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US Supreme Court Rejects Fast Track MS Case
The submissions have begun to flood in with the news that
the US Supreme Court has refused to listen to the DOJ-Microsoft case, saying that it should go to Appeals Court first. This, of course, means that the case will be dragged out for quite a while longer, something which Microsoft was hoping for, as Gates has stated that he hopes the upcoming Presidential elections will put someone in office more friendly to the company. As well, the Appeals court has ruled in MS's favor before. CNNfn has more
coverage as well.
This is fucking ridiculous. By not hearing the case and allowing it drag out longer the penalties imposed on Microsoft become meaningless.
Uh, yes, we would have a budget surplus with out him.... It was pretty much inevitable given the state of the budget after 12 years of Reaganomics and the economic upswing of the 1990's.
-Stu
And what has Microsoft's basic research done lately? I've never heard of anything, while IBM and Bell are extremely well known.
-- This and all my posts are in the public domain. I am a lawyer. I am not your lawyer, and this is not legal advice.
They're not giving you $400. You're paying THEM $300 or so. ($21.95 * 36 months)
As for MS in general... they're a major reason I don't want a new x86-based box.
--
--
Me spell chucker work grate. Need grandma chicken.
This is about representation in the senate (i.e. how many they have vs how many other states have). They would still have that. Electoral college may be based on reps + senators, but that doesn't mean senators vote for the Electors.
Unfortunately, my gutenberg links to the U.S. constitution are down at the moment, but I don't recall the electoral votes being in the senate part, but in the president part. Very different.
Yep, let's keep the government out. No enforcement of patent, copyright, contract law, etc.
Oh, you only want the laws you DISAGREE with enforced?
It waives accountability for those who put their money in and HAVE NO RESPONSIBILITY IN THE RUNNING OF THE COMPANY. I.e. the average shareholder does not handle day-to-day decisions. However, as I remember from my one course in contract law, the board, president, and other officers are accountable, and can go to jail.
IANAL, but WTF?
Yes, electoral votes are based on (House + Senate), but allowing direct election of the President IN NO WAY changes the fact that each state gets 2 Senators. So, in no way can that clause of the Constitution apply to this situation.
>Now a question: Who is Dukakis? The guy that got
>more votes than Clinton. There is no way of
>telling who would have won the 1992 election
>without Perot in the race
Perot was a centrist and most likely he stole
votes from both parties.
As for this time, Nader takes votes from the
democrats and Buchanan from the republicans
so it will be a wash.
>In my state, California, Gore is way ahead, and
>it will almost certainly go Gore, so I am in fact
>free to vote for whomever I want.
This reminds an election when I lived in Québec
back in the early 70s. We were working hard to
get the Parti Québécois elected. The feeling
around was that it was a sure win. A lot of
people I talked to after the election told
me that they didn't want the PQ to win too
strongly so they voted for the liberal party.
Guess what! we lost.
Playing your game is mighty dangerous.
This leads one to a conclusion: a vote for Nader is a vote against Gore.
This is a gross and inaccurate oversimplification.
It is a myth that a vote for a third party candidate is a wasted vote, and past time for this harmful and destructive myth to be debunked.
First, your assumption (most people voting for Nader would vote for Al Gore) is flawed. While I do not have scientifically valid statistics to fall back on, of the seven people I know who are planning to vote for Ralph Nader, four of them would vote for Bush, not Al Gore, if they were less concerned with the corporate coopting of our government. In each case they are not only socially conservative, they absolutely loath Clinton and anyone associated with him. The other three are, like myself, more centrist or left of center, and probably would vote for Gore over Bush, were we truly a two party system.
This is similar to Ross Perot, who, contrary to public myth (and Republican propoganda), drew as many votes from would democratic voters as he did Republican voters. Bill Clinton's win against Bush Sr. has often been blamed, erroneously, on Ross Perot, despite the fact that this has been shown to be false, both by the voting demographic itself and the reelection of Clinton for a second term, in which Ross Perot played a marginal part.
Ross Perot is an example worth citing for another, much more important reason, however. In the first election he ran in, against both Bush Senior and Bill Clinton, he got 20% of the vote, despite no one believing he had a chance in hell of winning (an erroneous belief -- had he not dropped out of the race in the face of alleged intimidation from the Right he would certainly have done better, quite possibly even beating out both Bill Clinton and Bush Senior. Indeed, that is a rather powerful motive for either the Republicans or Democrats to employ the methods of threat and intimidation Mr. Perot has alleged).
That aside, something vastly more important happened. Perot's agenda, balancing the budget, was not even a point of discussion for either major party before he entered the race, and only paid lip-service by both once he did. (Bush's proposal for limiting spending, voted down, was designed specifically to not kick in until after he left office, while the democrats in turn would offer only the vaguest proposals for controlling spending).
Simply by winning 20% of the vote, both parties were forced to sit up and take notice. Those of us who are liberal may not like the direction Bill Clinton and the Democrats went, but their eagerness to balance the budget, and in so doing go against some of their most traditional powerbase, was influenced in no small part by Ross Perot's good showing. The same is true of the Republicans, who set aside their promises of tax cuts and actually sent Clinton legislation which raised taxes, in order to reduce and ultimately eliminate the budget deficit.
Now both sides claim the surplus is of their making, and in one respect they are both correct: it was republican and democratic lawmakers, and a democratic president, that drafted and enacted the legislation and budget which made it happen. However, it is Ross Perot's presence and performance in the elections which were the real catalyst. Those 20% who voted for Perot had a vastly more profound and direct impact on public policy than the other 80% of us who voted for one or the other major candidate, even though their candidate didn't get elected.
Now we have Ralph Nader, who addresses an issue which concerns us all deeply (the increasing power of corporations in our government and the corresponding weakening of the individual's rights and influence), and which neither major party will address because of the powerful interests they are both beholden to.
On the one hand, our individual votes can help bolster a third party candidate's showing into a respectable, perhaps even dramatic, showing, making his rhetoric and platform a part of mainstream political debate. On the other hand, our individual votes can bolster one or the other candidate most think have a chance of winning, thereby reinforcing many policies we disagree with vehemently, but both so-called mainstream parties unfortunately agree upon.
The question is, will we vote to impact policy, or merely choose our next figurehead?
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
What? I hate to break this to you, but the one endeavor that the government has regularly gotten right is research and development. The only corporations that do any basic research are monopolies, or ex-monopolies. IBM labs, Bell Labs, Microsoft Research. Fundiing for basic research comes out of the government (DOE, NSF, NIH, AFOSR, etc). The government's track record on applied research is pretty good too, with such things as the Apollo program, the Manhattan Project, etc.
Pharmecutical companies even get NIH grants to fund the development of their drugs.
Believe me, if we leave research to the large companies, we are doomed.
And 19 state attorney generals of states where Microsoft doesn't have offices and the like to bring money into the state will decline to drop charges. They already have a guilty verdict, they aren't going to wimp out now even if the president calls off the DOJ.
How would that be materially different than the current appeal that Microsoft is making? In a case like this, with reams of evidence and trials that last for years, there will always be something to appeal on. Whichever side loses the appeal will appeal to the Supreme Court, and they will end up hearing it (or letting the lower court's ruling stand) just as if they were to do so today.
The really good reason is ongoing consumer harm due to a monopoly in the industry. Fast track appeals do not have to be an emergency, they just have to satisfy the conditions that it is an antitrust trial and that the Supreme Court will most likely end up hearing the case anyway.
Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
You mean like saying things like "information wants to be free..."?
Maybe corporations are given due process, required to pay taxes, etc., because the law provides for it? Nah!
You know, who are the retards that can't face an opinion they don't like? This guy's post may be one many disagree with, but it is not flamebait. Yet, at least one has moderated that way. Is Slashdot just a popularity poll of opinions or is it supposed to strive for intelligent discussion?
Get a clue, moderators! Just because you don't like a person's opinion does not mean that opinion is flamebait. Thanks goodness for meta-moderation!
For the record, Microsoft's "competitors" (ie, those who have brought this case against them, namely Sun, Oracle, and Netscape/AOL) also make political contributions, and in larger sums than Microsoft has. Microsoft has really been somewhat of a sleeping giant, in the political realm. They've had no real need to "bribe" officials before, and so they haven't let lose with any massive financial compensation for policy makers. You can bet that if MS has learned one thing from this whole ordeal, it's that to get things to go your way in Washington, DC, you simply need to spend more money than the other guys. And money is something MS has in abundance.
...
Draw your own conclusions
Not to mention the fact that that one lower court judge already has a grudge against Microsoft, having ruled against ehm prior to this case, yet losing to that ruling out to the appellate court. Kinda makes you step back and wonder whether or not Judge Jackson was the best judge to handle this case, especially in light of his other "transgressions" towards the end of his leg of the case ...
Hey, you only live once. Take the cash while you can get it.
If you dont like it, get a voice and stand up for yourself or get out of dodge.
I don't see the point in even bothering to continue with teh case if the supreme court won't hear it.
.net crap, they will continue to set their lawyers on anyone that threatens them in any way (note the ntfs fiasco 3 or 4 articles ago), they will continue to purchase and squash what they cannot purchase, etc etc.
I despise MS as much as the next person for the record.
However, at the rate the appeals court goes through things, then you know both sides will appeal it to the supreme court, we will be years down the line. And the technology that the law suit was about will have been forgotten.
MS will have its
Let see what MS has their greedy hands in.(note this is only what I can think of off hand)
1) Cable Set top boxes (although att is apparently going with someone else cos MS took their sweet time)
2) PDA operating systems (palm os is still better)
3) Satellite communications (MSN and some satelitte company are testing bi direction satellite).
4) They basically control the corperate world with NT and office suit
5) Almost every machine is sold with some varient of windows (95 98 ME whatever_next) that is required by oppressive OEM agreements)
I am sure there is more, but off hand I cannot remember anymore.
Anyways, the original point was, by the time the supreme court hears the case, they will most likely dismiss it cos the whole point of the case would have been technology that will have been obsolete for years already, and knowing MS, their buisness practices will change only somewhat to avoid looking bad in the courts eyes.
I came, I conquered, I coredumped
can't the DOJ go back to Judge Jackson and ask him to remove the stay.
Probably, but there's no guarantee that he will.
MS would then go to the appeals court to attempt to get the stay removed, correct?
No, they would attempt to get the stay re-instated and they would probably succeed.
Would it be worth the effort?
Sure it would.....for the lawyers. More motions to file, more court appearances, more billable hours. Other than that, there would be no difference from the situation as it exists today. Meanwhile, M$ will go on doing what they do best.
BTW, I don't really think the SC was wrong in this decision. Also, I don't think the DoJ really thought they'd get the SC to hear the case. But it didn't cost them much to try and who know...they might have won. They didn't and now it's time to get on with the appeal.
Admit nothing, deny everything and make counter-accusations.
It's very simple. 75% (A rough guess) of the people in this country are too ignorant to even think that a third party candidate is an option. Therefore, no matter how you vote, the stupid people are voting for Bush/Gore. So if you're a liberal, and are thinking about voting for Nader...vote for Gore since at this point Nader has no chance. There is no way he'll be able to convince the drones that he exists before election time. So go with the best you can get.
-Splat
If I am not mistaken, Gore will be just as swell: the inventor of internet, close 'friend' of Bill... Didn't he said we're being too harsh on Redmond?
--AP
Microsoft is guilty as sin. They're only delaying the inevitable.
I mean, if buying your competitors, using monopolies in one area to build monopolies in another and destroying competitors by lawsuits and squeezing out netscape by massive industry control isn't illegal under the sherman anti-trust act, then I don't know what is. I have faith in the appeals court. Maybe in two years or so we'll see results.
-Ben
Sorry, WINS is deprecated in Windows 2000.
Read the rest of this comment... tags.
Didn't we learn that people with money don't loose cases... no matter how much evidence is stacked up against them?
Microsoft most likely has someone on the court that is in their pocket, and they convinced them to deny it and send it to the Appealete Court first, thus allowing them more time (and the possibility of more friends to be elected into Washington).
If this is resolved by 2010 I think we all should be happy... by then maybe the market shift will have occoured and all this fight over "desktop icons" and "os contracts" will be so outdated it will baffle us how it continued this long.
Personally, I think the current case is missing out on a lot of points that are taking place now (i.e. Microsoft breaking standards to further domanance) but, this won't be entered into the case...
"This amp is special, see all the knobs go up to 11, that means it is one louder than other amps"
Granted, your average joe is not going to be savvy enough to learn about some of these alternatives unless you put them right under his nose, but people can be so attached to "conventional wisdom". Four years ago, I got into an argument with my car dealer rep because he insisted that I was wasting my money when I told him that I had gotten a BeBox. He was an admitted neophite in computers, but he knew that I had absolutely no use for anything other than Windows (nevermind that I got it because I love to program with the BeAPI).
