Justice Department Settles With Penguin, Still Suing Apple Over E-Books
From Paid Content:
Penguin, which is merging with Random House, has settled with the Department of Justice in the ebook pricing lawsuit, the DOJ announced late Tuesday afternoon. The DOJ sued Apple, Penguin and four other publishers in April for conspiring to set ebook prices. Penguin had planned to fight the case in court, along with Apple and Macmillan, but the company’s pending merger with Random House compelled it to get the litigation out of the way.
. . . .
Penguin said in a statement:
Penguin has always maintained, and continues to maintain, that it has done nothing wrong and has no case to answer. Penguin continues to believe that the agency pricing model has encouraged competition among distributors of both ebooks and ebook readers and, in the company’s view, continues to operate in the interest of consumers and authors. But it is also in everyone’s interests that the proposed Penguin Random House company should begin life with a clean sheet of paper.
The DOJ said it is “currently reviewing the proposed joint venture announced by Penguin and Random House Inc., the largest U.S. book publisher. Should the proposed joint venture proceed to consummation, the terms of Penguin’s settlement will apply to it.” Random House was not included in the DOJ’s original lawsuit, because it adopted agency pricing over a year after after the other big-six publishers did.
According to the DOJ’s competitive impact statement (PDF), Penguin has agreed to “substantially the same terms” that the three other settling publishers — HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster and Hachette — agreed to in April.
Link to the rest at Paid Content
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Notice how Penguin doesn’t deny collusion. Penguin says it did nothing wrong because the outcome was justified.
So, what about Macmillion? Must be kind of lonely out there. Is it hoping to set up a merger before it settles?
“Penguin continues to believe that the agency pricing model has encouraged competition among distributors of both ebooks and ebook readers and, in the company’s view, continues to operate in the interest of consumers and authors.”
Un, re-read those papers the DoJ served you with, Penguin. The charge was price-fixing to make consumers pay a higher price, NOT agency pricing. Do they think we’re stupid?
Never mind….