Slashdot Mirror
All MS Settlement Comments Now Online
Sundance writes: "The DOJ has published their answer to the Tunney Act comments on the Microsoft settlement. The gist of it is that, basically, they like the settlement agreement the way it was written and won't change much of it, if at all. Choice quote: "A number of commentors are concerned that Microsoft will deny disclosure of APIs and Documentation, or licensing of Communications Protocols, to open source developers on the grounds that the developers do not meet the "reasonable business need" or "authenticity and viability of business" criteria of Section III.J.2.(441) The United States believes that the requirements in Section III.J.2 are no broader than is necessary to prevent misuse or misappropriation of intellectual property." I guess that crimes pays, after all -- provided that you're rich enough to start with." hbo adds: "The comments are
indexed by comment id. There is also an alphabetical list of commentators. To find a particular comment, look it up in the list, then find the comment id in the index. Finally, click on the particular comment to view it."
Heh.
-- Dan
Woops, there is a typo in the /. post, the correct link is
:
:
http://www.usdoj.gov/atr/cases/ms-alpha.htm
I don't HREF it because the page is very heavy (1.9 Mb) and useless.
It starts
Public Comments on the
United States v. Microsoft Settlement
Alphabetical List of Individuals or Entities Who Submitted Comments
Comments are listed in alphabetical order by the name of the individual or entity submitting the comment. Each comment is identified by the comment number, number of pages, and submitter's name (as provided in the comment).
To view a comment, go to the Master Index of Comments and look up the comment by the comment number (MTC number).
MTC-00018130 0001 (u)
MTC-00029203 0002 --
MTC-00012751 0001 1157587@concentric.net
MTC-00010476 0001 16fort36@cs.com
MTC-00028611 0001 1miler@dragonbbs.com
MTC-00021140 0001 2trash
MTC-00000850 0001 3211@usa.com
MTC-00028710 0001 78455@attbi.com
MTC-00004269 0002 a
MTC-00013489 0001 A GOP Loyalist
MTC-00019734 0001 A. Walter
and ends
MTC-00028529 0002 Zukowski, Tom
MTC-00016442 0001 Zulaski, Stan
MTC-00012479 0001 Zuschlag, Mary
MTC-00005343 0001 Zwierzycki, Walt
MTC-00000649 0001 Zygmont, Justin
MTC-00023199 0001 Zygmunt, Steve
MTC-00014085 0001 Zylanoff, Phillipa
MTC-00009122 0001 Zynski, Bud
MTC-00024478 0002 Zyphur, Mike
MTC-00008199 0001 Zyskowski, Mike
Note: Every effort has been made to accurately reproduce the comments on this web site. Some comments were converted into text using optical character recognition (OCR) technology and then tested for accuracy. Nevertheless, some differences may exist between the original document and the text version on this web site. The PDF images of these documents most accurately reflect the original submissions; the HTML versions are provided to facilitate browsing and searching.
Men are born ignorant, not stupid; they are made stupid by education. Bertrand Russel
If they use terms that can be interpreted a number of ways and they are the ones responsible for interpreting them, the result being a choice wether or not to let competition gain footholds, do you think they'll do the "good" thing?
A child gets in trouble for cheating
The parents find out and sit the child down to talk about punishment
The child says "I won't do it again unless it's unreasonable."
The parents laugh and say "You will NOT do it"
This is clear and understandable and is appropriate because it's the child's judgement that was flawed in the first place that led him/her to cheat.
Leaving any leeway is irresponsible.
Ever as a teenager try to get out of being punished for something that your parents told you not to do, by interpreting their directions obviously wrong?
Didn't work then but in a courtroom I could see it work and that's not justice that's Microsofts obvious hope.
) Human Kind Vs Human Creation
) It'd be interesting to see how many humans would survive to serve us.
This system invites unnecessary load (in the form of reloads on that index file), makes it difficult to look up comments, and makes it impossible to search them. These are all problems that the worlds of library science and computer science have solved many times over, and the solutions are not being used.
Ignorance? Deterrence of public participation? Slap-dash job? Gross incompetence? The world may never know.
Tsk tsk what a waste of an fp, just incase anyone was interested Van Sickle, Harold had the fp MTC-00000001 in the case it seems.. and it all seems so familiar..
The DOJ has sold the public down the river by not breaking up Microsoft.
Breaking the company up would not have lessened its assets only its MONOPOLY
POWER. The DOJ has partnered with George W. Bush to repay Bill Gates for
his generous campaign contributions to him and the GOP party. There is
nowhere the public can turn anymore now that our Justice Department has sold
out to politics. There is no other explanation the public will believe.
You've made your bed with Bill, now sleep in it. A monetary fine means
nothing to the world's richest man - losing his power over the industry
does. As you attempt to settle with him, he is already targeting LINUX for
the Internet market - he has learned nothing, except whom to contribute to
for favors. You people can spin it anyway you like, we, the public, see it
for what it really is. There is no longer equality under the law, there is
no longer equal enforcement of the law, the law is Dubya.
I'm betting that there are alot of posts like that, I wonder if 30,000 gun toting MS-Bush bashing people are enough for a revolution....
Any sufficiently advanced man is indistinguishable from God
Huh. I emailed a comment to the DOJ, at the proper address, very soon after they began accepting public comments.
I can't find any permutation of my name or email address in the 'public comment' list.
Did this happen to anyone else, did you mail a comment but it's not showing up there?
Where's yours?
MTC-00004462
Any US citizen who didn't comment on the "settlement" doesn't deserve to be able to bitch about the outcome. My comment is actually a copy of someones elses writing, but at least I took the time to email it. The part about the DOJ saying "We really like our little agreement with Sata^H^H^H^HMicrosoft, so we're going to ignore all of your comments and continue as we are" REALLY SUCKS ASS! Damnit! If there ever was a time to talk revolution, this is it. The DCMA and probably the SSSCA soon have done more to undermine the constitution and the bill of rights than all of the communists that ever existed! God, this boils my hemmoroids! I've never felt this helpless. What is our great country coming to? An ever widening spiral of lost rights and freedom? I say to the Congress, DOJ, FBI, CIA and whoever else is with the Fed reading this, tread lightly where our freedoms lie, for you shall feel the wrath of those you wish to step on. Not a threat, but my god given right to protest and make for change. It's written down, right in the constitution. Don't ever forget that.
PHEW! That was one of my better rants. Back to eating my MacDonalds breakfast now...
--- Think of it as evolution in action ---
From: Luby, Thomas
To:Microsoft ATR
Date: 12/10/01 1:22pm
Subject: Microsoft Settlement
With all due respect to the DOJ Anti-trust department, this case should
have never been pursued in the first place. I thought that anti-trust
legislation was to protect the consumer, not to appease competitors that
are losing in the marketplace. Has Microsoft always been a perfect
angel? I don't think so. Microsoft should face no penalties that
involve changes to their product or by "releasing" information about
their source code. The future of computing is not a bunch of different
systems that aren't compatible but a global network of computers
seamlessly exchanging information. Microsoft is working on this goal.
Sincerely,
Thomas F. Luby
One wonders if any effort has been made to validate the origins of any of the comments. If it has, I guess this one slipped through.
I noticed alot of them had "@inetgw" appended to the address. Maybe someone set up a web page with Enter your Name and Address and send this premade comment.
If someone downloads the comments, do a search to see how many of them have "@inetgw" or a duplicate message.
Microsoft has 'cut off the air supply' of dozens of competitors over the years by copying their ideas and selling products at a loss until the competitor is run out of business. They've outright been proven to have stolen code from other companies such as Apple (QuickTime) and Stack. They've violated court decrees telling them not to do this, and they've falsified evidence in court (remember the videotape?). Their products are bad for productivity; look at how much time and money has been wasted fighting the viruses that keep plaguing Outlook and Internet Explorer again and again!
.NET is that Microsoft's going to make it cheap and easy for the biggest e-commerce companies to make web sites which work seamlessly with Windows, using proprietary Microsoft standards... and once that happens, Linux and Macintosh become second-class citizens. The day may come when you can only buy things from Amazon and eBay if you're using Windows XP or if you're willing to jump through lots of hoops.
And for all this, they're effectively being given a slap on the wrist and told 'don't do it again.' Microsoft has learned a very important lesson: laws can be broken. Just like speeding tickets don't physically prevent you from speeding, consent decrees don't prevent Microsoft from undermining other companies. They've learned that as long as they can drag out court proceedings, they can keep doing business as usual. It's even better if they can frame the battle as 'the evil government and evil competitors versus Microsoft's innovation, freedom, and all that's good for consumers!'
What's more, they're growing increasingly independent of other companies and outside standards. They tried to break Apple's Quicktime by suddenly dropping support for Netscape-style plug-ins; fortunately Apple was able to quickly release an ActiveX plugin. They decided that since Sun wouldn't allow them to 'embrace and extend' Java to lock users and developers into the Windows platform, they'd make their own replacement instead, and now Java support requires a separate download that most users won't bother with.
