Archive for the ‘Jokes’ Category
Some interesting and recent stuff
There has been some interesting stuff going on in the past few days that we haven´t been able to cover. Here’s a brief (and subjective) account of some recent antitrust related news:
– Bill Gates has been (and at the time of writing he may well still be) testifying in a Utah Court in the framework of a case initiated by Novell. Novell is arguing that Microsoft encouraged them to develop WordPerfect software for Windows, only to later withdraw its support because WordPerfect competed with other Microsoft products. Judge Motz, who is presiding over the case, has reportedly expressed skepticism that Novell’s claims have merit.
– Chinese authorities confirmed that there is currently an ongoing investigation concerning a possible abuse of dominance on the part of two State-owned companies (China Telecom Corp. and China Unicom). The antitrust branch within the NDRC is investigating whether these two companies -allegedly dominant in the market for broadband internet services- may have been charging their competitors higher fees for broadband access while offering favorable prices to non-competitors. This is to our knowledge the first high profile abuse of dominance investigation since the Antimonopoly Law was enacted in 2008. The fact that it is targeting two State owned companies makes it particularly interesting. We’ll be asking our “Chinese correspondent” to keep an eye open for any possible developments.
– Here´s one that I´m following with particular interest: NBA players hired the very well known antitrust lawyer David Boies to represent them in their battle against franchise owners that has led to the NBA lockout. The players have now filed two class action lawsuits (one in Minessota and one in California, which are considered to be favorable venues) asking for treble damages (that is, triple the amount of the more than $ 2 billion they would´ve made this season). The lawsuits argue that the lockout “constitutes an illegal group boycott, price-fixing agreement, and/or restraint of trade in violation of the Sherman Act” an hat the owners´ final offer for a new collective bargaining agreement would have “wiped out the competitive market for most NBA players”. (For our comments on the very similar NFL precedent see here).
– Giorgio Monti (Professor at the European University Institute in Florence and author of one of our favorite competition law textbooks) read our posts on Pierre Fabre and on the future of Article 101 and invited us to participate at a workshop in Fiesole on January 5th. Should be very interesting; we’ll give you more details in the coming days.
– Antitrust students at Berkeley have started their own Berkeley Global Antitrust Blog. Best of lucks to them!
-Finally, last week we received a couple of emails from readers that reveal that my co-blogger Nicolas is apparently becoming a celebrity. One reader told us about the fact that there is a Nicolas Petit street in Luxembourg, and another reader sent us a picture that shows that a young competition lawyer has a picture of Brad Pitt Nicolas above her desk (!)
See pic below for evidence. We´ll keep the identity of Nico´s fan secret in order to avoid any incidents with Ms. Petit ; )
Chillin´Competition: The Conference
As our usual readers know by now, this blog was born out of the conviction that it was possible to do and say some things differently within our small competition law world. We have intended to do that on the blog, and now we want to extend this attitude to a conference -the 1st Chillin´Competition conference- which will be somehow different from what you may be used to. We can´t say much more for now (except that it will be held in Brussels), but details will follow soon.
We want you to be involved to the greatest extent possible, and therefore we would like you to please send us your ideas on possible topics and speakers: we´re looking for excellent and open minded practitioners, officials or academics who might give brilliant, fresh and even humorous views on competition law issues. We already have ideas on a number of people who fit that description, and some of them have already expressed their willingness to participate in this initiative. Please send us your suggestions either publicly by commenting on this post or in private at nicolas.petit@ulg.ac.be and alfonso.lamadrid@garrigues.com
Thanks!
Antitrust Story
Like theft, monopoly pricing does not necessarily harm total welfare, but injures consumer welfare.
Depending on where you stand on the total v. consumer welfare equation, this may influence your social tolerance to theft.
A good illustration of this can be found in a story about William Baxter, a former Professor at Stanford Law School. Baxter also served from 1981 to 1983 as Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Antitrust Division of the DoJ:
“While strolling one evening on a quiet street near the Washington residence, Bill and his wife Carol were confronted by an armed robber; they emerged minus some personal property but without injury. At the next Antitrust Division holiday party, the incident became a skit in which the robber demanded Bill’s watch. When Bill resists, the robber points out that it would be only a wealth transfer – a mere redistribution that would not affect economic efficiency or total social welfare. Reassured that the robber shares his standards of economic analysis and acknowledging that the point is analytically correct, Bill immediately surrenders his watch”.
Source can be found here. Found in reading Ben Van Rompuy’s doctoral dissertation (VUB, Belgium).
Tough Competition
Competition is tough nowadays, even in competition law blogging!