The average joe I can forgive, but IT staffs at many businesses should know better. I can't believe how many times I've heard an MIS talking about all of the NT problems he's having and then looking at me like I'm insane when I ask him if he's considered looking for an alternative OS.
-Jennifer
It's not useless. It's just not appropriate. The law leaves a lot of room for interpretation and has been used at least once in the past (AT&T comes to mind). The key to it is in determining whether or not the outcome of the case would have significant impact on the public at large. Let's face it. The outcome of this case is not going to be felt directly by the public. Even those in the computer industry are probably going to have to wait to feel the impact (if there is any). The only reason that the Supreme Court might want to think about hearing this case is that you know that either side is going to appeal the next decision, but the law that put this case in front of the Supreme Court doesn't allow that as a reason.
-Jennifer
The "fast track" option is provided for exactly this case. Since the MS case is almost certainly going to go to the Supreme Court anyway, and since significant harm to consumers may happen (and on the basis of past evidence, is likely to happen) while we wait on the whole appeals process, it makes sense to take antitrust cases directly to the highest court in the land. A quick resolution is good for consumers and the judicial system, but not so good for Microsoft, which is why they're fighting it tooth and nail.
I can't say that I agree that this is what the law is for. The reason that the judicial process tends to take so long is to give both sides a really good chance to expose the whole story. Remember, you're only allowed to appeal if you can show new evidence or demonstrate that the last trial was somehow unfair, so should MS lose in the Court of Appeals, they can't just say, "we want to take it to the Supreme Court" and have it happen. Likewise, the DOJ is going to need some sort of reason to appeal should they lose.
The judicial process should only be short circuited if there's a really good reason. The Expediting Act leaves it at the discretion of the Supreme Court. Judges tend to have a certain amount of reverence for the system so I'd guess that the Supreme Court would be reluctant to expedite any case. It would have to be some kind of emergency. The only large and direct impact I can see this case having is as a reaction to the resolution, not from the resolution of the case iteself.
-Jennifer
I'm diehard liberal. I realized something recently, though. Gore is dispicable. Granted, still not as bad as Bush, but Gore's terribly moderate, and his ethics are questionable AT BEST.
Frankly, the only thing i can think to do is to vote for Nader, because the republican and democratic parties are just two sides of the same coin these days. A vote for Gore or a vote for Bush are just votes for the same, corrupt, bad government.
-benc
Don't get me wrong, I'm thankful that this system does have its good points, being the BASE concepts that went into the constitution with enough purity such that it would itself defend people against future politicians and megacorps. Its the Amendments I haven't been to fond of. Especially since not every one of them was legally passed based on the rules of the constitution in the first place. :)
I agree with you though, the Bill of Rights protects people from an over zealous 'justice' system. But one thing this system seems to not care about is GENERAL KNOWLEDGE. Its one thing to assume something or to let your personal opinion or the personal opinion of a mass mob (like that fact didn't come into play with OJ's case after what recently happened with King and the LA mob crisis) come into concern in regards to Justice or Doing the Right thing. Our jury selection system is setup among the same principals. Picking 12 people who are suppose to represent your peers in society, your equals, and to have them judge you fairly. The fairness comes into play when both sides get to pick jury members based on such things as color, or background or other personal issues that might taint ot solidify one jury member over another.
So then I ask... if Microsoft was to be judged
by a jury of their Peers. Who would it be? Fellow interest groups? Competitors? Their Customers? Non-profit technology based organizations? A mixture of them all?
Surely Microsoft should not be judged by people who don't even understand that the essence of time in the world of technology is too precious to waste on such an important issue.
And as far as witch hunts go... It is one thing
to have an individuals life judged upon when they have effected or influenced the lives of so many others. Its another thing to judge someone who was practicing their mystic arts in the corner and assumed privacy of their own home. And its entirely something else when you are judging someone who has manytimes over capitalized off their customer's ignorance and then using that ignorance as defence in their own trial.
-Matthew
...and its entirely something else when its not a "someone" but a paper-based entity known as a Corporation that exists for the purpose of making money and taking advantage of situations and capitalizing on them. Taking advantage is the nature of business. If we both trade two items or one item for cash value... We both like to think we are getting the better end of the deal... Perhaps alot of times we are even afraid to tell someone the real reason WHY you would be willing to engage in the deal for free that you change the buyer or seller's mind as to why you yourself are either parting with or buying something.
:(
Whats at question here is if Microsoft has taken advantage in a NAUGHTY, ILLEGAL WAY. Sadly what is often considered Naughty is not always considered illegal (Not that I'm complaining about porno or anything ). And when the nature of law prevents justice from being served in a timly matter... its time to change that law. Especially if by the time justice gets there, it doesn't even matter anymore because they were ruling on a case about Operating Systems by the time we have all moved to Web Applications and the whole landscape changed... And once again, Microsoft would have reinvented themselves like they are doing now with microsoft.net. Hopefully not TOO SOON.
-Matthew (Why can't I reply to myself?)
WELL SAID!
I totally agree. All this money is QUITE depressing. Its no coincidence that Americans are so sucidial and murderous and have little regard for life or the finer things about it that we have all missed in our blinding desire for that American Dream.
-Matthew
How long we gonna let this crap continue as
/., our Brain Junk food... Our perfect Time Filler viewport to the rest of the world. Well, not everything is junkfood... I personal like to think my daily dose of /. is quite a good health food choice. :)
.com was considered a disgusting thing on the net... Try to sit in a IRC channel back then with "aol.com" attached to your nickname.
:)
:)
:)
a society?
The Judge in the DeCSS vs. MPAA case use to work for the MPAA. Microsoft is DEFINITELY one of those special interest groups some lower-noticed politicians always talk about. And When are people going to realize that Newspapers, Radio, TV, Internet... It shapes us as a culture. Why do you think AOL and TimeWarner wanna get together so badly? Why do you think Microsoft invested so much in WebTV, satilites, NBC, doubleclick, etc. They know what the game is.
We derive part of our list of likes and dislikes, whats cool or corney, our fads, whats considered in or out from the media and all forms of marketing ideas and opinions, thru simple word of mouth or even from sites such as
But seriously. Money is the root of all evil. Its only recently everything started coming out. Hell, in the 1950's, we use to think smoking cigarettes actually had HEALTH BENEFITS. I wonder why we thought something like that. Surely it had nothing to do with the TV commericals from the Tabacoo Industry saying so, could it?
Now we NERDS and GEEKS, we know plenty about the moves Microsoft has done ever since their original lie to IBM about having developed an Operating System for the PC all by them little'o selves. Awww.. Aren't they so talent. Sure, or so it seemed after Gates realized it's easy to talk programmers out of their own ideas and creation back in the day, especially when you have $50k to throw at them.
Course. Now that we see what the computer landscape has become, it costs sometimes a cool $5k just to buy a good domain name. How many
people wish they knew that back in the days of IRC and Gopher... Back when having a
I just think we all need to wake up. Or if we're awake, get the hell outta bed already and start the dawn of a new day. It use to be you had to be connected, rich, or powerful to communicate with the masses. This forumla was true until the Internet. Now it is reversed. Thanks to Paid to Surf Advertising being thrown left and right in our Cyberspace and the advent of $28/month computers and laptop leasing with free one year internet service... the Internet more then pays for itself, just simply by running a few ad banners on your computer.
The truth is, your personal information is GOLD on the net. They are willing to pay you just to learn a little bit more about you. Mailing lists have been bought and sold so much, how commonly we recieve more then one thing from one company who just happened to have purchased every misspelling of our name and every forwarding address we ever had. I made the mistake when I was around 12yrs old circling the entire block of numbers on one of those reader service cards just because I realized the magazine didn't show what each number would get me in the mail, so I figured I'd find out. Ugh... Lets just say I almost changed my name.
One day though, it will be very appearent that you will be able to sell your information to the highest bidder, especially if you fall into certain consumer catagories because you have so much money to spend here or there and what your interests are and what your most likely going to spend your money on verses what is a complete waste of time to advertise to you about. One day, target marketing will be so accurate, it will be scarey. And then we will realize, we have no more secrets to sell about ourselves for we have given it all away for mere pennies compared to what the true value of our privacy is.
Oh ya, and whats this have to do with the US Supreme Court rejecting MS Case? Dare I even suggest a theory? It could just be no one wants to touch this MS Case which is a major hot potato issue. Especially not during election.
Each president demands their ass is kissed just right, just a certain way. Everyone is waiting to see who's ass they gotta kiss.
Sincerely,
-Matthew
Let's follow the trail:
And the Microsoft Monopoly Trial may very well be defined as 'x'. That's why Gates wants to see the election. If he gets Bush the Corporate Muppet, the possibility of the penalties being carried out is probably as good as dead.
----
Brazil has decided you're cute.
Personally I'm still waffling on my choice for the next president. But you can be damn sure of two things: 1) that it won't be influenced by "who's the favorite to win", and 2) it won't be Bush.
Who are you going to vote for then? That dickhead who claims to have invented the Internet?
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
Would you rather wait until corporate consumers clamor for price controls on Microsoft software? Virtually all government regulations on business are written by corporate lawyers and sponsored by their client congressmen.
Ironically, monopolies cause other businesses to clamor for regulation (e.g. public utilities, phone and cable companies). True competition reduces the need for regulation. Stopping abuses of monopoly power is by far the easiest way for the government to minimize its involvement in the economy. Currently Microsoft has a monopoly in the PC operating system market, and Microsoft abuses that power.
(Reality reasserts itself sooner or later.)
Although I think Microsoft is a monopoly and should be forced to play fair so that other OSes (can't imagine which ;) can compete, I also agree with the due process opinion. Circumventing the appeals court does not allow due process. I think the executive side was foolish and arrogant to push for a straight to the Supreme Court route.
JOhn
Campaign for Liberty
If you believe the Bush (sr) Comp, this is what kept him out of office in 1992.
Pea-rot was on the farther-than-Bush right and so the votes that would have helped Bush win the presidency were steered away.
Of course if you fail to come to a mutual agreement on the terms of the contract, then the only option is not not enter into it.
Now, if you can enter into an agreement with the hardware manufacturer for support options after you have altered the purchased system is another matter.
Do not think that you have no choice. Just because you don't like the chioces, doesn't mean that there aren't any.
I say the point is moot if, as I do, you live in a state that is "guaranteed" to vote Democratic. There is no way that Bush will ever take Massachusetts. We MA Democrats don't have to worry that a vote for Nader is a strategic mistake. But it sends the message nonetheless.
Well, if you're so proud of Bush, why are you hiding your identity behind "Anonymous Coward"? Sounds to be like you'd want people to know you're voting for him. But you're just a coward, like Bush himself.
--
And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
Don't underestimate the power of the President. He can veto almost any law he wants, provided 2/3 of Congress doesn't disagree with him. And he can try to convince members of Congress to create certain laws. That's what Hillary Clinton tried to do with health care reform.
--
And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
Transgressions? After the case was heard, Jackson publicly said that he would be opposed to breaking up MS. It is only after MS repeatedly flouted his rulings, continued to:
1) Deny events that were factually in the record.
2) Claim "no wrongdoing" and refused to take responsibility for their actions.
3) Claimed that any punishment that Jackson ruled out would be too much for any crime that they had committed.
4) Claimed that they were going to appeal whatever wristslap jackson imposed on them
that jackson changed his mind about the punishment they deserved. IMHO, he was too reserved. I would have dressed BillG and Ballmer in drag and thrown them into a cell full of rapists doing life.
Hari.
I always was under the distinct impression that in the US there was this thing called 'due process'. You go to court and a judge doesn't rule in your favor.. so you appeal. Again and again until you get to the Supreme Court. That's the way it was designed, remember?
I am not too naive to understand that the US wants to push this case along as fast as possible so that there isn't too much turmoil within the economy, but isn't that what a capatilist society is supposed to be about? The survival of the fittest? The best companies with the best products that the consumer likes best WINS?!
The government sticks it's nose too much into the economy as it is. I say, "Good for Microsoft."
(Moderators who can't think for themselves: Do your worst! I'm at the 50 Cap and I need a challenge!)
Rami
--
rJames.org - illustration
Very interesting.
I guess you're saying that Nader is to Democrats what Phillips is to Republicans. Very much the same point to make, with very much the same rationale.
I completely agree with everyone saying, "Vote for who you want for president, not for who you think will win." When did the presidency turn into the office of the least objectionable slimeball? Vote for who you really want!
Constitutionally Correct
Vote for who you want to, and encourage others to do the same. Convince them of the stupidity of what you call "strategic voting". The presidency is not about being the "least objectionable", it's about being the guy that the most people think can do the best job.
As soon as you start voting for politics rather than principle you've already started to lose.
