where exactly you think they would go? Seeing how the EU also sued them (and Apple settled) they would have been in the same situation - unless they went to what ,China?
There are countries that respect rights and are much more capitalist than the USA, and also going in the right direction. Which country would be best for Apple depends. But they're large enough that they'd have their pick and some of them would even pass laws that resolve issues that apple has with them in order to get them relocating. (much the way US states pass laws to make the tax climate better for company thinking about relocating there.)
But, since you mentioned China. There is hong kong. The Hong Kong justice system, for instance, would never have convicted Apple of this kind of non-crime. I am certain they don't have anti-capitalism laws on the books like they do here in america.
Don't fall into the trap of, being an american, and presuming the rest of the world is much worse off.
Many countries are more free and safer than America.
Why all the Obama bashing? <span style="color:rgb(24,24,24);font-family:arial, helvetica, sans-serif;line-height:18.1875px;">U.S. District Judge Denise Cote was nominated by Clinton back in '94. Sure Obama is the face of the federal government with Holder as his Attorney General, but it's not as if Obama or Holder strong arm the justices. That would be a serious breach of so many founding principles of this country. Anywho, this decision makes no sense (to the non-lawyer eye) and will undoubtedly be repealed and likely go to the Supreme Court (which has been remarkedly business friendly).</span>
<span style="color:rgb(24,24,24);font-family:arial, helvetica, sans-serif;line-height:18.1875px;">edit: Although I guess you could argue a decision either way would be "business friendly."</span>
That's why we have juries. Apple should have selected a jury trial.
Apple's case is a slam dunk. The purpose of judges is to prevent a miscarriage of justice, even in the case of a jury trial.
This "judge" is corrupt. Thus a jury trial wouldn't have made a difference. (Juries are more gullible and easier to fall for the government case than a judge is.)
Basically, the court was stacked against Apple from the beginning.... as every court in america is stacked against the defendant from the beginning. The government controls the judge, the prosecutor, the evidence, and even the defendant's lawyer is restricted from defending his client in many cases and ways simply because the government controls whether he can appear in court or not.
The judge warned Apple that it was in their best interests to settle before the trial. I have little sympathy for a company that ignores advice like this.
There also seems to be a lot of people in this thread who don't understand that judges often given guidance before cases. It's a sensible way to get sides to settle out of court and save both everyone money.
This is the guy who illegally exported guns to mexico in the hopes they would be used in crimes so that he could use it as a justification for tougher gun laws in america.
All I can say is this judge knows nothing about the book industry. The Agency model has been king forever, and the way the book industry works is that prices have *always* been set artificially by collusion among publishers.
Anyone who has ever owned a bookstore can tell you this. You are told what the prices are, what the discounts are and how high or low you can sell them. It's almost always been this way and the so-called "free market" rules don't apply and never have.
Unlike many posters here, I don't blame the judge, I blame the law.
I don't think Apple did anything wrong, but I'm not terribly surprised that they (were determined) to have violated some aspects of the law. Most people here are applying a standard of "what the law should be" rather than what the laws say. And since we're not lawyers, what do we know.
It's like when we watch the Winter Olympics every four years and deem ourselves experts on the rules of short track speed skating and rhythmic mogul ice dancing or whatnot.
So Apple "led" behind Barnes and Noble?
End of the line for this railroaded court, I expect the tart of a judge's ruling to be overturned on appeal.
Apple announced they will appeal and are adamant they did nothing wrong. It will be interesting to see how the appeal goes and what arguments are brought up (I'm guessing Cote's comment before trial that she thought the DOJ will prove its case would be one).
This is far from over.. Apple will appeal this all the way to the Supreme Court..which happens to be a business friendly.
The Supreme court hasn't been as packed full of right-wing ideologues and criminals for a long time. This does not mean it's "business friendly" though. Clarence Thomas for instance should still be in jail right now, not on the Supreme court. Scalia and Alito have no respect for the law or the government, or anything but their own radical opinions and have brought more shame to the body in the last five years than any other judge has for a century.
The Supreme court hasn't been as packed full of right-wing ideologues and criminals for a long time. This does not mean it's "business friendly" though. Clarence Thomas for instance should still be in jail right now, not on the Supreme court. Scalia and Alito have no respect for the law or the government, or anything but their own radical opinions and have brought more shame to the body in the last five years than any other judge has for a century.
First off, you're right that the law is a bogus law. It's a law written by communists (literally, back when communism was an up and coming thing) to punish people for "competing".
