Apple wants to go to trial to defend itself against allegations made the United States government surround a price-fixing scheme, Reuters reported on Wednesday.  ”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 Department of Justice last week accused the Cupertino-based company and five book ...

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has urged local retailers to voice their concerns about eBook price-fixing as it considers a lawsuit against Apple and five of the world’s largest book publishers, The Financial Review reported on Thursday. “The ACCC has previously stated that impediments to emerging competition involving online traders is an area of priority,” a spokesperson said. “Competition concerns may arise where traders seek to restrict the discounting of products b...

The United States Department of Justice is likely to lose its antitrust lawsuit targeting Apple and book publishers, according to a report from CNET. A number of legal experts agree that the case against the Cupertino-based company isn’t as strong as the one against publishers. The DOJ “has a far better case against the publishers than Apple,” said Dominick Armentano, professor and author of Antitrust and Monopoly. “If the CEOs of the various publishers got together in hotel rooms to d...

Apple shook up the e-book market with the recent introduction of iBookstore, its new e-book marketplace that is slated to debut on the iPad. Additionally, Apple partnered with five of the largest book publishers in a deal that would allow the publisher to set the prices of e-books to $12.99 to $14.99, and offered a profit-sharing arrangement in which Apple would take a 30% cut. Publishers boasted of their success and bullied Amazon into raising its Kindle e-book prices to the same price point set by Apple. Al...

Days after Macmillan books disappeared from Amazon’s inventory due to a feud over pricing, Amazon has confirmed that it has caved to Macmillan’s demands and will be raising the prices of Macmillan e-books from $9.99 to $12.99-$14.99 for hardcover and bestselling editions. The online retail giant expressed its strong disagreement with this pricing but decided to still offer the books to customers who can decide with their wallets whether they want to purchase Macmillan e-books at at what it calls &...