[fjtorres]

Note that when MacMillan first told AMAZON they had to swallow agency, like it or not, they only did it because Apple assured them the other publishers were onboard.
As the court evidence proved, none of them had the guts to act independently.
So it *wasn't* just MacMillan or just Penguin.
There was upfront coordination through Apple on the terms all of them were going to present to Amazon and MacMillan told Amazon exactly that, thinking they would quietly cave in.

What they didn't know was that Random House had squealed to Amazon months earlier, which is why Bezos pulled all the MacMillan books for a few days and then issued the public statement about how they were being forced to raise prices by the publishers. And why RH stayed away from iBooks until forced in.

Both RH and Amazon knew how to avoid crossing the legal line and played their cards beautifully; both raked in the benefits of the conspiracy and avoided all legal liability.