Your presumption that only lawyers can have an opinions is silly. The law is not complicated. In fact, the highest law, the one under which Apple is absolutely innocent, is the constitution. The constitution does not give the federal government the power to persecute Apple in this way. That document was written so that everyone could read it. All laws in violation of it (which anti-trust are) are null and void.
However, given the weakness of the case, the judge is to blame, always. Whenever the law is bad, it is the judge's job to set aside the law and rule in the moral way.
The judge here has committed a profound crime-- has betrayed any oath or claim of fealty to justice.
The only possible service to the people she's done here is to show that government justice is justice denied.
That the obama administration will go after people for the crime of being successful capitalists and government judges, no matter how weak the case, will let them get away with it.
She's shown that the "justice" system has been corrupted into a partisan persecution organization.
She's shown that the US government is nothing more than a bunch of mafia-like thugs.
The judge said the pricing change to agency model was NOT the result of market forces, but a price fixing conspiracy by corporations. Yeah, like Amazon dictating $9.99 pricing caps to publishers was the result of "market forces."
It's actually more about forcing right-wing market ideology which would be the opposite of communism.
What Amazon does is immoral, underhanded etc. but actually conforms closely to right-wing so-called "free market" ideology. What the publishers traditionally do is what's called the Agency model (Apple was trying to help them re-instate this model), which is technically "price setting through collusion," and somewhat in opposition to the right-wing free-market stuff. This is because it's a mode of selling and an approach to the market that evolved long before the rise of right-wing ideological politics in America.
The first is bad for the consumer, the writers, and the publishers but conformant to the ideology, the second is very good for the consumer, the writers and the publishers but does not conform to the ideology. In other words it's a government body enforcing capitalist ideology, not communist.
One may ask why a government body is enforcing *any* ideology and why they wouldn't just go with the law and the facts (even though the law is somewhat tainted by the same ideology) but there it is.
The funny thing about all of this... Apple has the ability (money) to undercut pricing that Amazon couldn't match and take a large chunk of their market share from them... but I bet Apple would've been sued by the DOJ for anti-trust there too. LOL
There are supposed to be laws that protect competition in the market place... A company is not allowed to undercut pricing to the point that other competitors cannot sustain a business... And yet this is exactly what Amazon has been doing.
I understand there are also laws to protect consumers from being forced to overpay for a certain type of product, this is why we have collusion laws, but book prices DID NOT GO UP after Apple entered the market, they went back to their NORMAL prices before Amazon ransacked the market.
The fact that this judge is too short-sighted to see that is just ignorant.
Comments
Quote:
Originally Posted by agramonte
where exactly you think they would go? Seeing how the EU also sued them (and Apple settled) they would have been in the same situation - unless they went to what ,China?
There are countries that respect rights and are much more capitalist than the USA, and also going in the right direction. Which country would be best for Apple depends. But they're large enough that they'd have their pick and some of them would even pass laws that resolve issues that apple has with them in order to get them relocating. (much the way US states pass laws to make the tax climate better for company thinking about relocating there.)
But, since you mentioned China. There is hong kong. The Hong Kong justice system, for instance, would never have convicted Apple of this kind of non-crime. I am certain they don't have anti-capitalism laws on the books like they do here in america.
Don't fall into the trap of, being an american, and presuming the rest of the world is much worse off.
Many countries are more free and safer than America.
Ho, ho, ho!
Quote:
Originally Posted by jungmark
That's why we have juries. Apple should have selected a jury trial.
Apple's case is a slam dunk. The purpose of judges is to prevent a miscarriage of justice, even in the case of a jury trial.
This "judge" is corrupt. Thus a jury trial wouldn't have made a difference. (Juries are more gullible and easier to fall for the government case than a judge is.)
Basically, the court was stacked against Apple from the beginning.... as every court in america is stacked against the defendant from the beginning. The government controls the judge, the prosecutor, the evidence, and even the defendant's lawyer is restricted from defending his client in many cases and ways simply because the government controls whether he can appear in court or not.
True, but you missed my joke.
The judge warned Apple that it was in their best interests to settle before the trial. I have little sympathy for a company that ignores advice like this.
There also seems to be a lot of people in this thread who don't understand that judges often given guidance before cases. It's a sensible way to get sides to settle out of court and save both everyone money.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jessi
This is the guy who illegally exported guns to mexico in the hopes they would be used in crimes so that he could use it as a justification for tougher gun laws in america.