My biggest concern with
The real danger with Microsoft is that they have so much money to throw around that they can buy any market they want to buy. Whatever the Next Great Thing is to come down the pipe, mark my words: Microsoft will either buy the company responsible for it, or copy the ideas and give them away for free until the company is dead. You don't agree with me? Tell me how to compete with Microsoft. Say you have a great idea for a technology which will be as much of a leap forward as GUI's were over text screens, what's the use of bringing this to market if you know Microsoft's only going to bundle a workalike with Windows?
It's no longer possible to compete with Microsoft. They own the industry, and the government won't even slow them down.
Here's a google cache of a webpage that some of the pro-comments came from here. I wonder if the DOJ would consider these comments less valuable.
Seems everything in the 8,000 range is from MS employees and other non-living entities. I thought some random twit slipped through at comment 8432 (AOL address), but no, that's from MS as well, and from obviously someone good at public writing (read: propaganda).
I'm still hunting for the case-widening and case-lengthening posts, along with the pr0n link they admitted receiving, Ashcroft-snotting posts and other crap from the people here.
Haven't found a Taco OR Hemos post yet (nor Rusty or Ino). Found mine, though. Also found some Ayn Rand-spewing nutter with the same name as my father who wrote a rather disjointed diatribe but I think was pro-MS.
woof.
I search the list for my name... not there, so I searched the list for my email address... not there.... so I looked around for something resembling my name or email address...
somehow, they managed to butcher it very badly - the last letter of my username was wrong, and the domain name has a dot where there should have been an 'o'. At first I thought this was some clever anti-spam technique, but other email addresses seem to be valid. Lets hope the DOJ doesn't screw up the settlement too (fingers crossed).
---- I made the Kessel Run in under 11 parsecs.
MTC-000000001 0001:
First Comment!
I Heart Sorting Networks
This document is available in three formats: this web page (for browsing content), PDF (comparable to original document formatting), and WordPerfect. To view the PDF you will need Acrobat Reader, which may be downloaded from the Adobe site. For an official signed copy, please contact the Antitrust Documents Group.
I realized I'd not seen anyone post anything in WordPerfect in years! Gosh, I wonder why they did that.
As Nietsche famously said, "If you stare too long into the Abyss, 1d4 Tanar'ri of random type will attack you."
That's around 400 megabits per second, about right for an uncapped cable modem. Before the site is swamped of course. I've had two download streams, each going that fast in the past, before they capped us.
Here's an improved alphabetical index that prevents the annoyance of having to cross reference manually:
http://eon.law.harvard.edu/mscomment/
I just realized: There's a very important lesson to be learned from these public comments.
Look at the sheer number of people who simply signed off on a form letter. Look too at the large number of people who, in their own words, condemned the antitrust suit as 'sore losers picking on nice Microsoft.'
What this means is that people have been buying Microsoft's propaganda. Lots of people. It also means that people have no idea there are any alternatives other than Windows.
More clearly than anything else I've seen, this shows the uphill struggle Linux is going to have -- or that anything will have, if it ever wants to unseat Windows.
People have been hit by Windows viruses and Outlook trojan horses, they've had to put up with all the nastiness and instability which is an inherent part of Windows, they've had to deal with exorbitant upgrade pricing and heavy-fisted licensing practices... and yet they still sing the praises of Microsoft.
As long as this continues, we will never have justice.
It is easy to see how things are shaping up from the start Should Never Have Brought Suit looks like they put the case against the suit before anything else, I think that says alot. Then comes Allegations Of Political Influence, they say "The commentors' allegations, however, lack any factual support", not that the gutting of the DOJ team and the fact that they are suddenly settling after a new president comes into power even make it as far as circumstantial evidence, and they go on to say "Allegations that the substance of the RPFJ reflects any kind of political corruption are meritless", and what investigation did they do to come to that conclusion? None. In any other case if an alegation was made it would be investigated, here it is not, the people will draw their own conclusions. In Removing The "Fruits" Of Microsoft's Anticompetitive Conduct they say "But the United States never alleged in this case that Microsoft illegally acquired its operating system monopoly.", Stac Electronics anyone? In Fines they say "punishment is not a valid goal", now that speaks volumes, can anyone imagine if they had said the same thing about Kevin Mitnik? In Adequacy Of The United States' Competitive Impact Statement they say "As this recitation shows, while the commentors couch their objections in terms of an alleged failure by the United States to comply with the Tunney Act, for the most part the objections are in substance comments on the RPFJ itself. Because the CIS fully complies with the Tunney Act requirements, none of the objections is well taken.", again there is no explanation, no investigation, you can almost hear them say "Move along, nothing to see here", and they almost do when it comes to Timing And Process Of Hearing they say "Allowing Third-Party Participation Through An Evidentiary Hearing Would Unnecessarily Delay And Complicate These Proceedings" and they try to bury the litigating states with "The Tunney Act Proceedings Should Not Be Held In Conjunction With, Or Rely Upon Evidence From, The Litigating States' Remedy Hearing" and "The Court Should Grant Deference to the Judgment of the United States". Then we get into technical definitions "Some commentors argue that it is inappropriate for Microsoft Middleware to depend on separate distribution from a Windows Operating System Product.