Apple loses e-book antitrust ruling

After taking it on the chin in a lengthy opinion by federal district judge Denise Cote, “Apple may be more cautious about entering into other markets with the same zeal.” [Macworld] George Priest, distinguished antitrust specialist at Yale, isn’t on board with the action against Apple: “When firms come up with new pricing schemes that force other companies to adopt new schemes, that’s a good thing” [Daniel Fisher, Forbes] Nor is Geoffrey Manne, who points out that authors have expressed alarm at the prospect of seeing the e-book market thrown back into Amazon’s hands. Ira Stoll wonders whether a presumption is being created that outsider firms should denounce incumbent monopolies to the government rather than disrupt them through vigorous market entry, while Wayne Crews says that by finding a clear Sherman Act violation, the government is merely showing how useless the law is. A different view from Bill Dyer: “Apple is going to have a very tough row to hoe on appeal.”

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