Holder was cleared of any cover-up as well as knowing anything about this prior to its public unveiling (http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/OTUS/fast-furious-probe-clears-holder-faults-atf-justice/story?id=17274903#.Ud1sMjvVBdJ). Please don't spout off nonsense without backing it up.
All I can say is this judge knows nothing about the book industry. The Agency model has been king forever, and the way the book industry works is that prices have *always* been set artificially by collusion among publishers.
Anyone who has ever owned a bookstore can tell you this. You are told what the prices are, what the discounts are and how high or low you can sell them. It's almost always been this way and the so-called "free market" rules don't apply and never have.
Quote:
Originally Posted by malax
Unlike many posters here, I don't blame the judge, I blame the law.
I don't think Apple did anything wrong, but I'm not terribly surprised that they (were determined) to have violated some aspects of the law. Most people here are applying a standard of "what the law should be" rather than what the laws say. And since we're not lawyers, what do we know.
It's like when we watch the Winter Olympics every four years and deem ourselves experts on the rules of short track speed skating and rhythmic mogul ice dancing or whatnot.
So Apple "led" behind Barnes and Noble?
End of the line for this railroaded court, I expect the tart of a judge's ruling to be overturned on appeal.
Amazon celebrates their newly government approved and protected monopoly by.....wait for it.....raising prices!
http://www.mhpbooks.com/monopoly-acheived-an-invincible-amazon-begins-raising-prices/
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/05/business/as-competition-wanes-amazon-cuts-back-its-discounts.html?pagewanted=2&ref=technology&_r=0
But of course, it's all in the interest of the consumer. Obviously.
Amazon stockholders can pop the champagne though. Profits are finally coming their way!
Everyone in AI is always a lawyer.
Apple announced they will appeal and are adamant they did nothing wrong. It will be interesting to see how the appeal goes and what arguments are brought up (I'm guessing Cote's comment before trial that she thought the DOJ will prove its case would be one).
Quote:
Through their conspiracy they forced Amazon (and other resellers) to relinquish pricing authority...
So they're guilty of stopping an actual monopoly from continuing to screw writers and publishers.
Brilliant.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Wurm5150
This is far from over.. Apple will appeal this all the way to the Supreme Court..which happens to be a business friendly.
The Supreme court hasn't been as packed full of right-wing ideologues and criminals for a long time. This does not mean it's "business friendly" though. Clarence Thomas for instance should still be in jail right now, not on the Supreme court. Scalia and Alito have no respect for the law or the government, or anything but their own radical opinions and have brought more shame to the body in the last five years than any other judge has for a century.
Quote:
Originally Posted by mrrodriguez
Lol why is it that every verdict against Apple you guys think it's a conspiracy and blame everyone but Apple.
Everyone in AI is always a lawyer.
Gee, kinda like everyone saying the judge is bought when Apple wins.
??:err:
Please take your radical views elsewhere.
Sigh. Ignorance of history. Doomed to repeat it.
Yeah, like Amazon dictating $9.99 pricing caps to publishers was the result of "market forces."
Quote:
Originally Posted by reroll
Damn communist government!
It's actually more about forcing right-wing market ideology which would be the opposite of communism.
What Amazon does is immoral, underhanded etc. but actually conforms closely to right-wing so-called "free market" ideology. What the publishers traditionally do is what's called the Agency model (Apple was trying to help them re-instate this model), which is technically "price setting through collusion," and somewhat in opposition to the right-wing free-market stuff. This is because it's a mode of selling and an approach to the market that evolved long before the rise of right-wing ideological politics in America.
The first is bad for the consumer, the writers, and the publishers but conformant to the ideology, the second is very good for the consumer, the writers and the publishers but does not conform to the ideology. In other words it's a government body enforcing capitalist ideology, not communist.
One may ask why a government body is enforcing *any* ideology and why they wouldn't just go with the law and the facts (even though the law is somewhat tainted by the same ideology) but there it is.
The funny thing about all of this... Apple has the ability (money) to undercut pricing that Amazon couldn't match and take a large chunk of their market share from them... but I bet Apple would've been sued by the DOJ for anti-trust there too. LOL
There are supposed to be laws that protect competition in the market place... A company is not allowed to undercut pricing to the point that other competitors cannot sustain a business... And yet this is exactly what Amazon has been doing.
I understand there are also laws to protect consumers from being forced to overpay for a certain type of product, this is why we have collusion laws, but book prices DID NOT GO UP after Apple entered the market, they went back to their NORMAL prices before Amazon ransacked the market.
The fact that this judge is too short-sighted to see that is just ignorant.