The United States District Court for The Northern District of California “has ruled that Apple and AT&T may have violated the Sherman Antitrust Act when they had a secret agreement that locked customers in for five years, three years past the two-year agreements that customers thought they were signing. The court ruled as well that Apple may have violated the same law by limiting the market for iPhone applications to those available through the App Store. In addition, the court ruled that Apple’s decision to permanently disable unlocked iPhones with its Version 1.1.1 update may have also violated the law,” Scott Bradner writes for Network World.
“I say ‘may have’ because what the court did was refuse to rule that the charges made by the people suing Apple and AT&T should be dismissed. The next step will be discovery, where Apple and AT&T will have to produce mountains of documents detailing just what they have been doing,” Bradner writes.
“This case has hardly started, but one possible outcome could be that Apple is told that it cannot have the kind of restrictive agreement it now has with AT&T and has to open up the iPhone for more third-party applications. I expect that Apple, but not AT&T, will benefit considerably if this happens — as will consumers (and, of course, the lawyers),” Bradner writes.
Full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Fred Mertz” and “Judge Bork” for the heads up.]
In other words, Apple has every legal right to exclusively sell iPhone through AT&T. Just like Verizon is selling some Samsung knock-off, and Sprint is selling its own LG version of an iPhone knock-off. They are all just as exclusive as the iPhone on AT&T.
They also have every legal right to control the way users will get applications for their phone. They also have every legal right to control system software updates and prevent user modification.
i am happy if this exclusive deal with AT&T;ends… Apple wins out anyway, if they include T-Mobile. They have better service where i live and in many metropolitans. So, in that case the only loser would be AT&T;.
There is a difference between your phone being “locked” to ATT, and YOU being under contract WITH ATT for cell phone service.
Your contract means you will pay a monthly charge for access to their network. That is a legal, contractual thing that is time limited.
Your phone being “locked” means that it will only work with that network. That is a physical, technical thing that can be undone by ATT.
I bought my 3G on the first day it was available. At the end of July, beginning of August, we went to Germany. As part of buying the necessary data and phone packages so my phone would work there without astronomical roaming charges, I asked the ATT rep I spoke to if it could be unlocked.
He replied that after 3 months, for a small fee, about $30, it could be unlocked so I could insert a prepaid SIM card from a German carrier whenever I went overseas.
Of course, my ATT contract would still be in force when I got back and I could reinsert m ATT SIM and continue until the end of the contract.
Gee, folks, this isn’t rocket science.
Sure, Apple has a contract to <u>produce iPhones that only work with ATT right out of the box</u>, for some period we haven’t nailed down yet.
But the Apple/ATT contract does not limit YOU once your contract with ATT ends.
You are then free to go and contract with T Mobile, the only other carrier that it will work with in the US.
Just don’t expect visual voicemail to work at T Mobile.
Awwww, skip the jPhone stuff – rest of you go nutz
But intonation and inflection, cut me off a piece of that
I THOUGHT you were going to Chicago
I thought YOU were going to Chicago
I thought you were going to CHICAGO
Just be damn careful how you do stuff like that in Japan or China
BC
God Bless the litigious USA!! No wonder this country is so screwed financially.
The fact that AT&T;has been busted for this kind of anti competitive practice before makes it easy for judge. I thought the lawsuit was about anti-trust or the restriction of consumers to have a choice of cellular service not phone hardware. That would make the partnership exclusive and anti-competitive.
Oh, come on, plenty of carriers have phones that are exclusive to just them. THAT’S not illegal!
Judge Ware has created, out of whole cloth, a single producer, single product monopoly. (Isn’t that what a PATENT is all about???) He is finding that Apple is abusing its monopoly position in the “iPhone” market… ignoring that it is merely a competing product in the overall “smart phone” market, which is a sub-market of the overall cellular phone market.
He apparently is basing this on a case in which another idiot judge ruled that Xerox could not prohibit third party repair parts from being installed in their copiers without voiding the warranty.
I could as easily argue that Dishnetwork’s receivers are single producer monopoly products in the “Dishnetwork receiver” market and that Dishnetwork is abusing its monopoly position be requiring owners to use their receivers with Dishnetwork’s satellite entertainment system and impermissibly excluding customers from receiving and watching DirecTV content on their receivers and that such a prohibition is a violation of the Sherman Anti-trust Act. For some reason, DirecTV won’t let Dishnetwork customers get their content either… There’s a class action just waiting here for some enterprising shyster…
Knowing AT&T;, i.e., the old SWB folks, the idea of an exclusive deal was their idea not Apple’s.
Apple, at the time was simply looking for a carrier… any carrier!
Lucky for Apple, there’re going to come out of this looking like the injured party!
The courts will in do course break the deal with AT&T;, Apple will then unlock all the iPhones, make a pile of money and leave the court laughting all the way to the bank!
Chalk up another win for Apple Legal department!
And yes there will be a fast resolution to this case!
Just wondering if there are any actual lawyers (or people that will admit to being a lawyer
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(Ben Franklin was right…… “First we shoot all the la…….”
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Just a thought.
en
effing brilliant…You think Apple consul had a clause in the contract for AT&T;to cover any anti-trust litigation fees that might arise?
Give AT&T;everything they want on exclusitivity, and if it’s challenged, make them pay and we make even more boatloads of cash.
Inquiring minds would like to know,
“He is finding that Apple is abusing its monopoly position in the ‘iPhone’ market… “
So RIM can be sued because their Blackberry email is tied to their own servers, or require purchasing hardware that is exclusively available from RIM.
Thank God! Praise the Lord and Pass The Pancakes, at least the US has ONE recession proof industry! Go Lawyers!!!!