WASHINGTON – The Justice Department has warned Apple Inc. and five of the biggest US 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; 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 and NewsCore.
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.
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ReplyDeleteThanks Lisa.. I really appreciate it. I am trying to shy away from awards because I know they take up a lot of time.. the thought is wonderful though!! :)
DeleteThis is awesome news. I only read ebooks now and the whole thing with the agency model when Apple opened their ibook store made me so angry. I don't have an ipad for this reason. Thanks for posting!
ReplyDeleteI read an equal amount but I agree, this is going to be great. My mother just bought the new ipad and she wants to start reading again, I told her to borrow my Nook for now.. haha.
DeleteIn the UK the government put VAT (value added tax) which is currently at 20% on e-books, there isn't any VAT on paper books which is quite unfair.
ReplyDeleteThat is insane!! I wasn't aware of that. I guess we are lucky over here in the US in that aspect.
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