(84) They argue that there is no logical reason for such a distinction and that requiring separate distribution merely provides another way for Microsoft to avoid its disclosure requirements.", given that MS already has its auto-update feature in Windows the horse has already bolted. In Non-Retaliation they say "Section III.A of the RPFJ prohibits a broad range of retaliatory conduct by Microsoft" yet we already have MS trying to force OEMs to give up IP rights which can be seen as retaliatory conduct, again horse, bolted. As far as a level playing field for licencing goes "The RPFJ permits Microsoft to provide Consideration to an OEM with respect to a Microsoft product or service, but only where the level of Consideration is commensurate with the OEM's contribution to the development, distribution, promotion, or licensing that particular product or service." so as long as MS says OEM X helped out, discounts as usual all around. Back to the retaliation and "To ensure that the twenty Covered OEMs will be free from the threat of Microsoft retaliation or coercion", so if you're not one of the 20 you're fscked. The rest is just the same, attempting to defend the indefensible, there is nothing good here, not one shred, like Kurtz wrote in in his book at the end of Apocalpse Now, Kill Them All...
Any sufficiently advanced man is indistinguishable from God
There is a fairly complete list of links to stories about the whole mess.
Can't find the right link, but it sticks in my buffer.
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
that different comments has exactly same content in a row?
Comment MTC-00021678
Comment MTC-00021680
Comment MTC-00021682
Comment MTC-00021678
Comment MTC-00021694
Comment MTC-00021702
Comment MTC-00021704
Comment MTC-00021705
Comment MTC-00021706
Comment MTC-00021710
What do they think? They take DOJ an idiot who wouldn't notice this? Oh wait...
I'm too tired to list them all, but I'm sure there's much much more.
(This line is inserted to get around the lame-o lameass filter, blah blah blah blah lameass filter is lame, blah blah blah blah)
Hmm. No Malda, Robert; no Bates, Jeffrey; no Lord, Timothy.
Looks like inetgw is Microsofts Internet Gateway, or is that Microsoft Astroturfing Gateway?
Any sufficiently advanced man is indistinguishable from God
What's up with that?
I'm betting that there are alot of posts like that, I wonder if 30,000 gun toting MS-Bush bashing people are enough for a revolution....
I doubt it, since all the gun toters voted for Bush.
I read quite a few of the comments, and most of what I was able to find (albeit in a very small sample, 20 or so) were pro-Microsoft comments. Now, at least 5 of those 20 were form letters that must have originated with M$ and quite a few others seemed to be so clueless as to what M$ does in the marketplace..."stop harrasing Microsoft"..."stop keeping M$ from innovating"...ugh...
The United States is populated with sheep. I can't wait to leave...
I sure wish they would have deleted the email addresses of the posters, what a gold mine for spammers.
The difference between Canada and the USA is that in Canada healthcare is a right and gun ownership is a privilege.
In my letter my name is spelled correctly as 'Beier' but it is incorrectly spelled in the alphabetical listing as 'Bejer'.
What is odd is that the only previous time that I've seen that mispelling is in the credits to the movie Showgirls. Kinda makes you wonder.
Thad Beier
I love Mondays. On a Monday, anything is possible.
This makes a nonsense of the rest of that section since it is based on the premis that OSS companies will be able to obtain licenses for Microsoft APIs and network protocols. What are they going to do with them? Since access to that information is restricted they won't be able to release the results as open source.
At the end of the day, we might as well accept that the US government (and most US citizens) would be entirely happy with a world where Windows was the only operating system which could either run on modern computers or connect to the internet.
Maybe it's a form letter. In political situations those are VERY common. It's not some secret ploy, ask anyone that is lobbying for some change. Everyone does this. It's a way to get poeple to show support that wouldn't otherwise sit down and write out letters by hand.
Oh yeah, we've never done that on Slashdot for copyright laws, have we?
So, basically, they wanted comments from the consumers, who the suit is supposed to protect, but they've ignored and dismissed all of the comments. They acknowledged no validity in any comment, nor attempted to seriously address any of their concerns, other than by saying, "that's not so". Being quite frank, the remedies in this proposal don't go far enough. The only way to ensure a competitive market which is beneficial to the consumer is to impose strict remedies -- preventing MS from imposing ANY restrictions on what OEM's do with the products they put on their machines, forcing MS to license at least some critical components of Win9x, NT, 2k, and XP to allow for competition with MS' "bundled" software and to allow alternate OS' to be able to use Windows software.
The ignorance of some stupid commentors is noted. "Would you rather be using anything else", and "there's nothing else easier to use" predominated among MS-supporters. Had MS not been a monopoly and had an unfair advantage with OEMs, BeOS would have superceded it by now and become the standard desktop OS.
The incompetence of the Justice Department is easily discernable through comments such as these:
174. A few commentors argue that, under Section III.C.2, Microsoft has control over what non-Microsoft products may be promoted by an OEM because Microsoft could define what "impair[s] the functionality of the user interface."(183) Section III.C.2 applies only to shortcuts, but it allows those shortcuts to be of any size and shape. Potentially, these shortcuts could be so large as to cover key portions of the Windows user interface (for example, the Start Menu). As the Court of Appeals found, Microsoft has an interest in preventing unjustified drastic alterations of its copyrighted work. Microsoft, 253 F.3d at 63. The limitation preventing shortcuts from impairing the functionality of the user interface was designed to respect this interest, while still giving OEMs considerable freedom to promote Non-Microsoft Middleware.
No, actually, its not possible to for shortcuts to "be so large as to cover key portions of the Windows user interface (for example, the Start Menu)". Even if it that would be MS' fault for design flaw. Furthermore, MS should only be allowed to sell OEM's its OS. The OEM's should have the freedom to modify it as they will. MS should not be allowed to HURT consuemrs by preventing their OEM's from tailoring their OS to their needs.
Granted, this proposal is better than nothing at all; but it doesn't go far enough to punish MS for past illegal deeds, rectify the monopolistic situation created, and prevent MS from future monopolistic deeds.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
The United States believes that the requirements in Section III.J.2 are no broader than is necessary to prevent misuse or misappropriation of intellectual property.
Basically, they are saying: the US government created the Microsoft monopoly via copyright, and the government doesn't feel like taking it away. I guess those MS tax revenues are pretty hefty.
Oh well. Here in America we have a curious sort of "Non-Laissez-faire Capitalism".
Microsoft has 'cut off the air supply' of dozens of competitors over the years by copying their ideas and selling products at a loss until the competitor is run out of business. They've outright been proven to have stolen code from other companies such as Apple (QuickTime) and Stack. They've violated court decrees telling them not to do this, and they've falsified evidence in court (remember the videotape?). Their products are bad for productivity; look at how much time and money has been wasted fighting the viruses that keep plaguing Outlook and Internet Explorer again and again!
And for all this, they're effectively being given a slap on the wrist and told 'don't do it again.' Microsoft has learned a very important lesson: laws can be broken.
If that had been all they had learned, freedom and progress might still have had a chance in the United States. Unfortunately, Microsoft has learned much more. They have learned that, not only can they break the laws they don't like without any repercussions to speak of, they can purchase new laws to actively legislate their monopoly into perminance.
Consider: Microsoft owns most, if not all, of the patents on DRM technology as applied to computers. Microsoft is the only major software company promoting the SSSCA that will mandate this technology into every PC sold in the United States, while every other player in the industry, bar none, vehemently opposes this legislation.
We are about to make the Microsoft Monopoly the only legal operating system in the United States, modulo those unthreatening "competitors" they might choose to license the patents to, for a heafty fee. Anyone taking any bets on the survival of GNU/Linux, FreeBSD, or any new OS startups within the United States if and when the SSSCA passes?
It will soon become time to emigrate folks, I kid you not.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
This is only sorta on topic I realize. But isn't it convenient that all of us got to post comments to the first RPFJ and right after all the comments were in they release a new version of it. Is it just me or does that totally slam the purpose of the Tunney Act? I commented on the original document by reading it thoroughly and writing my specific problems with each section. Given their changes, sections of my commentary (and undoubtably numerous other's commentaries as well) are irrelevant, and things I would've commented on are not included as it was impossible to know these changes.
Step One: Release a bad settlement
Step Two: Accept public commentary
Step Three: Modify the bad settlement slighty to give the appearance of having listened to the commentary in order to get the settlement originally desired, not allowing the public to comment on it
Step Four: Laugh all the way to the bank
I think there should be a new Tunney Act period for the new settlement. But hey, what do I know anyway. It's not like they listened to my original comments...
-Mike
Well, let me start by saying here's mine.
That said, I don't think the current DOJ gives a rat's ass about the public's opinion on the case (duh). