“Apple Inc wants to go to trial to defend itself against U.S. government allegations that it conspired with publishers to raise prices of electronic books, a lawyer for the Silicon Valley giant said in court on Wednesday,” Grant McCool reports for Reuters.
“Two publishers took a similar stance in the first hearing in Manhattan federal court since the anti-trust division of the Department of Justice last week accused Apple and five publishers of colluding to break up Amazon.com’s low-cost dominance of the digital book market,” McCool reports. “The publishers are Macmillan, a unit of Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck GmbH, and Pearson Plc’s Penguin Group. Settlements with the other three publishers — HarperCollins Publishers Inc, Simon & Schuster Inc and Hachette Book Group — were announced a week ago.”
McCool reports, “‘Our basic view is that we would like the case to be decided on the merits,’ Apple lawyer, Daniel Floyd, told U.S. District Judge Denise Cote. ‘We believe that this is not an appropriate case against us and we would like to validate that.’ The judge scheduled the next hearing for June 22.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Bring it on!
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Dan K.” for the heads up.]
Related articles:
Apple vs. Amazon: Who’s really fixing eBook prices? – April 17, 2012
Apple: U.S. DOJ’s accusation of collusion against iBookstore is simply not true – April 12, 2012
Apple not likely to be a loser in legal fight over eBooks – April 12, 2012
16 U.S. states join DOJ’s eBook antitrust action against Apple, publishers – April 12, 2012
Australian gov’t considers suing Apple, five major publishers over eBook pricing – April 12, 2012
DOJ’s panties in a bunch over Apple and eBooks, but what about Amazon? – April 12, 2012
Antitrust experts: Apple likely to beat U.S. DOJ, win its eBook lawsuit – April 12, 2012
Why the market shrugged off the Apple antitrust suit – April 11, 2012
What’s wrong with the U.S. DOJ? – April 11, 2012
Macmillan CEO blasts U.S. DOJ; gov’t on verge of killing real competition for appearance of competition – April 11, 2012
U.S. DOJ hits Apple,major publishers with antitrust lawsuit, alleges collusion on eBook prices – April 11, 2012
U.S. DOJ may sue Apple over ebook price-fixing as early as today, sources say – April 11, 2012