For what it's worth, I've been told the same things about supporting Phillips this November. "He'll never win! You're throwing your vote away! You might as well vote for Gore!" But I can't vote for Bush because I don't think he'd represent my views as well.
Shake up gov't. Vote third party. In a way, it's probably the best thing you can do for the US, regardless of which party you actually vote for.
Constitutionally Correct
Is your "approximate showing" based on
That's what it comes down to. If everyone supported who they really thought the best candidate was, US politics would be much more interesting. As it is we have a nation full of sheep that follow the flock.
And the Repubmocrats think mutton tastes good.
Constitutionally Correct
Okay I was a little disappointed to hear that the Appeals Court was going to get this first. But people here are right, M$ should get their chance like everyone else even if they can afford the best lawyers money can buy. Unfortunately I don't think the issue is any longer about whether M$ are good or evil.
They are going to do their best to tie us all up with C# and VB and whatever-dot-net If they are broken up next year or 3 years from now or never it's not going to make much difference. What will make a difference is that companies like IBM, Compaq, Dell other big hardware folks are now significantly less scared of them and are free to sell and support the alternatives.
Personally I hope that Microsoft ends up being the Corel of the new Millenium. Loads of monolithic software that nobody uses and those of us who remember the old days chuckle about over our beers.
I just got NT booting under VMware under RedHat6.2 so I can use Linux full time at work to develop Win32 Apps. A year ago I had no choice but NT4.
If I can't completely forget about Microsoft within two years I'm going to quit the tech business and become a lumberjack.
But in this case, a tie is as good as a win for Microsoft.
Marco...that was Portugese.
The president is the executive branch of the government. The executive branch is responsible for enforcing the laws. This means that the president is ultimately in charge of the AG's office. The president could order the AG to drop the case.
If Nader were elected into office it really wouldn't change much. The president is constitutionally responsible for enforcing the laws, not creating them.
What's the track record on monopoly remedies being reversed on appeal?
I dunno about the entire historical record, but as far as MS is concerned, this isn't the first time that Judge Jackson has ruled against them. The last time Judge Jackson ruled against them, and it was sent to the appellate courts, the appeals court ruled in favor of MS.
Furrfu. And I'm not even a Merkin.
Stefan.
It takes a lot of brains to enjoy satire, humor and wit-
The truth shall make you fret. (Ankh-Morpork tImes motto)
I use IE because Netscape 4 crashed my computer hourly. IE doesn't. Likewise the majority of my friends who use IE do so because they simply got tired of Netscape's stability problems. I hate Microsoft and it kills me to say this, but IE is currently the better product until Mozilla gets really usable.
So far I've gotten all my Karma from telling people they are wrong... :)
WHY should an immortal paper entity be given due process? A corp is a thing, with less life than a slug (and even less benefits to the planet).
I wish you corp leeches would get a clue. This is MY world, too, and every time you equate a human being with a faux entity like a corporation, you steal a bit of our collective humanity, diminishing me and everyone else right along with your sorry selves.
You get a clue. It's easy to demonize corporations if you think of huge entities like Microsoft and Union Carbide, but the protections afforded to corporations are quite important if you don't want a totalitarian state.
Imagine there is no due process for corporations. You and some friends start a restaurant. Two months later, the government claims the restaurant has violated the health code and fines it $50,000. They don't tell you what the violation was, and there is no appeal. But who cares! Your restaurant is a corporation, and deserves no due process.
Your anti-corporate hysteria is simply anathema to business of any sort whatsoever.
This is about being sick in ones heart at the whoring of our nations political structure for the benefit of corporations and their bottom lines.
Being in favor of allowing due process to corporations, which is what this thread was originally about, is hardly the same as being in favor of allowing them to bribe politicians into enacting various subsidies, laws, and tariffs in their favor.
But those shareholders never have to face the consequences of the acts of the company, beyond the potential loss of equity. I really wonder: why do we have limited liability at all? Why is it that an individual is held accountable for their actions, but if a bunch of individuals put their money together, we have laws that waive that accountability? It doesn't makes sense to me. Corporations look like just another socialist/commie invention, in opposition to the principles of capitalism and basic ethics.
If a business doesn't have limited liability, then it really is a person or a group people, and perhaps it should have some rights. But if it's just a shield that lets people do whatever they want to without having to face consequences, then I don't think it deserves any respect or consideration at all.
There are two issues here, financial liability and liability for criminal acts.
Removing the limits to financial liability would simply place corporate ownership even more out of reach of the average person. No one would dare to buy stock unless they had the resources to thoroughly research the company, and to buy enough stock that they could influence the decision making. After all, no one wants to suddenly become massively in debt because of bad decisions made by a company in which they didn't own enough stock to be in control. Besides, the people lending money to corporations or fully aware of the possibility of bankruptcy, just as credit card companies are fully aware that people can go bankrupt. They take that into account when they lend money.
Similarly, criminal liability of shareholders is bad because shareholders cannot possibly monitor every aspect of the corporation. If the manager of a convenience store bribes a cop, he goes to jail, not the owner of the store (unless the owner told him to do it). Similarly, executives and managers in corporations must implicitly assume that the shareholders do not want them to break the law. If they do, it should be at their own risk. Of course, if a large shareholder told them to do something illegal, then it would be his fault. Theoretically, that's how it works now, and it seems fair to me.
That is all irrelevant to my point. I was never arguing about what punishments corporations should receive. I was merely arguing that it is essential that they receive due process, because otherwise the government can confiscate property at whim. Obviously, if there were no due process, the government could seize your restaurant even if there were no health violations. They could simply claim that there were violations, and you would have no recourse.
Either you don't know what the phrase "due process" means, you didn't read my post, or you are intentionally changing the subject. In any case, you seem to be making gross extrapolations from my statement that corporations should receive due process. I don't see how you can expect to be correctly deducing my positions on how corporations should be punished from my position on whether or not they get due process.
The finest poems remain unwritten, the greatest speeches unspoken
AS WELL THEY SHOULD!!
So vote for him for crying out loud! I'm more than tired of people saying, "Wow, Nader would be GREAT in office. He'll never win though, so I'm not going to vote for him."
Personally I'm still waffling on my choice for the next president. But you can be damn sure of two things: 1) that it won't be influenced by "who's the favorite to win", and 2) it won't be Bush.
El riesgo vive siempre!
And they've shifted into a higher gear since Judge Jackson's ruling too. Its like they're determined to either cement their empire or set things up so that America's IT industry completely collapses if they get shut down. Of course, we know that's not going to happen, but they can still do lots of damage...
-RickHunter
Heck, vote pretty much anyone who isn't a democrat or a republican. And remember that a smaller government can also be a good thing, because there's less for big companies to bribe, and less corruption in general.
-RickHunter
The pondscum^H^Hlawyers know a cashcow when they see it. This whole shebang will cause vast amounts of money to flow - all of it into lawyers pockets.
Me? Bitter? Naaaahh...
---
"What, I need a *reason* for everything?" -- Calvin
Free PC version of ChipWits at http://www.breueronline.de/klaus/chipwits/
We'd be just as screwed with them as we were with the Corporations.
The Real Solution[tm], is to diffuse the power -- that is, keep the federal goverments restricted by the Ninth and Tenth amendmends.
It's Linux, damnit! Pay no attention to renaming attempts by self-aggrandizing blowhards.
Consider:
1988: Bush v. Dukakis. Bush gets (approx.) 55%, Dukakis 45%. Bush wins.
1992: Bush v. Clinton v. Perot. Bush 37%, Clinton 43%, Perot 20%.
Now a question: Who is Dukakis? The guy that got more votes than Clinton. There is no way of telling who would have won the 1992 election without Perot in the race, but there is a problem that the guy in office got there with a minority vote. (actually a plurality.)
In Russia's fledgling democracy, and in most city's mayoral races, if no candidate gets more than 50% of the vote, the top 2 must run off against each other. Apply these rules in 1992: Bush and Clinton run off against each other. It turns out that (hypothetically) Perot took more votes from Bush than from Clinton (I am not advocating Bush, it just looks likely from the numbers.) Same candidates, same voters, different result? Maybe voters, not being afraid that the right-wing vote will be split, allowing a left-wing candidate to win, turn out and give Perot a larger vote than Bush or Clinton.
This example is entirely speculative, but it points out the problem with our election system, and why there are only 2 major political parties. Require a candidate to have greater than 50% of the vote, and people could vote their choice without worrying about the worse of 2 evils getting into office. Unfortunately, this requires an ammendment to the Constitution.
MotoMannequin
"With all appliances, and means to boot!" - William Shakespeare
MotoMannequin
"With all appliances, and means to boot!" - William Shakespeare
And since /. is full of intelligent and logical people full of reasoning skills, we all know how foolish it would be to support such an attack on a company like M$, no matter how much we despise them. After all, history shows these attacks hurt us more than them, and in the end do nothing to "stop" company X from doing what it has been doing.
I seek not only to follow in the footsteps of the men of old, I seek the things they sought.
I agree. That's why I walk around carrying a Linux-only libretto computer. Everyone says "Does linux have a graphical user interface?" or "how do you get any work done?"
:-)
If I could only find the time to make "Catz" work under Wine my wife would switch too and make the house MS-Free.
- Paul
1) Why would MS/Apps port Office to Linux? Office is a desktop suite, Linux is a server/enthusiast OS.
2) Why would MS's upper management be distracted? In a well managed company (and you don't get where MS is without being well managed) the only people being "distracted" by the case should be MS's legal system and emplyees who have to testify.
3) (IANAL) If the case is thrown out, the government can't appeal. Throwing out the case is the same as saying "not guilty."
And dumbed down AOL? The internet will become an easier to use AOL that does more. This is what the desktop consumers want. Microsoft may be breaking the law, but they're still making products that people want.
This post should be moderated down to a trolling, but I thought I'd reply rather than use a moderator point.
-Erik
Think about the sort of people that Bush is likely to nominate as Supreme Court justices. Now think about the sort of people that Gore is likely to nominate.
Still see no difference?
Oh come one! Try to be fair. Golf would be very important to you too if you were a Supreme Court judge!
IIRC, all involved parties have *clearly* stated their intention to bring this to the SC anyway, if all of the appeals don't go their way. This seems like a compelling reason (to me anyways) for the SC to say "Screw it, let's get this over with.". Add this to the fact that MS is very obviously wanting this to take as long as possible, and it sort of ticks me off. When you look at a legal battle, you can bet the side who wants it to take the longest, is probably the one more in the wrong.
mas cerveza, por favor politically incorrect stu
The Prez couldn't force the court to stop trying it, he can force the Justice Dept. to stop prosecuting it. The Justice Dept. lawyers represent the Federal Gov't when it comes to prosecuting cases or bringing indictments or whatever. IANAL, so I'm not sure they could withdraw now, and there's no reason they should, but the Prez has a say in the actions of the Justice Dept., not the courts. That's why the INDEPENDENT asshole^H^H^H^H prosecutor both operated and was appointed from outside the Justice Dept.
[command INSERTWITTYQUIP failed: insufficient wit]
Justice Jackson, what is best in life?!
To sue your enemies,
to see them bankrupted before you,
and to hear the lamentations of the stockholders.
Midwatch Industries
Microsoft is aware that they can bribe Washington politicians in order to get a favourable ruling in the anti trust case. Consider that seperation of powers between the three pillars of government (judicial, executive, legislature) is required to have a working democracy. 1-Nixon didn't go to prison because "No president has ever been sentenced to prison" = Political expediency outweighing judicial equality. 2-O.J. is innocent because he can afford to be. 3-Rodney King deserved his asault because he was black and his attackers were white. 4-Microsoft can rely on the American political system to turn a blind eye to any legal transgressions they make now our in the future. Welcome to the corporate dictatorship.
No we don't need them but they work damn well. While the entire ghetto OS line known as Win9x needs to die a quick death, the NT line is perfectly good for what it does. And Office is the best suite I've ever used - and I've used Lotus and Corel's offerings, so I've at least got the big three down. Quite simply, if it works, don't fuck with it. Vendors have been following that simple policy - and that's why you still buy machines with Windows installed.
>>>"It forces Microsoft to 'behave' more than they would otherwise do..." How? This delay just gives M$ more time for 'business as usual'. They aren't "in check"; they aren't "behaving"; they are trying to maintain the status quo as long as possible. Don't believe me? Take a look at this . What exactly is "slowing them down in their voracious ways"??>>>.... IANAL but didn't Judge Jackson require some interim restrictions on MS, which he then stayed pending appeal? Since the SC refused to hear case and now it'll be significantly longer, can't the DOJ go back to Judge Jackson and ask him to remove the stay. MS would then go to the appeals court to attempt to get the stay removed, correct? Would it be worth the effort?
