitrust regulators
That didn't take long.
On Monday, Apple (AAPL) changed the rules that govern its new iAd mobile advertising platform to exclude competitors like Google (GOOG) and Microsoft (MSFT).
On Wednesday, Google took the matter public, blasting Apple for setting "artificial barriers to competition [that] hurt users and developers and, in the long run, stall technological progress."
On Thursday, the Financial MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Jun 10, 2010 7:07 AM ETPosted in: Antitrust, Apple, DOJ, Financial Times, FTC, Google, iAd, John Batelle, John Gruber, Microsoft, Silicon Alley Insider
