DOJ accuses Apple and other publishers of price fixing e-books

[FredisDead]

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203961204577267831767489216.html

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.

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.

[backscatter712]

1. THANK FSM!!!

Prices for e-books are ridiculous, usually being only slightly less expensive than dead-tree books, which leads me to *ahem* alternative methods for obtaining them.

While they're at it, the DOJ should insist that book publishers put together a system where if you own a physical dead-tree copy of a book, you can obtain the e-book for free. I'm not a fan of being forced to buy a book twice.

[flamingdem]

3. I wonder if they were behind the push

against Megaupload. Kim Dotcom got everyone used to freebies.

[Pholus]

2. Yeah that's why the high Icrap sales worry me -- easier to monopolize under those conditions...

The 30% apple tax on content as well as software.

Just doesn't seem worth it....

[got root]

6. lol

[ohheckyeah]

4. Wow -

that was quicker than I thought and it's a good thing. Amazon even states on some e-books "price set by the publisher" because Amazon was getting blamed for the outrageous e-book prices.

Steve Jobs was behind the price fixing from what I've read.

$15.99 for an e-book is outrageous.

[exboyfil]

7. The amazoning thing is seeing a book for $15.99

when a very good + used copy is going for $4.00 ($.01 + $3.99 in shipping).

I can understand charging a premium for a new book. The newness has value (I am the first to read A Dance with Dragons for example), but they need to soon start dropping their price. When the used hard copies start flooding the market, they need to start dropping their own prices.

What I am waiting for is to find out what publishers actually bring to the party. The internet will lead to more and more authors marketing their books directly. I would have to think publishers must be scared to death. Eventually we might be seeing groiups of authors getting together to do their own website/marketing. Then the more famous authors will become what they hate - publishers taking a piece of action from new authors (they already do this by lending their name to others work).

[got root]

5. the textbook loby must be pissed... and they have a long and storied tradition of price control

not about to cede all that to some upstart.

[exboyfil]

8. This is where the feds could have a roll

in college especially. A good portion of the fed grant/loan guarantee money goes towards paying for high priced textbooks. I cannot understand why a Chemistry book for example costs nearly $200. The DOE could easily make available open source copies of such textbooks.

[Pholus]

9. Let's hope the "battle of the titans" gets both to spend down their piles of cash.

That way, the rising tide will life all boats.

[got root]

10. well, i'm definately root'n for that ;)

right now i'm liking what i'm seeing in regards to apples prices