Monopoly watchdog group the Open Markets Institute has filed a brief, signed jointly by PEN America and the Authors Guild, encouraging the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division “to block the merger between the two sole competitors in the long-run magazine and book printing markets,” Quad and LSC Communications. In October, Quad (formerly Quad Graphics) announced…
DOJ
The Last Gasp: Apple Agrees To Settle Shareholder eBook Complaint
The long-running saga of the Department of Justice vs. Apple over antitrust issues with ebook pricing had one last gasp. Two years after Apple paid out more than $450 million in settlement credits in the original case (which was settled two years prior, in 2014), the company has settled a subsequent derivative shareholder complaint, originally…
Harper Canada Finally Settles eBook Pricing Case
HarperCollins has reached a consent agreement with Canada’s Competition Bureau related to the introduction of agency ebook pricing there, a year after the other parties had settled. Hachette, Macmillan, Simon & Schuster and Apple all entered into consent agreements in January 2017, but Harper had resisted. They said, in part, “HarperCollins Canada is confident in its…
One More Round of eBook Settlement Credits Coming Later This Month
As we suggested in June, the Apple ebook settlement fund of $400 million still had a substantial remainder of unclaimed funds after the primary distribution year expired. Between the Apple funds and the previous publisher settlements, there is still $84 million in consumer compensation credits available. so in early September Judge Denise Cote agreed to…
Consumer Deadline — and A Pot of Leftover Money — Looms At Expiration of Apple Settlement Credits
The big Apple-funded pool of up to $400 million in consumer credits as a result of the ebook settlement agreement with the consumer class and state attorneys general began distribution about a year ago — which means that any unused or unclaimed credits will expire at the end of the day on June 24. Many…
Legal: European Court Disallows Lower Tax for eBooks, Harper Responds In Canada
Responding to a query brought by the Polish Constitutional Court, the European Court of Justice has ruled that member states may not apply a lower value added tax to downloadable ebooks or other publications — even though lower taxes are allowed for books and other publications that are printed (and in turn, even digital books delivered by…