Apple’s legal response to DOJ in eBook price-fixing case
May 25, 2012 at 12:46 pm
Ars Technica posted Apple’s legal response (PDF) to the U.S. Department of Justice’s lawsuit against the Cupertino, Calif.-based Firm, and six publishers, for allegedly conspiring to fix eBook prices. In the document, Apple condemned the federal government for siding with “monopoly, rather than competition,” and then called the Department of Justice’s complaint ”fundamentally flawed as a matter of reality and law.”
Phrases like “false” and “absurd” seem all through Apple’s response to the accusations, which parallels the company’s statement from April, in regards to the suit’s filing, exactly where Apple basically mentioned it is breaking monopolies, rather than starting them. Daring Fireball cropped this small nugget from the legal response that summarizes the entire 31-page document:
The Government sides with monopoly, rather than competition, in bringing this situation. The Government begins from the false premise that an eBooks “market” was characterized by “robust value competition” prior to Apple’s entry. This ignores a easy and incontrovertible truth: before 2010, there was no real competition, there was only Amazon. At the time Apple entered the market place, Amazon sold almost nine out of every ten eBooks, and its power more than value and product selection was almost absolute. Apple’s entry spurred tremendous growth in eBook titles, range and range of offerings, sales, and improved quality of the eBook reading encounter. This is evidence of a dynamic, competitive market. These inconvenient details are ignored in the Complaint. Rather, the Government focuses on increased rates for a handful of titles. The Complaint does not allege that all eBook rates, or even most eBook costs, improved immediately after Apple entered the market place.
[Image via CBSNews]
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