If it does, as I said before, I hope Apple gets sued into the stone for restraint of trade when it comes out that HTC has corrected the (bs) issue and had product held up for no reason other that legal bullying.
I hope so too! But like I said earlier, it's going to be an INCREDIBLY tough battle for HTC or the Govt this time (I think that's why Apple did it this way).
I'm not a lawyer, so I can't give legal advice or apply the law here, but I can tell you that you should
Read This
The parts you may find interesting in this wikipedia article are:
Noerr-Pennington doctrine
"private entities are immune from liability under the antitrust laws for attempts to influence the passage
or enforcement of laws, even if the laws they advocate for would have anticompetitive effects."
"Under the Noerr-Pennington doctrine,'[a] party who petitions the government for redress generally
is immune from antitrust liability.'"
"Petitioning is immune from liability even if there is an improper purpose or motive."
Reason:
"The doctrine is grounded in the
First Amendment protection of political speech, and "upon a recognition that the antitrust laws, 'tailored as they are for the business world, are not at all appropriate for application in the political arena.'"
Scope:
"Private parties may be immunized against liability stemming from antitrust injuries flowing from valid petitioning." Including "...liability arising from the antitrust injuries caused by government action which results from the petitioning."
Exception:
"There is a "sham" exception to the Noerr-Pennington doctrine which holds that using the petitioning process simply as an anticompetitive tool without legitimately seeking a positive outcome to the petitioning destroys immunity."
"The
sine qua non of a "sham" proceeding is not the purpose to harm a competitor, but rather the absence of any purpose to actually obtain government action. Thus, initiating an administrative proceeding that one actually hopes to win in order to harm one's competitors is within the ambit of the
Noerr-Pennington doctrine, while initiating a similar proceeding that one does not meaningfully intend to win solely to delay one's business competitors is within the sham exception."
Even then, the exception only removes the immunity. It's not a cause of action in itself.
I hope HTC and/or the State can overcome the hurdles necessary to nail Apple to the wall. But it seems that such a battle will be, not only an uphill one, but practically vertical, like fighting uphill while rock climbing.