Check this out:
Some weeks ago, when introducing “THE RAID”, we wrote the following:
“In Chilling Competition we have devoted a number of posts to antitrust-related movies (see our previous posts on: “First ever Hollywood competition law movie?”; “More competition-related entertainment“; “OFT goes to Hollywood”, and, very specially, our nominations to the “Antitrust Oscars”). Given that all of those posts received a crazy amount of visits, we can reasonably presume that you too like this sort of videos.”
This afternoon, one of our readers sent us a link to CPI´s September Antitrust Chronicle, where we see that CPI has created its “First CPI Film Festival”. Does this sound familiar?
Not only the concept “sort of” ressembles our “Antitrust Oscars”, but the films are also the same ones that we had referred to in our previous posts, and that you had referred to in previous comments.
It´s nice to know that even though CPI Blogs o´Blogs has tipically “boycotted” our posts (with one exception; Nico had already referred to this in the past), their ideas and tastes are so strikingly similar to ours!
Our competition lawyers mindsets lead us to the conclusion that there´s not much that can be done here since this situation can be regarded as either
a) a case of Conscious Parallelism (CPI) in an oligopolistic setting where CPI´s conduct can be qualified as a follow-the-leader reaction? 😉
or
b) a situation in which the content of our most visited posts must be regarded as an essential facility that needs to be shared with competitors.
THE RAID: An antitrust movie
In Chilling Competition we have devoted a number of posts to antitrust-related movies (see our previous posts on: “First ever Hollywood competition law movie?”; “OFT goes to Hollywood”, and, very specially, our nominations to the “Antitrust Oscars”). Given that all of those posts received a crazy amount of visits, we can reasonably presume that you too like this sort of videos.
Today Chilling Competition is proud to release a true gem, a “classic” on its own right that we have digitalized for our readers: The Raid.
In our opinion, The Raid is the best and funniest antitrust movie of all times. It has everything: it is a comedy with action, romance, and an educational purpose (it was filmed -a few years ago- as part of a compliance program for Neste).
If you think we’re not objective, then you’re absolutely right:
The Raid is directed and starred by very special actors to whom we profess great admiration: General Court’s Judge Marc van der Woude (who plays the character of Luc Desmet, a Commission inspector); Toni Huopalainen (who, in addition to being the scriptwriter, plays the role of European Commission official Tom Jenssen); and our friend and favorite competition lawyer Luis Ortiz Blanco (to see a moustached Luis in his role as a priest confessing a cartelist jump to minute 20.33).
A million thanks go to all three of them for granting us the permission to digitalize their movie and for their great sense of humor.
Enough for introductions…
(Only accessible on Chilling Competition’s youtube channel via this link).
Breaking news! Real Madrid´s antitrust case against F.C Barcelona
Surprising competition authorities as well as its own players –who have just started the pre-season in Los Angeles- Real Madrid C.F. (hereinafter “RM”) has apparently lodged an antitrust complaint against FC.Barcelona(“FCB”). RM alleges that FCB has abused the dominant position it has enjoyed in the European and Spanish football market for the past 3 years.
Some rumors point at a charismatic RM employee as the mastermind of this complaint, which was submitted on the same day he returned from his holidays in his hometown of Setúbal (Portugal).
The complaint is based on the following grounds:
Dominance. The complaint alleges that FCB is dominant in as much as it enjoys a 77% market share (having won 10 out of the 13 titles in play in the past 3 years). A more detailed analysis reveals that FCB controls 75% of the Spanish market (having won 6 out of 8 competitions) and 80% of the EU market (having won 4 out of 5 competitions).
Barriers to entry-Vertical Integration. According to RM´s complaint, FCB´s vertical integration makes it impossible for other clubs to gain a foothold on this market. The complaint explains that for the past 20 years a subsidiary of FCB (La Masía) has produced players (e.g. Messi, Iniesta or Xavi) with such features that enable them to correctly interoperate/play only with other FCB players and not with those of competitors. Besides, injured or retired FCB players can be constantly replaced by a new folk from La Masía, thus guaranteeing an unfair market control by the alleged abuser.
Abusive Behavior. According to the complaint, the misconduct of FCB also includes “acting and faking”. Such conduct would have allegedly led regulators and referees to incur in errors in the events where a direct competition between RM and FCB has taken place. In this sense, the complaint appears to be based on the General Court´s Astra Zeneca Judgment.
The complaint – in which the word “why” is repeated 17 times– also mentions the reinforcement of the situation by international organizations such as Unicef and the reputed publication The Economist, which recently published an article entitled The Catalan Kings, where FCB virtues were praised but its misconduct was not denounced.
Remedies sought. RM seeks the cessation of the allegedly anti-competitive conduct as well as the reparation of the damage suffered during these years. In particular, RM has asked the competition authorities to impose both structural and behavioral remedies on FCB.
Some suggested structural remedies would consist of divesting some of the most decisive assets of FCB (“primarily FCB should get rid of Lionel Messi or, subsidiarily, the binomial Xavi – Iniesta should be somehow split”). Possible behavioral remedies would include “restricting the possession of the ball to no more than 50% in any game” or “sharing of know-how with rivals before, during and after any game”.
[Note by Alfonso: César Chaparro (a very good friend, a former antitrust lawyer, and currently an official at the World Bank –based in Washington DC and Nairobi-) has sent us this report about a competition case that could bring about a revolution in world football. As you have seen, it´s a joke with which César –who is a great guy but happens to support Barça (nobody is perfect) wanted to tease me. Given that the lawyer who represents Real Madrid in competition related matters is a subscriber of this blog it would also be interesting to find out about his opinion on this “news” too..) And if you really want to know how FC Barcelona trains, watch this]
New job openings
Last week Nico started using this blog as a way of advertising available jobs. In line with our often stated belief that there´s life out there beyond competition law, we´ve decided to provide you with info on other less obvious but certainly interesting work alternatives.
So here´s the first one: the legal tabloid abovethelaw.com has a great piece on how Drunk Driving Defense can be an alternative to “Big Law” jobs. This doesn´t appear to be a small market niche: I once (completely unitentionally) found a whole section of book stacks at Harvard Law School´s library solely devoted to the law of Drunk Driving.
So far vacancies are only available in the U.S. However, I´m pretty sure that Brussels would make a good geographic market for a similar venture. Actually, my co-blogger hosted a party at his place this Saturday and I can tell you: it was crowded with potential clients..
(Needless to say, drunk driving is a hugely serious issue, and the last part on Nico´s party was only a joke. Not only no one “drove under the influence”, but also most people were only driving strollers..) 😉
OFT goes to Hollywood
Remember our Antitrust Oscars?
We have a new and excellent candidate for the category of “Best Film by a Competition Authority”.
Check out the Compliance Film that the OFT has just released and which includes a dramatised dawn raid and special guest appearances from the likes of Prof. Richard Whish. A cool initiative within the OFT´s wider compliance project.
(Thanks to Christopher Brown and Luis Ortiz Blanco for drawing our attention to it!).
And coming soon to a blog near you…we have a truly excellent film in the pipeline with very special actors and a very special director. We´ll post it here as soon as we can overcome some technical issues.
PS. For those of you who haven´t already heard, Damien Neven (former Chief Economist at DG Comp) is joining Charles River Associates. Stay tuned, there might just be some more related news coming up soon.
Competition (?) Press Clips
Many recent news appear somewhat different when looked at from the perspective of an antitrust geek professional. Some quick examples:
Novel anticompetitive practices? Pizza maker charged with using mice against competition
An EU sponsored cartel? “The EU will have to agree with rating agencies to ensure that none of them declares the Greek rollover as a default”
(An interesting case study of oligopolistic behavior: monitoring is easy, and the EU certainly has credible retaliatory mechanisms at its disposal…)
“The successful competitor, having been urged to compete, must not be turned upon when he wins” Man dies after winning vodka-drinking competition
Similar perils arising from too vigorous competition: Man dies in sauna competition; Man dies in cake-eating competition
A successful maverick? Roland Bunce wins next top model competition
There were a couple of “real” antitrust news too:
Google´s subpoenas Feds to launch probe of Google
European Commission fines Telekomunikacja Polska
One of our posts quoted by Bloomberg Edison, Air Liquide EU Rulings May Aid Fine Cuts, Lawyers Say
Finally (and I promise this is not a joke either), the last of our Press Clips is a further illustration of the Spanish Competition Commission´s proactiveness:
The CNC fines various associations in the Press Clippings Sector
Competition Video
The video footage of the 2011 ICN conference was just posted online. It confirms several “on-the-spot” impressions:
- Our dutch friends still use human navigation systems, 0’52
- White walls and black doors make a “boombastic“, “unique” architecture, 1’03
- Museums can be funny places, 1’57 (I will not disclose identities)
- Live performance piracy was pervasive, 3’11
- Some people were very hungry when they reached The Hague, 3’50
- John
TurturroFingleton attended the event, 4’05 - Speeches during black-tie dinners can actually be hilarious, 7’16
- Excellent officials also have terrific dancing skills (check the video on the left, in the back), 7’40-7’42
More seriously, the conference was a great event.
Chillin'Competition 