I find there's a lot of confusion about the price fixing litigation for ebooks that has come out in the past few months. Specifically, people ragging on Amazon for something that's not their fault.
Amazon did not choose to engage in illegal activity. Ergo, they didn't get hit with the DOJ lawsuit.
This is a good discussion on what happened and why it was illegal.
While I'm hardly a legal expert, I am a consumer, and price fixing is something that is illegal for a reason. It's something every consumer should be wary of and regard with the utmost suspicion. Because if a company can screw you on the price, then the consumer is the one missing out.
There's been a lot of crying out about how the book publishers are special, and they deserve the right to price fix. Don't believe me? Take a look at the responses sent by the Publishers, and the DOJ's counter responses essentially saying their complaints are invalid. This link on Passive Voice has not only the official court documents, but some excerpts highlighted and good discussion on the topic.
In other random news, What sort of reader are you? This gave me a chuckle.
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