Chillin'Competition

Today we´d like to  point you to a couple of short and interesting pieces on which we would appreciate hearing your views:

As some of you may know, Apple recently announced that it will allow  newspapapers, magazines and other publications to sell digital subscriptions of to iPhone, iPad and iTouch users (if you don´t, see here). An interesting post published yesterday on The Wall Street Journal Law Blog  (see here) has highlighted the potential antitrust-related risks incurred by Apple with regards to some of the terms of its offer. One of the central issues essentially boils down to defining the relevant market affected by Apple´s offer: is there a relevant market for consumer tablet computers? A wider market for digital and print media outlets?  Any opinions? And even case Apple were found dominant in a nascent market, should that warrant antitrust intervention?

A second interesting, and certainly controversial piece of reading, is this one. It´s an article written some years ago in The Sunday Times concerning lawyers´ dissatisfaction with their work. I have stated here some of my views on this topic, and I´ve even ventured some criticism on how things are often done (see here and here). However, I view this article as overstepping the mark and as a consequence it ends up depicting  “City” lawyers -and, in a sense, the whole profession-  in a way that makes lawyers appear as despicable inhuman beings. There are a number of cheap overstatements in this admittedly somewhat tongue in cheek article, but I´m sure it should elicit some reactions amongst our readership.