Why is this? some ask: well they're embrace and extinguish philosophy has reached the end of its ropes, and few industry leaders are about to trust MS as a partner. Justifiably so. They are naturally disadvantaged in their current form, due to their culture and history.
And if they're split? : Winco will have about as much new value as a non-GPL'd Linux (not much) and a huge legacy value which gradually tapers off to nought without the Back Office and MS Office and Explorer crutches. But the AppCo people can take their .NET and make a fairly good play on Linux or BSD or WinCo or whatever, by forming the Net Monopoly around the same crutches. That Linux may be used as a platform for .NET, is irrelevant... in this capacity it becomes a carrier for .NET, as a tree is a carrier for an ivy (the tree usually gets choked off, for non-biology majors). Open Source does not benefit by MS deploying COM cross-platform.
Further it would be VERY difficult (impossible?) to make a winnable anti trust suit purely on the basis of an AppCo. So I say let MS win this round, because their current monopolist culture will be the very reason they fail.
* WinCo and AppCo are terms I borrowed from The Register
This is an unbased accusation. Bush has never used his influence to achieve something outside of his jurisdiction while in Texas, despite taking heat for it on several occasions. I think that fud is what most of Nader's campaign is based on. Nader is the master of irrational fear. Not all corporations are bad. Corporate entities are a part of the landscape. Unless Nader has a better idea, killing corporations doesn't seem like a good idea to me.
A society that will trade a little liberty for a little order will lose both and deserve neither. - Thomas Jefferson
Oh, geez. Where to start.
Nixon didn't go to jail because Ford felt that the country didn't need that spectacle. That was Ford's decision.
OJ is quite possibly innocent. The fact that you assume him guilty shows you just as racist as those who say that Rodney King deserved his beating. Fact is that any half-competent lawyer could have gotten OJ off. There just wasn't enough evidence to convict.
Rodney King was drugged and led the police on a high-speed chase that resulted in an arrest situation that was charged, and then he tried to run away. The behaviour by the police was excessive, but he wasn't selling girl scout cookies, either. As a matter of fact, the police officers ended up convicted largely because they were white, in an odd case of reverse prejudice.
Microsoft may rely on the American political system to turn a blind eye, but that hasn't happened yet.
A society that will trade a little liberty for a little order will lose both and deserve neither. - Thomas Jefferson
Actually, my friend, the only reason he won't win is due to arrogance and ignorance in the 18 and older population.
There are a number of states also involved, and I expect that with all of the evidence that is out there, the states (most of them, anyway) will continue the prosecution even if Bush does get into office and wants to drop the case. What I would also like to see is the hiring by the states of Joel Klein to oversee the appeals process.
I rather expected this to happen, actually. The Supreme Court tends to avoid cases of extreme complexity, preferring to rule instead on those where there are only a few (significant) issues left to resolve. While I do expect that portions of the results of this case will make it to the final round of appeals, I'm not altogether sure that it will actually take the case, and may just leave it where it is, unless some *really* sticky issues come up, and for now, I don't see how they could.
I, like many of you, am of mixed feelings about this. I don't like to see government intervention into business, but at the same time, I think that there is a viable reason in some cases. As a historical example, before AT&T was broken up, a former co-worker used to call family back home in India for as much as $8 per minute. Within a couple of years, that price had dropped to $3 per minute, and is even lower now.
You can never go home again... but I guess you can shop there.
I believe that M$ has been behaving itself (relatively) since the case started. I don't believe that all of the PC makers would be selling machines with Linux on them if the antitrust case had never started. Now that M$ has been given the nod that it can do anything it wants I am expecting companies such as Dell and Compaq to start announcing that they are discontinuing their Linux support due to lack of interest. Hopefully the genie is out of the bottle but I think today it a dark day for computer users everywhere. May you live in interesting times.
All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence and then success is sure - Fortune Cookie from an long lunch
If corporations are entities with rights under the law, perhaps we should start charging corporations which deliberately cause other corporations to die with murder.
Instead of treating corporations less like real people, perhaps we should be treating them _more_ like real people.
In society, we have various rules developed over thousands of years to keep our activities within certain parameters which make society run smoothly.
By comparison, business is still in the primordial slime. There is little regard for the welfare of the overall market, and each individual company becomes a mindless beast concerned only with its own welfare and survival.
We cannot blame Microsoft for using the tactics which work in this Lord of the Flies environment, any more than we can blame the shark for evolving its razor-sharp teeth, but that does not mean that we should allow the shark to prey on swimmers unchecked.
It's long been said that companies viewed from a distance can almost be seen as a life form in their own right. It's time to start holding that life form to the same rules the rest of us abide by. Or, if they're just dumb beasts, we should treat them like beasts, and shoot the rabid dog when it becomes dangerous.
But what should the penalty for corporate murder be?
Please show me where there is a multi-OS computer, Windows and Linux or Windows and BeOS.
Dell sells a few computers with Linux. But none with multiple OSes.
Gore's actual quote was that in the congress he led the effort to create the commercial internet out of the academic/military effort - which is exactly what he did.
REALLY! Tell me from which major OEM I can buy a computer with Windows and Linux, or Windows and BeOS? Or a non-server computer with either BeOS or Linux on it?
Oh, you didn't mean THAT free. Sorry.
I think this will be the end of BeOS. I doubt they could hold out much longer.
Either way, it's going to take years to resolve. And if the order to break up is upheld, it'll take even more time to implement.
The "fast track" in law isn't that much faster than the "regular track". Translation for computer people: it's not like a cache hit versus going to disk....
Is gates just openly suggesting that the whole system of checks and balances we try to create to keep the legislative, executive, and judicial powers in line are crap? What power would hte president have over this case?
Personally I dislike MSN - so don't get me wrong here. But there is a much more benign reason they could be offering $400 back if you sign up for MSN. Namely they give you $400 now on the condition that you pay them $21 a month for the next three years... $756.
hell I'd happily lend money like that for a near 100% return on investment in only 3 years.
Ad in classifieds: Pandora's Box (no box) $5
Bill Gates has *never* said he hopes the election will put someone more friendly in the White House. What he has said is that the trial is a legal issue that will be resolved in court and that people should vote their conscience.
The best money can buy.
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
A corp is a thing, with less life than a slug (and even less benefits to the planet).
Wrong. You've been listening to fools like Nader too much.
Corporations are owned by human beings, with rights under the law. They're called the shareholders.
--
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
OTOH, last time I checked, Micro$haft has the biggest monopoly since Rockafeller! Gimme a break, how can this not be of major national signifigance?
At least one judge was using Linux. ;) While I can't see Micro$haft being able to explain why they aren't getting a sale (HINT: Something going for $129 or $219 doesn't sell, duh :), I would like them to explain why they have some extra "features" in WinME that would start to monopolize the digital camera software market, and of course it only will work in Winblowz... any ideas where this could lead? I think Micro$haft stalling like this is only going to allow Billy Boy to plot a new way to reaquire power, seeing if he can ajar out some of his have-tos with the company's behavior, which is unlikely. I wouldn't be suprised though if two companies were told they can't collabarate, but if it's not said, I wouldn't be suprised if they did.
Karma whorin' since 1999
I guess Presidents are easier to buy than Supreme Court judges. ... or are they?
Respectfully, David Tallan
The Democratic party has lost touch with the far-left -- environmentalists, unions, etc. -- and is now little more than a variant on the Republican theme. Clinton's "New Democrats" are not all that different from Bush's "compassionate conservatives". As time goes on, the two parties converge.
Enter Nader. He can't "fix" the Democratic Party because it's system is broken, the nomination controlled by internal powers-that-be. So Nader runs as a Grenn, getting votes from disenchanted liberals, and causing Gore to lose. That, in turn, causes a crisis in the Democratic Party, and *maybe* leading to a recommitment to liberal philosophies.
Think of it as a peaceful revolution.
It might work; then again, it might not. Right now, the entire political system is broken down, in a vicious cycle of apathy and poor candidates. Solving social problems is a delicate balance between violent revolution and stagnation. Nader is trying to walk that line.
All about me
The reason the Justice Department and Judge Thomas Jackson wanted the case to go directly to the Supreme court, is because they realized that Judge Jackson screwed up by being to "hard" on Microsoft. Judges are not suppose to care who wins. But Judge Jackson, by not allowing Microsoft enough time (Microsoft asked for 6 months, Judge Jackson gave them 2 days) to prepare there case, opened a narrow gate, in which the Federal Appeals Court might overturn the decision.
I just want the cute little TUX screenmate from SGI to work on linux :)
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
If #3 happens, then all the hackers slackers and pistol packers should forcibly grab a handgun each and then take over some unused mass of land, cashing in their stock options and building a new country in the middle of nowhere and setting up the coolest infrastructure in no time flat.
Then they could run TCPIP all they want, run Open Source, and make corporations illegal within the country limits.
--- Jump!! Fire!! Bullet time!! - Lego version of the Matrix
The supremes have tossed this back into the hands of Bill's lapdogs on the 9th circuit court. We know those guys well by now - If they aren't on Bill's payroll, it's darn hard to tell. Why did we even bother to hope for anything different?
So the legal system has dropped the ball. Bill's favorite kangaroo court will come up with a bunch of bogus opinions that have little to do with the facts or logic of the case and don't have to make sense, they just have to fill paper. Then back to the Supremes who will rubber stamp it all without even needing to explain why. We can expect Bill to get off with a wrist pat, and straight back to the old cynical lawbreaking, this time with a mandate from the highest court. Huh. The guy who told enough lies in federal court to earn any less-well-heeled person a good long time in the slammer.
So nothing has changed. As it was before, it's up to *us* to bring Bill down. His pals in the high courts obviously aren't going to. Let's not forget that we are winning the fight against Bill and Co. We're going to keep winning it. Damm, it feels good. Hey, there's one bright spot, this way we know for sure we did it, without help from the gov. Let's get personal now. Let's code Bill and his gang of thugs right into oblivion.
--
When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
When I posted a comment that started this thread, I knew it was inflammatory, and I hoped that it would spark more interesting and insightful commentary than this.
Let me be clearer, since you're not getting it: I actually WORK in corporate America. I, like most of you, am a drone working in a high-rise, looking out over the scuttling ants so far below my window that their humanity is all but lost (which, fallaciously, assumes they have any humanity to begin with.) I SEE the dehumanizing elements at work, and the keepers of the flame that ensure the machine grinds forward. (And this is in a start-up, no less!)
You kid yourselves if you think the Faustian bargain we've all made will ever be enough to satisfy our souls. What I ask of you is that you THINK for yourselves--which means stop this incessant comparison of things, such as corporations and governments, to us living, breathing creatures of this planet. We are unique, we have thoughts and feelings that CANNOT be contained within these walls, nor answered by the pandering to our greed presented by these organizations.
DEFEND yourselves, not the corps or the governments. YOU ARE SEPARATE FROM THEM.
Which brings me to my ultimate point: my rights are separate from, and superior to, the organization I work for. I will not equate the two, and if any of you have any thoughts left to you outside of the corporate mind engram you've embraced, you will not either.
Finally, in response to this person's post, and the comment about being rich being equal to being successful, please remember the two are NOT necessarily equivalent. If you really believe that, you elevate mediocrity to godhood, and elimate any meaningful definition of what success can be.
"The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws."--Tacitus, The Histories
"Excellent."
--
Chief Frog Inspector
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Even if MS is guilty of many things, antitrust violation is not one of them. Remember that our law is based on precedent. If MS is convicted of antirtust then the DoJ has everything but written permission to destroy any buissness on the pretext of 'antitrust violation.' That includes some of the powerful companies that are attacking MS. Go ahead convict MS, but don't convict them of antitrust.
~~Apathy alert: Approaching the Point of No Concearn
Founder's Camp
Founder's Camp
News for non-Nerds. Stuff that matters.
Look at the timing. Here is the announcement just when M$ is releasing the precious Datacenter version of W2k. It doesn't seem to have affected their stock price which looks to break the 52 week low heading into negative territory. If they don't start taking over Sun's domain, then their argument that W2k is cheaper and easier to use will fall on deaf ears throughout the entire industry. Oracle and Sun are at all time highs for the year, compared to the Wintel Dell/Compaq industry. Michael Dell needs to make up his mind in public, is he selling more Linux servers or W2k servers. His remarks are vague and inconsistent.
Sure, I'd like to see MS squashed, but for me, I'm more concerned about some of the other monopolies out there, like Hollywood and the Recording Industry. The worst thing that Microsoft has done recently is threaten to sue Kernel developers over NTFS. Those other folks are trying to make it impossible to own data and to create competing products by outlawing reverse engineering.
The problem is not company uses monopoly to defeat rival company. The real problem is this: company uses monopoly to make rival ideas illegal.
Little did we think that corporate America would be responsible for creating an Orwellian society... and for years, we never suspected a thing.
