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In an ongoing court case that was filed by the DOJ last year Apple is alleged to have been a "ringmaster" in price fixing for eBooks, including an e-mail from Steve Jobs to Harper Collins, as part of an attempt to move Apple off of it's standard rate of $9.99 a book.

The proposed settlement of the antitrust suit against HarperCollins, Hachette SA, and Simon & Schuster will be effective 30 days from approval, with compensation distributed to each state. 49 states (excluding Minnesota) accused the publishers of price fixing.

In France eBooks are only 1.8% of the general market, and total sales of books have actually increased by 6.5% from 2003 to 2011. Some interesting conclusions are drawn from this, namely that prices for French language books are fixed by government decree and set by publishers--not by price discounters such as Amazon, and last year the publishers lobbied to do the same for eBooks. The French government is also friendly to booksellers, offering grants and help with rent. The result is French language bookstores are doing well, while some such English language bookstore such as the 30 year old Village Voice are closing because of the competition from resellers like Amazon and eBooks. The article surmises that the French are really only delaying the inevitable, but I find it curious that nothing is really stopping them from turning entirely to eBooks now, the main factor is cost rather than convenience or access.