Apple's Closing Arguments Concludes E-Book Price Fixing Trial

ibooks iconAfter slightly more than two weeks of litigation, USA v. Apple, Inc. concluded with closing arguments from Apple and the Department of Justice.

AllThingsD reports that Orin Snyder, Apple's lead counsel, closed out the trial with a slick Keynote presentation, as the company's lawyers have been doing throughout the trial.

At one point, the PowerPoint presentation the Government's lawyers were using failed to play audio, with the Judge noting that they weren't using a Mac.

"Apple did not conspire with a single publisher to fix prices in the e-book industry," Snyder said, arguing that the negotiations under scrutiny in this case were nothing more than "standard, lawful business activity." And the DOJ’s claim that they were more than that, a nefarious plot over which Apple served as ringmaster, is entirely unsupported. "All of the government’s evidence is ambiguous at best," Snyder argued, lambasting the DOJ’s case as one built on "word games and inferences."


Snyder's final slide shows an iPad with the text "It's time to close the book on this case".

The Department of Justice has argued that Apple was the "ringmaster" of a scheme to raise e-book pricing across the industry. The government says Apple convinced publishing companies to work together to set pricing above the $9.99 price point that Amazon was selling books at before the iPad came out. The DOJ's slide deck is available from AllThingsD as well.

U.S. District Judge Denise Cote is expected to have a final judgement within a few weeks. Both sides agreed to have a judge hear and decide on the case rather than present it to a jury.

Popular Stories

iOS 26

iOS 26.1 Available Now With These 8 New Features

Monday November 3, 2025 5:54 am PST by
Following more than a month of beta testing, Apple released iOS 26.1 on Monday, November 3. The update includes a handful of new features and changes, including the ability to adjust the look of Liquid Glass and more. Below, we outline iOS 26.1's key new features. Liquid Glass Toggle iOS 26.1 lets you choose your preferred look for Liquid Glass. In the Settings app, under Display...
2024 iPhone Boxes Feature

Apple Adjusts Trade-In Values for iPhones, iPads, Macs, and More

Thursday November 6, 2025 11:12 am PST by
Apple today updated its trade-in values for select iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple Watch models. Trade-ins can be completed on Apple's website, or at an Apple Store. The charts below provide an overview of Apple's current and previous trade-in values in the U.S., according to its website. Maximum values for most devices either decreased or saw no change, but the iPad Air received a slight bump. ...
Finder Siri Feature

Apple's New Siri Will Be Powered By Google Gemini

Wednesday November 5, 2025 11:57 am PST by
The smarter, more capable version of Siri that Apple is developing will be powered by Google Gemini, reports Bloomberg. Apple will pay Google approximately $1 billion per year for a 1.2 trillion parameter artificial intelligence model that was developed by Google. For context, parameters are a measure of how a model understands and responds to queries. More parameters generally means more...
Liquid Glass General Feature

Apple Shares Liquid Glass Design Gallery

Thursday November 6, 2025 2:45 pm PST by
Apple is promoting the new Liquid Glass design in iOS 26, showing off the ways that third-party developers are embracing the aesthetic in their apps. On its developer website, Apple is featuring a visual gallery that demonstrates how "teams of all sizes" are creating Liquid Glass experiences. The gallery features examples of Liquid Glass in apps for iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, and Mac. Apple...
Apple Logo Spotlight

Report: Apple to Launch These New Products in 2026

Sunday November 2, 2025 5:34 am PST by
Apple is planning to launch at least 15 new products in 2026, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. Gurman outlined what to expect from Apple in 2026 in the latest edition of his "Power On" newsletter. He said the company is heading "into one of its most pivotal years in recent memory," with the rollout of major new Apple Intelligence features, intense regulatory pressure on the App Store,...
iOS 26

Apple Releases iOS 26.1 With Liquid Glass Toggle, Slide to Stop Alarm, New Apple Intelligence Languages and More

Monday November 3, 2025 1:11 pm PST by
Apple today released iOS 26.1, the first major update to the iOS 26 operating system that came out in September, iOS 26.1 comes over a month after iOS 26 launched. ‌iOS 26‌.1 is compatible with the ‌iPhone‌ 11 series and later, as well as the second-generation ‌iPhone‌ SE. The new software can be downloaded on eligible iPhones over-the-air by going to Settings > General >...
apple watch se 3 always on

Apple to Remove iPhone-Apple Watch Wi-Fi Sync in EU With iOS 26.2

Thursday November 6, 2025 4:37 am PST by
Apple in iOS 26.2 will disable automatic Wi-Fi network syncing between iPhone and Apple Watch in the European Union to comply with the bloc's regulations, suggests a new report. Normally, when an iPhone connects to a new Wi-Fi network, it automatically shares the network credentials with the paired Apple Watch. This allows the watch to connect to the same network independently – for...
Early Black Friday Deals 2

The Best Early Black Friday Apple Deals

Sunday November 2, 2025 10:04 am PST by
We're officially in the month of Black Friday, which will take place on Friday, November 28 in 2025. As always, this will be the best time of the year to shop for great deals, including popular Apple products like AirPods, iPad, Apple Watch, and more. In this article, the majority of the discounts will be found on Amazon. Note: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with some of these vendors. When ...

Top Rated Comments

AZREOSpecialist Avatar
162 months ago
I love how our DOJ has time to waste suing Apple over something it never did, yet apparently does nothing when voters have to wait in line for 8 hours in Florida to cast a ballot, when states try to change voter registration rules two months before a national election and then try to eliminate early voting or limit the voting hours, when some states are trying to change how the electoral college votes are awarded from those states, when legislatures across the country are gerrymandering districts in a way to ensure that the popular vote won't decide the winner of an election.

Where is the DOJ when it comes to enforcing the ADA and FCC rules against companies like Apple, Netflix, Amazon, Vudu and others who resist making closed captions or subtitles available for those who are deaf or hearing impaired? There are so many things that the DOJ should be focusing on, and Apple is not one of them. This is the most ridiculous waste of taxpayer dollars I've witnessed since the $400 Pentagon toilet seat.
Score: 12 Votes (Like | Disagree)
HiRez Avatar
162 months ago
It's mind-boggling how this case was ever brought. DOJ seems completely inept and clearly didn't do their research on this, didn't even understand what they were suing over.
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)
SamGabbay Avatar
162 months ago
Love how it's embedded in flash

:rolleyes:
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Mak47 Avatar
162 months ago
I've read every piece of legal document available to the public and it is crystal clear that Apple (as much as I enjoy their products) conspired with the big publishers to increase e-book prices in a strategy to make amazon "play nice".
Nobody in their right mind can deny those facts exist.

I'm quite certainly in my right mind, and my friend, those facts don't exist.

It appears to me that Apple, understanding a dissatisfaction with the status quo on the part of the publishers, made a move to jump into the ebooks market in a powerful way.

That is not illegal, nor is it even immoral by any reasonable person's measure.

The publishers were dissatisfied with Amazon's $9.99 model to begin with. They were pursuing a strategy that would essentially have killed Amazon by refusing to offer top quality new releases in the ebook format at all. Barnes & Noble was pursuing an agency model with the publishers before Apple even entered the conversation.

The fact is that content creators (the publishers) were no longer interested in Amazon's model. Ebooks did not have the market power in 2009 that they do today. They would have killed the $9.99 price point no matter what.

Apple stepping in to support the (already in development) agency model simply gave the publishers a better alternative. Now instead of windowing their high profile titles, they could release them at a price point they were comfortable with in all formats.

Apple did not require that the publishers stop doing business with Amazon. They didn't require that Amazon stop selling ebooks for $9.99, or dictate the price that publishers could sell to other retailers. They simply said they wanted equal pricing so they could remain competitive.

In the end, the publishers told Amazon they were no longer interested in their model--which they were going to do anyway, in one form or another. Amazon chose to remain in the ebooks market and agreed to pay the prices the content creators were asking. This is not collusion, it is not conspiracy and it is not illegal.
Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)
iWatch Avatar
162 months ago
Only a hardcore "fanboy" would think apple did absolutely nothing wrong here.
They obviously conspired with the big publishers at driving up the e-book prices in such a manner that Amazon would either have to sign a new contract or be blacklisted by the major publishers.

That is illegal.
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
MartiNZ Avatar
162 months ago
Love how the Calendar shots have the stitched leather .. this wasn't done in Mavericks :D.
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)