Gates for 2000! Okay, so he would probably lose power in doing this. (I'm serious)
Sorry, couldn't help but point this out.
SUWAIN: Slashdot User Without An Interesting Name
SUWAIN: Slashdot User Without An Interesting Name
Personally, I dont understand why people 'need' MS products. I've been using computer to get work done for 10 years now and have NEVER thought, "Shit, I need Windows." I don't use and I still can exchange documents with people of ANY OS. OEM's need to grow up and ditch MS like a bad case of fleas. Once HP, Dell, Compaq, Emachines, and Gateway all move from MS, who are they going to sell thier OS to. People use "what came with their computer" (which btw is why they use IE..) and don't seem to concerned with exact what that OS is (even if they do know what an OS is...)
Burn Hollywood Burn
You're the one who's claiming we're denying them due process (presumably by going directly to the SC)...but since that *IS* the law..there's no due process eliminated.
No one is going around saying they should be broken up without a trial (lack of due process). (What's really funny is that until fairly recently..all Anti-Trust cases went DIRECTLY to the SC on appeal.)
Hmmm, DELL, well there's one (for the record we buy DELL boxes with Linux preinstalled at my place), but one OEM hardly represents a free marketplace. Still can't walk into Office Depot or Sears and buy anything but a Windows box. And since Compuserve/AOL are actual online service providers, it's hardly a comparison. What the MSN rebate is a sign of is a monopoly software vendor extending it's reach into markets where it doesn't belong (not that AOL isn't doing the same thing, but don't change the subject). You can post all of the lame ass rebuttals you like, the transcripts from the trial show that MS was cognizant it was breaking the law and using it's desktop monopoly to harm competiton. The fact that anyone tries to defend this shows what a sad society we live in.
To fail is human, to blue screen MS!
You know, I would agree if it were a cash rich ISP doing the same thing (a.k.a. AOL). But when it is the maker of the dominant desktop OS, it's not just a matter of good investing, it's a process of owning your eyeballs for the entire computing experience. MS only does things that help maintain the monopoly, if there is perceived consumer benefit then that is just a perk. MS has been proven to be ruthless and unethical numerous times, there is little in the way of a defensible position for a Microsoftie (not implying you lean one way or the other, so please take no offense).
To fail is human, to blue screen MS!
Are you for real? Until you can walk into a store and buy a PC with a choice of operating systmes, the OEMs are far from FREED. The situation has improved, but it will take several years to get it back in balance. Let's see, more proof of monopoly...how about the fact that MS has so much cash they can offer you $400 up front via a number of retailers if you agree to use their online service? Is this because they want to topple the evil AOL empire (evil, yes, but a different topic altogether) or because they want to own every aspect of your computing experience? Either way, the consumer ends up with one less choice in the end. Please show the competiton that MS is being exposed to, and give relevant examples. While the rapid acceptance of Linux is surely viewed by a threat to the Redmond Menace, it hasn't put a dent of MS revenue stream YET (please note the yet). This isn't about beating a self righteous drum, it's about taking an illegal monopoly to task.
To fail is human, to blue screen MS!
Not going to be felt by the public? Then, by all means, show me a case that will have greater impact on the public? We are all racing along in an economy that is now entirely driven on technology, and the face of that technology for the vast majority of the world is MS Windows. After the mounds of evidence presented in the trial there can be no doubt MS broke the law, and that the most important recourse is to force MS to compete on a levelled playing field. This case cannot come to a satifactory end until a consumer can walk into a store and by a PC with a non-MS operating system, and until you can purchase anything at a major electronics store without being offered a rebate if you sign up for another MS service. Consumers are bombarded by the MS mesaage everyday, you don't think a break up would impact this? Not felt by I.T. pros? We are already looking for more non-MS solutions and are excited to see our OEMs offering support for Linux, not only do we feel it, we love it. I can only hope that politics don't allow MS to escape the punishment they have so obviously earned.
To fail is human, to blue screen MS!
Somewhere I hear the Red Queen screaming 'Off with their heads!', or possibly 'Kill 'em all, let God sort them out!'. Perhaps you just feel the need to vent your spleen (that's allowed on my world as well) but keep in mind that all governments are just immortal paper entities, as well. You may not like certain aspects of human civilization, but our shared hallucination called society prevents us from using brute force instead. Due process INDEED, so to speak. This is not a sig and I don't care who you're voting for.
How do you research your states voting rules?
:)?
It seems you've thought a bit about this... do you have more thoughts/info/recommended readings? An email address (in case you want to become a public resource
Libertarianism is rich wolves and poor sheep playing gambler's ruin for dinner.
"Corporations are owned by human beings, with rights under the law. They're called the shareholders."
.....that control the media and the way you get your information and are always out to protect their own interests instead of the average joe that can't afford to become shareholders and buy out candidates to push their agendas...
Really fellow computer users need to remember this day. This needs to be the war cry that we all pick up a copy of linux and do whatever we can to make it better . We need to make it more accessible, more usable, more pervasive. And then when we are done we need to write an application for it.
If you don't want to program, how about becoming a beta tester and find bugs? If not that, how about working on documentation? How about making yourself available on IRC to answer questions?
And we all need to help others install and get started with it.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
"Of the nine high court members, only Justice Stephen Breyer dissented from the full court's action. He said the case ''significantly affects an important sector of the economy.''"
One the one hand, it would have been nice to resolve this case soon. On the other hand, since nothing truly substantial will probably result from this eventually, taking longer for it to be resolved is probably a good thing. It forces Microsoft to 'behave' more than they would otherwise do, and the longer they remain in check the longer competitors can roll out good products.
To my mind, the best thing that came of this court case against Microsoft was slowing them down in their voracious ways.
________________
________________
Private Essayist
Good question. Presidents appoint Supreme Court justices, so if you buy the prez, you dictate about twenty years worth of justice by your standards. For a couple of hundred years, that worked fine. Seems to be eroding pretty quickly these past two decades, though. We need another Andrew Jackson. Ralph Nader will do, but not if ya don't vote and encourage others to do so, too.
information is immaterial
Hooray for someone who sees through the smoke. Due process MUST be applied, cuz the moment it fails, they're coming after /. and all the other peripheral geniuses. Remember back in the day when M$ was cool, when Gates was a young geek who toppled IBM without ever even going to court? Could happen to you, dude.
information is immaterial
Have people forgotten that the electoral college elects the presidents in this country? Here is how it works
How the Electoral College Works: The current workings of the Electoral College are the result of both design and experience. As it now operates:
Each State is allocated a number of Electors equal to the number of its U.S. Senators (always 2) plus the number of its U.S. Representatives (which may change each decade according to the size of each State's population as determined in the Census).
The political parties (or independent candidates) in each State submit to the State's chief election official a list of individuals pledged to their candidate for president and equal in number to the State's electoral vote. Usually, the major political parties select these individuals either in their State party conventions or through appointment by their State party leaders while third parties and independent candidates merely designate theirs.
Members of Congress and employees of the federal government are prohibited from serving as an Elector in order to maintain the balance between the legislative and executive branches of the federal government.
After their caucuses and primaries, the major parties nominate their candidates for president and vice president in their national conventions traditionally held in the summer preceding the election. (Third parties and independent candidates follow different procedures according to the individual State laws). The names of the duly nominated candidates are then officially submitted to each State's chief election official so that they might appear on the general election ballot.
On the Tuesday following the first Monday of November in years divisible by four, the people in each State cast their ballots for the party slate of Electors representing their choice for president and vice president (although as a matter of practice, general election ballots normally say "Electors for" each set of candidates rather than list the individual Electors on each slate).
Whichever party slate wins the most popular votes in the State becomes that State's Electors-so that, in effect, whichever presidential ticket gets the most popular votes in a State wins all the Electors of that State. [The two exceptions to this are Maine and Nebraska where two Electors are chosen by statewide popular vote and the remainder by the popular vote within each Congressional district].
On the Monday following the second Wednesday of December (as established in federal law) each State's Electors meet in their respective State capitals and cast their electoral votes-one for president and one for vice president.
In order to prevent Electors from voting only for "favorite sons" of their home State, at least one of their votes must be for a person from outside their State (though this is seldom a problem since the parties have consistently nominated presidential and vice presidential candidates from different States).
The electoral votes are then sealed and transmitted from each State to the President of the Senate who, on the following January 6, opens and reads them before both houses of the Congress.
The candidate for president with the most electoral votes, provided that it is an absolute majority (one over half of the total), is declared president. Similarly, the vice presidential candidate with the absolute majority of electoral votes is declared vice president. In the event no one obtains an absolute majority of electoral votes for president, the U.S. House of Representatives (as the chamber closest to the people) selects the president from among the top three contenders with each State casting only one vote and an absolute majority of the States being required to elect. Similarly, if no one obtains an absolute majority for vice president, then the U.S. Senate makes the selection from among the top two contenders for that office.
At noon on January 20, the duly elected president and vice president are sworn into office.
A case that matters to people who sit in front of the computer fewer than 12 hours a day.
Bruce
Bruce
I am the real Bruce Perens.
Well, LOVE Microsoft all YOU want but your are engaging in an interesting double standard. You are judging the DOJ for playing hardball but somehow Microsoft escapes the same scrutiny. They're waiting to see if the next Administration will be more favorable to them? What does that have to do with the facts in this case? It seems to me that Mr. Gates has purchased himself much more due process than this case warrants, given the fact that Microsoft is clearly guilty of Anti-Trust violations in both the evidence against him AND in the court's judgment.
Thanks. I am a bit uneasy reading MS trial coverage from MSNBC for some reason...
I see. The Supreme Court rejected M$FT's case but willing to hear Mr. Martin's case. According to CNN's site,"The Supreme Court will decide whether disabled golfer Casey Martin has a legal right to ride in a golf cart between shots at PGA Tour events." I guess golf is more important than the Evil Empire.
And remember that the whole idea of .net is to put software on a pay-per-use basis in the long run? The idea of changing consumers from a 'spend loads of money being forced to buy software' basis to a 'spend loads of money being allowed to use software you don't even get to keep' is only appealing to the stockholders- it's a loser of an idea to the consumer, who wants to believe they are getting stuff that will last forever and always remain useful- and THAT is the major (false) promise of MS software, that you get it and it will ALWAYS remain useful and NEVER go out of style or become unsupported because it's MS! MS is _always_ supported *cough, cough*
What might be happening is the final phase of the scorched earth policy. The underground (linux, MacOS, Be etc) thrives, and there's only so far MS can really push- they can only make Windows legally compulsory in an indirect way, for instance creating a climate where banking software, election voting software etc. is Windows-only because nobody thinks it's worth bothering to develop such software for anything else. If they try to go further and, say, get legislation passed to ban Macs and Linux from the Internet (using some trumped-up argument) they will fail- it would be demanding so much that nobody would go along with it. If they succeeded, people would ignore those laws. There really is only so far that they can go with their monopoly, which is a bad thing for them as their business model is still based on ravenous expansion without limits- they are heading for a fall when it's time for them to reach an equilibrium and stop growing, because they're so utterly not based on sustaining business, only on expanding it. I would even say there is a chance of their overextending and collapsing, for business reasons only- what if they held a .net and nobody came? Well, first they'd doctor the PR and doctor the accounting and insist that everything was working- the most dangerous thing they could do, yet the most likely. Then, having run the stakes up to immense heights this way, they'd be facing- the IRS, over the accounting they'd done, and the press (what remains of it) over their deceptions, all without having got enough _genuine_ mindshare to maintain a survivable business- and remember MS is prone to obsoleting their old stuff to move you to the new stuff. If they can't do that they've just sabotaged themselves.
The government's direct action just might be unnecessary...
The problem is, if it genuinely looks like the popular opinion's gone against Gates, all that bribe money goes for naught- the politician blithely doublecrosses the special interest in order to get re-elected. This would go for even Bush- if it looked like he was going to lose power and influence because he was easily painted as the puppet of MS, he would of course avoid helping them and possibly even hurt them to show he was not beholden. Therefore, paint him the puppet of MS, and see how much of that he's able to take. It _is_ an effective political attack.
I don't have any faith that Gore would be that much better than Bush. Why do you? I'm not certain Nader would be much use either- but he is _different_ and coming from outside the two party system, besides which his agenda about corporations and trusts is very clear and mirrors my own. I am absolutely certain about who I want to be counted for at this point, and it doesn't matter so much that he's not super likely to win. A vote for Nader is notice of one more person who's _really_ against corpocracy. That record will stand, and the other politicians are very aware of these things. It puts them ALL on notice. If I voted for Gore, it would be meaningless- nothing about that says what I want to say with a vote. Even if he wins there's no way to tell I actually cared about something- 'anti-Bush' isn't much of an agenda and sends no message. 'actually voted for Nader, dammit!' damn well sends a message, win or lose.
In fact, if killing you will earn/save them more money than they would be fined for doing so, the corporation is _obligated_ to kill you! Isn't fiduciary duty wonderful? Isn't it neat to be able to afford lawyers that can finally make the penalties of criminal negligence cheaper than redesigning that gas tank, testing those tires, inspecting that food product? Isn't it just WIZZA PEACHY KEENO that fiduciary duty obliges the corporation to kill people if that gains shareholders more money than fixing the problems?
Criminal negligence- it's not just a good idea, it's the law! :P
(steps aside to watch the battle between '+1 insightful' and '-1 troll' with a couple of really sick bastards chiming in as '+1 funny' :) )
With only one company, it's more like 'fascism' or the classic Cold War version of 'communism'- you cannot blithely separate industry from government if one entity of industry runs everything.
There are many mechanisms by which a company (particularly in information technology) can leverage its existing strengths to add more strengths and use all this strength not to help its customers but to screw competitors. Microsoft's illustrated this nicely and will no doubt have entire chapters of future history books, next to Standard Oil and the railroads and Ma Bell. Sort of the 'rabid weasel' variant of a classic trust- a literal version of 'network effects!
If such a company manages to screw everybody else badly enough that there's no point even trying to do business in the field being controlled, then there is no more capitalist market in that field- see point 1, repeat until you have a clue, because...
It ain't a 'market' if you can't comparison shop! :)
Regarding the error in law, clearly this is what the MS guys are after- the question is, to what end? I wonder if they really expect a slap on the wrist, or think they can make insincere pledges of good faith at this point. The question that comes to my mind is this: might the appeals court entirely reject Jackson's breakup idea, instead choosing to be 'nice' by leaving MS in one piece- and imposing a web of REGULATION? It's hard to see how many other answers there would be. In a lot of ways MS would be better off broken up- I saw another poster expressing gratitude that they would not 'metastasize', and the analogy is both jarring and apt. Perhaps we're all better off if they are _not_ broken up, if they remain monolithic.
> Unfortunately, this requires an ammendment to the Constitution.
However, that amendment to the constitution isn't possible. There are only two prohibitted amendments:
provided that no amendment which may be made prior to the year one
thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any manner affect the first
and fourth clauses in the ninth section of the first article; and that
no state, without its consent, shall be deprived of its equal suffrage
in the Senate.
The first is no longer relevant, but the small states will not give up the second (I'll probably be in the majority in Nevada with a "secession first" view).
The electoral votes which give the small states disproportionaly more choice are part of that senatorial representation. We're not giving it up.
hawk, esq., a diehard Nevadan wandering the country
>Remember, you're only allowed to appeal if you can show new evidence
>or demonstrate that the last trial was somehow unfair,
No, this is just plain wrong (though it has application to capital punishment).
THis is a federal civil case. You *cannot* introduce new evidence. You *cannot* even introduce new arguments about the old evidence. You have two bases for appeal:
1) error of fact. To do this, you must show that no reasonable person could have reached the conclusion of fact *from the evidence* admitted. This isn't even remotely likely in this case. Again, the standard isn't just "decided wrong," but "couldn't possibly conclude that."
2) error in law. The trial judge (or lower court) made an error in applying the law. Here, the lower court's opinion receives no weigyht at all, and the legal arguments are made again. In this case, though, there is no way to avoid the conclusion of illegal monopoly given the Findings of Fact. There is room to argue about the remedy, however. [and personally, I think some of the state AG's should push for a multiple-vendors-of-windows solution]
hawk, esq.
The electoral votes are party of the senatorial role: states don't get "number of reps + 2", but one for each rep, and one for each senator. Reducing the prerogatives of having a senator is a reduction in that senatorial representation.
hawk, esq.
That's what microsoft is after. For them to have any expectation of reversing the findings of fact is as silly as, well, the courtroom behavior. So no *reasonable* lawyer expects to see them reversed, but then, if the firm of Larry, Mo, and Curly continues to represent ms . . .
The focus is then on the remedies. The conclusions of violations are inescapable, but it is possible that the appellate process would impose an entirely diffferent remedie, which is where microsoft's real hopes lay.
And in the topsy-turvy world of spin, splitting ms is being construed as "anti free market", while the "lesser" remedy of massive regulation is seen as "pro free market".
In reality (speaking as an economics professor rather than a laywer now), splitting a monopolist which ahas used market power is the *pro* markets response . . .
Time to write anotehr op-ed piece . . .
Rehnquist himself having actually worked for Microsoft would be a conflict. His son working for a firm that works for microsoft isn't even close.
hawk, esq.
However, today, trial and appeals are about as long as they were before, but business move on the cliched "internet time"; if a company memos employes about potental layoffs at 9am EST, their stock could be devalued by half by the close of the market that day. Companies merge and go bankrupt daily. MS, for example will probably release 5 new OS systems (98, NT, 2000, ME, Whistler) before this case is done, all with more and more 'intergrated' applications that can potentally harm the competition in the market.
However, MS does deserve some review; they argue that there are aspects of the way that Jackson ran the case that are more operating details as opposed to issues at large that should first be considered by an appealate court. To some extent, I agree with this. But MS also knows that any delay in the final final judgement of this case is going to allow them time to release products that might be questionable under it.
IMHO, however, they know this, and the DOJ knows this, and the Supreme Court knows this. I feel that the SC should have added a stipulation, that if the case in the appeal court was not resolved within a year, then the SC would automatically hear it, as to expitide the process. Now, MS has the oppotunity to play games with their 'friends' in the Appealate court and could extend this case out well past it's usefulness ... when .net is in place by more than 90% of the PC base.
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
this is why I never advocated a breakup, or a fine for Microsoft - I think such measures would be silly and ineffective, and they'd only pass them on to the consumers.
The only answer to this question is; find the people who made the decisions, gave the orders for illegal behavior, and put the fuckers behind bars. Naughty children need to be spanked. Perhaps Bill Gates can bundle license plates with crushed rocks?
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
don't forget how badly LDAP is embraced by MAD (Microsoft Active Directory)
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
Look, Perot got like 20% of the popular vote, did it send "the establishment" a message? Yeah, the message was: lay low for a few years, make some superficial changes, then go back to normal later when the reform party becomes a public joke.
Next thing you know, Dan Quayle will be running for president in 2004 on the Green ticket.
Now in some (IMHO) more progressive european countries, where they have more than two evil parties, they do a run-off if any candidate gets less than 50% of the vote. In that case, you don't have to be afraid to vote for the guy you want to win, because you won't end up with a minority winner.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
I really believe that if some good reporter were to investigate the financial dealings of the members of the DC Circuit Court, and those of their close family members, that attempts by Microsoft to influence this case will be found. Playing this one legally when none of the rest of their dealings with the public courts have been conducted that way would be too out of character for Microsoft. They believe they own all the marbles, and therefore the rules are up to them.
Dog is my co-pilot.
I'm glad to hear that. If M$ HAS to break out of the x86 straightjacket, they will. I don't want them to Metastasize. I want them to die with the x86.
:-)
M$ is ONLY on the x86, Linux is on EVERY other platform and Aqua (or an Aqua-like environment,) will give the leverage onto the desktop that Unix needs.
Once Intel gets a reliable OS running natively on the Itanium (and it now has one, Linux) and they can get a user friendly face on it (Aqua) look for the x86 instruction set to go so that their hardware can run free of the M$ anchor and fast as Hell!
Let M$ win the battle and lose the war.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
Pondscum, sorry politicians, are failed lawyers who can be bought for a shag in the oval office.
By the time they get there, they are so compromised that they are virtually useless.
You want a representative government, pick the people out of the phone book. Until then all you're going to get are failed lawyers making even more laws.
That's all they know how to do in response to anything (and that's not exactly the right response to a shark attack...)
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
In my case, I go to http://www.state.ma.us/ and click on 'elections' and try to figure out which document will describe the electoral college process; if your state does not have good online archives, try writing to the office of the Secretary in your state's capital; at least, in Massachusetts, the election information seems to be published by the Secretary of the Commonwealth. (Obviously you'd have a State Secretary or a Secretary of -the- State in a state that didn't call itself a commonwealth!)
And, of course, if none of this works out, you can go to the public library; especially in the fall they tend to have government leaflets/handbooks/manuals to hand out.
You can email me at parity@angelfire.com.
--Parity
--Parity
'Card carrying' member of the EFF.
I've already had most of this debate in a thread under the voting poll, but, briefly -
... Presidential votes are not popular votes, but go through the electoral college; I'm told New York elects its delegates per-district; other states have a 'winner-takes-all' policy where -all- the electoral votes for a -state- go to one candidate. If you've got a per district policy in your state, you have a very good chance of electing a Nader in your district (depending on your districts voter makeup, of course, and the activities of your local green party... but it's just as doable as electing a state representative from a minor party.) If you've got a statewide electoral delegate policy, well - realistically, your state is going to go to one of the big two and chances are your state is not really even contested. ie, even if the popular polls are a dead-heat, on a state-by-state basis probably only 4 or 5 states will actually be 'contested' and the remainder will be 'givens' on election day.
;)
a) I think you should vote your conscience not 'strategically'; democracy works best if everyone votes their conscience and ignores the pundits and pollsters.
b) -If- you still insist on voting strategically, remember to vote strategically -within your district-
c) Given b, Per-district representation is the most obvious way to break the stranglehold the Big 2 have on the presidential electoral process; campaign for per-district representatives if your state has a winner-takes-all rule! (Of course it won't happen -this- year, but hey.)
d) I have to go research my state's voting rules now, so there is no point d.
--Parity
--Parity
'Card carrying' member of the EFF.
This whole idea of voting against somebody is bullshit. There is no such thing. If you vote for Al Gore and the Democrats, you are voting for the DMCA. You are voting for the War on Drugs. You are voting for a political system in which bribes (aka soft money) are routinely exchanged in public.
You can tell yourself whatever lies you want, but the fact is that by voting for a Republicrat you are showing your support for the current corrupt system. Our current system is quickly failing. As long as people continue to buy into the FUD and vote for candidates which they know are corrupted by soft money and which they don't really want to see elected, it's going to keep getting worse. Every time somebody endorses the Republicrats with their vote, they are endorsing the current decline of our democracy into a cesspool of big-money corruption.
This decision preserves 200 or so years of judicial protocol where the SC is the *last* court of appeals, in which they hear only cases that merit there attention. They could very well decide *not* to hear this case if they believe the Court of Appeals came to the right decision. This is a process the entire Judicial system would be extremely reluctant to tinker with.
Except that for most of the 20th century, the Supreme Court heard *all* antitrust cases by direct appeal. The SUpreme COurt is also the court of original jurisdiction for a certain class of cases. The dispute between New Jersey and New York over whether the landfills at Ellis Island were in New York or New Jersey (having sales tax implications) was heard *directly* by the Supreme Court as the court of original jurisdiction.
I have discovered a truly marvelous sig, unfortunately the sig limit is too small to contain i
On being a corporate leech:
Don't knock it until you try it.
The great thing about this nation is the freedom to become as filthy rich as you like (as long as you pay your taxes). You also have the freedom to have no ambition and make minimum wage at the local BK. Don't get bitter at the success of other people just because you're sick of standing next to the fry machine.
So, if you're really sick of the "corporate leeches", get off your fat ass and do something about it. Organize. Run for office. Do something besides whining on Slashdot and going back to playing Everquest.
You are incorrect.
I -want- Nader elected.
It's not going to happen, period, due to the system.
So I'll vote for Gore, who I'm kinda eh about, but I certainly don't want Bush in office. My voting for Gore does more to keep Bush out of office than my vote for Nader would do to get him IN office (which would be, zero).
BilldaCat
When Minnesota starts holding elections in a electoral college format, you let me know.
BilldaCat
Yeah, you could vote for Nader.
You could also throw your vote into a black hole. End result is the same.
He won't win in an electorial college system.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Perot had about 20% of the popular vote back in 1992. From what I'm reading right now, he got zippy electorial votes.
Read this for some more information.
Don't get me wrong. I love Nader, and would be happy to see him in office. I also realize that's not going to happen, and will vote for the less evil.
BilldaCat
It's a shame that half the public has to resort to voting against someone they don't want rather than for someone they do want, but sometimes that's the only sensible option once the race is down to two candidates.
Still, a protest vote can be safe in certain circumstances. If your state is already going to Bush, you could vote for Nader as a signal to the Democratic party that they have gotten too conservative. If your state is already going to Gore, you could vote for Buchanan as a signal to the Republican party that they have gotten too liberal.
But if your state is up for grabs, IMO you should vote against the one of the leading pair that you think will be most harmful to society.
--
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
> Corporations are owned by human beings, with rights under the law. They're called the shareholders.
So whenever Microsoft is found guilty of wrongdoing, those shareholders are going to pay the damages and/or spend time in jail. Right?
--
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
I can't believe that anyone here would consider voting for someone who pushed hard for adoption of the Clipper Chip. Remember? Key escrow for all encryption...
But then, I guess you care less about personal privacy than attacking corporations just on the grounds they are giant and you dislike them. I don't like what big corporations are trying to do either, but currently it looks to me like the most worrying thing is the attack on personal privacy from all directions (government and business). But of those two groups, government is a lot more worrying to me. If you keep a government that respects personal privacy, then you might have a chance to force corporations to do so at some point.
To me, Gore has a proven track record of being the least trustworthy so far.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
W2K is not a part of this case, but it IS a continuation of the same tactics demonstrated to be in violation of trust law. W2K embraces and extends Kerberos, network file sharing, DNS, ....
It's a Blueprint for Domination". In the data center world, we are already feeling pressure to change the way we do business, simply because of the way W2K works. While other platforms can play in a W2K world, the objective is simple: Windows 2000 server and Active Directory rule the enterprise.
This is why this case needs to be expedited. By the time the appellate court wades through it, and it gets appealled again to the Supreme Court (and don't think MS won't want the S.C. to here it if they lose in appeals), W2K will be firmly rooted exactly where Microsoft wants it. Then, if they lose, the arguments start about where to break it up. Can you split apart Windows 2000 Server (OS) apart from Active Directory (application) into seperate companies (and still have anything work)? Look, you can't break it apart here! Oh, and Exchange 2000 is tightly integrated in Active Directory, so we have to keep that too. And Back Office is .....
Welcome to inovative integration.
Real Change has some interesting dirt on all of the candidates -- here's what they have on Nader:
Authoritarian hypocrite, secret luxury house, owned by the trial lawyers' lobby, just another politician, busted a union among his workers, abuses workers, amassing millions of dollars and playing the stock market with it, secrecy and stonewalling, vindictive toward critics, forced contributions to his college PIRG groups.
Ralph Nader's Skeleton Closet
Si
Coming soon - pyrogyra
,I>Microsoft broke the law. The corporation is being allowed the same rights as a human in due process, while still hurting the economy, and people... If a individual person were to do the same, he'd be locked away, and stripped of his rights.
Indeed humans charged with crimes (and innocent in the eyes of the law) are not infrequently held in custody.
The laws governing companies allow for no analogy with prison, either on remand or as a punishment.
Corporations don't have the same rights as a human. That's why the law that applies to companies is call "company law". Simple really.
When it comes to being charged with a crime they appear to have rights over and above even those of a high status human.
Hate Microsoft all you like. Don't deny them the same legal process anyone else is entitled to - no matter what you think you might know about what they did or how they did it.
And then if they wind up broken-up or subject to some other remedy, justice is seen to be done and they have nothing left to complain about.
The problem is that companies are treated differently from people when it comes to being tried. Is Microsoft held in "jail", are they subject to any kind of restrictions on their behaviour until the trial is concluded? A person standing trial would not be able to conduct their normal business, they would be in the court. A convicted person typically makes any appeals from a jail cell.
I.E. they are not being offered the same legal process as "John Doe". They are being given one which has several advantages. If the US government really wants to present the fiction of corporations as people then they should actually treat them as people. Even if they have to find creative ways to jail, bail and execute a corporation.
If corporations are entities with rights under the law, perhaps we should start charging corporations which deliberately cause other corporations to die with murder.
As well as other catagories of homicide and "assualt" for cases which don't actually result in "death".
Instead of treating corporations less like real people, perhaps we should be treating them _more_ like real people
One important point is that even when charged with something serious a corporation can carry on exactly as before. A person in the same situation cannot, they are either held in a jail or subject to some kind of bail order.
A corperation exists to protect it's investors and executives, i.e. you create a corperation to grant yourself a form of limited liability when you are fucking with people.
Whilst a corporation may exist to protect these people from liability. (IMHO this protection should not extend to any liabilities related to criminal actions in the first place.) There is no reason to protect the corporate entity from any liability what so ever. Think of a corporation like a car protecting it's occupants, so long as it does that it dosn't matter if the car ends up a wreck.
This is why I believe that the only things that a company should have the right to do in order to increase sales is to improve the quality of their products or services.
You'd also need laws cripple things like software licences. Such that companies can't use them to add additional restrictions not granted by general IP laws such as patents and copyright. Licences could only grant the holder additional rights, but by default there would be no difference between a CD containing music and one containing software. None of this OEM or retail version nonsense or issues like if you install OS X on your machines you can't install OS Y.
A Dick and a Bush .. You know somebody's gonna get screwed.
War is necrophilia.
A Dick and a Bush .. You know somebody's gonna get screwed.
War is necrophilia.
Financial damages are nothing to an entity designed to generate more revenue it's just a temporary setback. If I killed 60 or a 100 people I would be put to death by the state if firestone the soul-less immortal being kills 60 to a 100 people it gets fined! Not only does it escape jail and death but the amount it gets fined is the equavalent of me getting fined $1000.00. Otherwise all the pretense about due process is just crap. What good is due process if it can never end up in a meaningful punishment for the guilty party. I say ff a corporation kills it ought to be killed. All the assets of the company ought to be seized and the shareholders ought to be left high and dry and ought to lose all their money. Maybe then they would act to make their corporation act ethically. It's like my dog If I can't control the behaviour of my dog I am liable and my dog will be put to death.
A Dick and a Bush .. You know somebody's gonna get screwed.
War is necrophilia.
A Dick and a Bush .. You know somebody's gonna get screwed.
War is necrophilia.
A Dick and a Bush .. You know somebody's gonna get screwed.
War is necrophilia.
A Dick and a Bush .. You know somebody's gonna get screwed.
War is necrophilia.
A Dick and a Bush .. You know somebody's gonna get screwed.
War is necrophilia.
Anyone got the answers? I don't, but would like to know.
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Brazil has decided you're cute.
Yeah, you could vote for Nader. You could also throw your vote into a black hole. End result is the same.
You don't vote on who you think will win. This isn't a horse race. You vote for the person you would want elected. Anything ELSE is throwing away your vote.
GORE BUSH
CHOOSE ONE
OBEY
If MS were the only supplier of gasoline, or the only bank, or even the only airline, I'm sure the Court would be much more eager to resolve the case.
MSK
You are a fool who has incorrectly analyzed your choices.
;-)
Here are your errors:
1. Thinking there's a difference between Gore and Bush - there isn't
2. Thinking your vote affects anything, regardless of who you voted for - it doesn't. The chance that your one vote prevents Bush from gaining office is less than your chance of winning the lottery.
3. Thinking a vote for a third party candidate who can't win doesn't get noticed - Perot's 20% scared the shit out of politicians. Do you think we'd have a budget surplus 8 years later without him?
I'm also guessing you don't live in Minnesota
First, make it work, then make it right, then make it fast, then, make it bloated!
Here's a thought - think longer term. So Bush may beat Gore. If no one votes for Nader, we'll have this same awful choice 4 years from now. At which point, if no one votes alternatively, it'll repeat over and over. Think longer term. Nader won't win, but a successful campaign from Nader will probably mean more in the long run than whether Bush or Gore wins.
First, make it work, then make it right, then make it fast, then, make it bloated!
Actually, prior to passage of the Expediting Act (see below), the Supreme ourt was tasked with directly hearing all federal anti-trust cases.
Work for Change & GET PAID!
CNN has this story.
Wired has this one.
There can be no doubt that the Supreme Court will decide this eventually. Why can't they look at it now. Are they lazy? Afraid? I'm not buying the 'Due Process' argument. The fact that the SC was able to decide the motion to expedite implies that it is within the bounds of the legal system.
A lot of people have said that voting for Nader would be your way of saying that you want an end to companies like Microsoft. That much is true. It would send a message to the federal government that a significant portion of the population really does care about this issue.
I'm going to take a giant leap here and say that of the people who would like Nader as President, if they were told they had to choose between Bush and Gore, they'd choose Gore. Bush, like most Republicans, is pro-corporate and would most likely pressure the DOJ (which he technically shouldn't do) to drop the MS case or do something to make it more likely the DOJ will lose or give up.
In addition, most people would say that Nader will never win. One on hand, it's true. Nader will never get enough votes to win. On the other hand, it's irrelevant because people are supposed to vote for whom they want as President, not for whom they think will win.
However, there is one thing I think a lot of pro-Nader people don't seem to realize (or don't want to admit). Given the above assertions, about half the population will vote for Bush, and the other half will vote for Gore or Nader. This leads one to a conclusion: a vote for Nader is a vote against Gore.
In other words, voting for Nader may make Bush President. Say for example 45% of the people vote for Bush. If Nader weren't around, then 55% of the people would vote for Gore, and he'd win. However, if 15% of the people vote for Nader instead of Gore (it could happen - Perot almost got 15% back when he ran for President), then that means that Gore will only get 40%, and Bush will win, despite the fact that most of the people in the country don't want him as President! In other words, Bush would be a "minority President", but he would still be President, and then everyone who voted for Nader will be screwed.
This is an issue that my wife and I are struggling with. Do we vote for Nader and send a message to our government, but risk putting Bush in office instead? Maybe someone on Slashdot can help us decide?
--
And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
Indeed.
Today, I found this article on Memepool. In it is an editorial and a lengthy interview with Ralph Nader. That man has a serious (if not well-intentioned, as I would like to believe) chip on his shoulder when it comes to corporatist america and democracy in general.
I would LOVE to see him in the White House. Hell, I'd love to see him as just an ADVISOR in the White House.
Rami
--
rJames.org - illustration
And I fully intend to vote for him. Even though, I live in Israel right now, I am going to go wayt out of my way and head on down to the American Embassy JUST TO VOTE FOR NADER.
And if he's not on the ballot, I will rip it up.
Rami
--
rJames.org - illustration
Dell sells Linux Laptops.
Anything else?
No kidding.
Renquist is on the Supreme Court. Precisely who do you think someone could appeal Renquist's apparent conflict of interest to?
The appeals court is fairly corruptable with a lot of ultra rightists at the top. On several occasions they have not hesitated to come to the full support of Microsoft. It's pretty much up to Linux and the rest of the world now...freedom today and into the future has been severely jeopardized by this horrendous decision. As more systems are taken by MS, that will mean fewer US Linux jobs, and less open source code from the USA. Think about it -- something like half the court is somewhat liberal, and only one of them dissented. What do you think will happen when it hits the more easily manipulated, Microsoft friendly appeals court? At a minimum, a hand slap -- probably a $1 fine to Gates. Most certainly, all of Judge Jackson's remedies will be rejected.
Treatment, not tyranny. End the drug war and free our American POWs.
See my user info for links.
Now, with this out of the way -- they will *have* to answer why Win 2000 and Win ME are such a slugish sellers?
Anyone want to short MSFT over the next year?
1st) code under an open-source license for whichever operating system you like
if you can't do that for any reason,
2nd) buy a pin-up of RMS
3th) visit some *real* penguins, tape them with some kind of video camera, encode as Sorenson-Quicktime and send that to LKML. In no time whatsoever, Quicktime will be a supported standard under Linux.
4th) buy a mega-tube of sunblocker and give that to Alan Cox, he'll start coding for 2.4 again
5th) Join $cientology, get high in their ranks, tell the masters that Microsoft is responsible for www.xenu.org. Watch as Tom Cruise features in the first Linux movie. (get out of CO$ again, of course)
6th) write clean code
7th) goto 7th
8th) get a life
Now when I've found a way to escape from 8th, I'll heed my own advice.
Have fun...
That's the same attitude voiced in a Simpson's episode -- where both G.Bush and B.Clinton are really squid-like aliens. When unmasked by Homer...the crowd is shocked...and someone yells, "We could vote for a 3rd party candidate!"
One of the aliens says "Go ahead...throw your vote away!"
I'm proud to have "thrown away" my vote in the last two presidential elections...the three presidential elections before those had me voting for people I simply didn't and couldn't agree with.
As for Nader, he gets some consideration from me...he has saved many lives and is honest in his convictions. Personally, I agree more with the libertarian point of view so they will more likely get my vote this time round.
Either way, if you don't vote in all elections -- especially in non-presidential years -- you are throwing your vote away.
A firewall can not protect you from yourself. Turn off what you do not need. Do not use the firewall to do your work.
Very well said. The concept behind free-market capitalism as it has developed in the U.S. and elsewhere has been that competition delivers benefits to consumers, not so ultra-libertarian notion that individuals should be free to do whatever they want, including band together to create multi-billion dollar companies that can thwart competition. Now, of course, MS has argued that its actions have been aimed at bringing better products to consumers and not thwarting competition, but the lower court has found otherwise and, if you read the court's opinion (which I strongly urge everyone interested in the lawsuit -- pro- or anti-MS -- to do; I have to believe that many commentators on the subject either have not done so, or lack the sufficient legal and/or technical knowledge to understand what it is saying), you will see that the evidence is pretty damning. You will also see that the judge "gets it" -- the thrust of the opinion is that MS tried to thwart the development of "platform independent middleware", the two main examples being Netscape and Java -- I have got to believe that Larry Lessig and others have done a great job getting the judge up to speed. I believe that anyone who is familiar with anti-trust law will come to conclusion that, if you accept the facts as set forth in the opinion, the gov't has a pretty strong case.
IANAL.
Nonetheless, I've dealt with legal conflict of interest. I've been personally affected by it. This qualifies, without question. For Rehnquist to claim otherwise is an invitation for an appeal of the appeal, though he's likely counting on that not happening.
An example of a conflict of interest, as related by an (honest) Judge... who would, incidentally, have been more favorable to the plaintifs than the defendant... she excused herself from the case because her husband had represented the defendant in an IP case some six years earlier.
From her explanation, I gathered that a conflict of interest was constituted by any possibility of a suggestion of impropriety in the judge with relation to the case... down to and including through family members, friends, and associates.
-- Still waiting for the Nike endorsement
Renquist is on the Supreme Court. Precisely who do you think someone could appeal Renquist's apparent conflict of interest to?
House Judiciary Committee? I vaguely remember something like this coming up before...
-- Still waiting for the Nike endorsement
It's worth reading to learnhow it's done.
There is no more justice,only money.
Unfortunately, the D.C. circuit court of appeals judges who know the most about monopoly antitrust cases are forced to recuse themselves. They formerly worked for the Department of Justice. The remaining justices are experts in labor law and the like.
No wonder Microsoft thinks it can get a better hearing in D.C. How long will it take to get those judges up to speed on such a large and complicated case? How much better can the appellate court be in deciding issues of law than the Supreme Court, which is going to have to go over them all once again, maybe years from now?
I don't know if it works the same in the US, but our top Appellate Tribunal hears procedural appeals by a differently-constituted panel of Lords of Appeal.
This was what was used in the Pinochet case, when the General became the first criminal defendant in history to appeal on the grounds that his judge had a publicly-stated commitment to human rights.
I had a tenner on his lawyers taking it to the ECHR for the comedy value alone, but they declared him unfit to plead first.
-- AndrewD
A Maze of Twisty Little Laws, All Different.
Thanks, Supreme Court. Looks like they'll get around to this after it's (as the french say) fait acompli. By that time Windows ME (Medical Edition) will be all that's available for pacemakers.
Perhaps there's some natural Karmic justice, like Bill being crushed under a pile of his own loot.
--
Chief Frog Inspector
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
But really, it's the principle that I'm voting for: who will best defend the freedoms of individuals from monied interests.
.4
Let's give the candidates I'm familiar with a score (1-10):
Bush 1
Gore 5 (optimistic, but possible)
Nader 10
Let's also give them an approximate showing in the polls:
Bush 40%
Gore 45%
Nader 10%
So, that gives us a sort of expected value for the principle I gave:
Bush:
Gore: 2.4
Nader: 1
Hmmmmmmmm.
I know that something seems subtly wrong with this. This is one of the things I don't like about game theory: it often encourages people to sacrifice principle for expediency.
Of course, if you put Gore down to a 3, then the matrix gets a lot more interesting.
Libertarianism is rich wolves and poor sheep playing gambler's ruin for dinner.
Until this election , I have never really understood "strategic" voting -- that is, changing your vote on what the polls say everyone else is going to vote like.
But this time I'm concerned. You see, I would like to vote for Nader, but mostly, I don't want Bush to win. And when I try to persuade people to vote for Nader, I'm very aware that most of them are on the Gore side.
So unless Gore takes a wide lead in the polls, encouraging people to vote for Nader is taking away votes for Gore (never mind that if Nader started showing broad support everybody would start running hard to the left and things might change).
I'm stumped. Ideas?
Libertarianism is rich wolves and poor sheep playing gambler's ruin for dinner.
Meanwhile, Emperor Gates bought the White House, and issued decrees stating that Microsoft is now the One True Government of the World, and that support for Democracy was to be phased out.
Seriously, this is scary. The appeals court has effectively ruled, in the past, that technology is outside the US legal system. Which may mean MS is essentially lawless and entitled to do anything, whether "legal" or not, with total impunity.
Sure, the Appeals Court might like that now, but I won't be too sure they'll think the same, if MS decides to declare martial law & invade America. They've greater resources & technology than the US Military (which all use versions of MS s/w that MS know the bugs of AND know the security holes of).
IMHO, we need to stop worrying on whether the US Government, in it's efforts to wiretap, have found your secret recipe for chocolate brownies. Instead, we need to pay a bit more attention to a certain corporate giant that has ALL the money, resources and knowledge needed to cripple the US and assert itself as the One True Government.
Conspiracy theory? Sure! Highly Improbable? Certainly! Much more illuminating than arguing over who's "right" - DEFINITELY!
In 100 years time, this case won't make any real difference. But, if the nightmare scenario above turns out to be real, in 100 years time, you'll see a difference that would make your worst nightmares feel warm and cheery.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
I am not too naive to understand that the US wants to push this case along as fast as possible so that there isn't too much turmoil within the economy, but isn't that what a capatilist society is supposed to be about? The survival of the fittest? The best companies with the best products that the consumer likes best WINS?!
Yes, this is the theory (as I understand it) behind capitalism: all companies try hard to make good products. Consumers will select the best product and buy it. Therefore, the companies that make the best products win. This competitive activity fosters innovation and our society ends up better off.
Here is the problem: companies only like capitalism when they want to get into a market. Once they are in that market, they hate capitalism. Competitors mean that they have to work harder to make their products better. It's much easier and cheaper to destroy your competitor than to compete against their products.
This is why I believe that the only things that a company should have the right to do in order to increase sales is to improve the quality of their products or services. It is the only thing which fosters what I see as competition. Everything else is designed to destroy competitors, which is, by nature, anti-capitalistic. Let me say that again: competing against a competitor's products is competitive, destroying a competitor is not. (If the competitor is destroyed becuase their products can't compete with yours in terms of quality, then that's another story.)
This is why I believe in antitrust as a valid function of government. It's like the referee at an american football game: they make sure that the teams compete instead of engage in clipping, holding, murder, and other such illegal activities. NOTE: I have no idea the best way for government enforcement of antitrust. Like all government activity, it's ripe for corruption and that part sucks.
Now anyone who has looked at Microsoft's history can tell that their competitive activities have been anything but competitive. Microsoft is out for blood. They will do anything and say anything to destroy their competitors. Therefore, I think that the government's action is capitalistic, for it's attempting to rectify something that is not.
I don't make the rules. I just make fun of them.
A huge increase in case load is unlikely since the law that allows for bypasssing the Court of Appeals only applies to anti-trust cases. Besides which, the SC can decide on each case if they want to allow it to bypass the CoA. I agree that the SC made the right decision (even though I'd like the case to be over with quickly), but the reasons that this is the right decision have nothing to do with SC caseload.
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Preventive War is like committing suicide for fear of death. - Otto Von Bismarck
But those shareholders never have to face the consequences of the acts of the company, beyond the potential loss of equity. I really wonder: why do we have limited liability at all? Why is it that an individual is held accountable for their actions, but if a bunch of individuals put their money together, we have laws that waive that accountability? It doesn't makes sense to me. Corporations look like just another socialist/commie invention, in opposition to the principles of capitalism and basic ethics.
If a business doesn't have limited liability, then it really is a person or a group people, and perhaps it should have some rights. But if it's just a shield that lets people do whatever they want to without having to face consequences, then I don't think it deserves any respect or consideration at all.
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As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
So i guess the law that says important antitrust cases can go straight to the Supreme Court is useless, since if they didn't accept this case, i can't imagine one they would. What more did they want?
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Mod up a post Rob doesn't like and you'll never mod again
Gates has stated that he hopes the upcoming Presidential elections will put someone in office more friendly to the company.
Gates will be fuckity-fuck-fucked if Nader gets into office. Vote Anti-corporation
Need Free Juniper/NetScreen Support? JuniperForum
Rehnquist apparently doesn't think there is a legal problem nor an appearance one by a "reasonable" person. I disagree (and I'm pretty neutral about Micro$oft)
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DO NOT DISTURB THE SE
It'd be most amusing if Ralph Nader somehow managed to make it into office. Never happen, of course, but I'm sure if it did, it'd provoke some most amusing responses in Redmond.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
IIRC MS themselves asked for the case to be brought to the supreme court. So, there can be no talk about denying them anything.
I am just sad that this is going to take that much more time in which MS is going to wreak havoc on the IT industry. They do have a track history for that, and disrespect of court's orders etc.
I'd like to put forth another view, one that has been synthesized from a number of legal web sites and magazine articles published at the time Da Judge petitioned the Supreme Court to take the M$ case.
The one statement that was made by virtually every single source, both pro and con, was that the Supreme Court was not equipped to deal with all the issues that the Microsoft appeal would raise. When it was compared to the AT&T breakup, every single writer said that the major difference between AT&T and Microsoft was that there were no disputes in fact or procedure in the AT&T case versus many disputes in fact and procedure in the Microsoft case. Anyone who had read the briefs from DoJ and Microsoft will agree that the two sides are far, far apart on many issues.
One interesting prediction I recall was that if the Supreme Court were to take up the action, the Higest Court would "hire" the DC Court of Appeals to do much of the legwork. The pundit then speculated that the difference between that procedural model and the more formal appeal-superappeal process would be minimal. What I recall of the article said "It might save a month or two of time."
I disagree with other posters in this thread. The Supreme Court hasn't refused to hear any appeal at all. The action taken by the Supreme Court was specific to taking the case now instead of later, when the Appeals court could take care of the viewpoint differences of the two sides.
Also, the DC Court of Appeals would be able to rule on such things as the lack of a remedies phase of the trial.
Me, I think it's a good thing.
Reuters reports (via Yahoo!) that his son works for a Boston law firm and is actually working on a private antitrust case for Microsoft! Now, if that isn't a conflict of interest then I don't know what is...
OK everyone. Microsoft isn't going to get split up in a few weeks like everyone here seems to want. We have three possible scenarios:
.NET from being more than wishful thinking. All the productive people are seriously demotivated and start buying posters at ThinkGeek. Probably nothing serious will happen at the end but if they're tied up for long enough it won't matter. GNU/Linux, KDE & Gnome will take over the desktop by being nice to people and not trying to sue them.
1) MS is split. MS/OS runs like crazy to fix the stupid bugs and cuts much better deals with the PC makers. MS/Apps promises to release Office for Linux and Mac & Anything else, making corporate purchasers happy and destroying the chances of OSS office suites.
2) MS is stuck in court for years, distracting senior management and stopping
3) The case is thrown out of the appeals court, the government doesn't appeal and corporations end up ruling the world. The internet becomes a kind of dumbed-down AOL with the wild old TCP/IP being removed as too open to abuse by terrorists, hackers and other undesirables.
My money is on scenario 2, option 3 is too dangerous even for the US government (I hope). Either way, lets keep on building OSS solutions and promoting the fact that companies don't have to spent large sums of money and sign dodgy EULAs to get the solutions they need.
- Paul
It allows more arguments to be made and heard, creating a larger body of knowledge surrounding the case before it goes to the SC. Very little new information or lines of reasoning are made when a case goes to the SC, rather the Court passes judgement on decisions and arguments made in the lower courts.
This decision preserves 200 or so years of judicial protocol where the SC is the *last* court of appeals, in which they hear only cases that merit there attention. They could very well decide *not* to hear this case if they believe the Court of Appeals came to the right decision. This is a process the entire Judicial system would be extremely reluctant to tinker with.
Finally, If the SC would bypass the Court of Appeals, then they would open themselves to a huge increase in their caseload and diminish the value and impact of the lower courts.
Just because the could take a case directly, doesn't mean they have to.
Hate Microsoft all you like. Don't deny them the same legal process anyone else is entitled to - no matter what you think you might know about what they did or how they did it.
And then if they wind up broken-up or subject to some other remedy, justice is seen to be done and they have nothing left to complain about. It should be obvious that this court case has been about PR as much as law. ("Freedom to Innovate" etc...)
Sure the lawyers get rich, but when hasn't this been the case?
WHY should an immortal paper entity be given due process? A corp is a thing, with less life than a slug (and even less benefits to the planet).
I wish you corp leeches would get a clue. This is MY world, too, and every time you equate a human being with a faux entity like a corporation, you steal a bit of our collective humanity, diminishing me and everyone else right along with your sorry selves.
If you want to be a lap dog, feel free. Just keep it away from the rest of us.
Due process INDEED.
"The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws."--Tacitus, The Histories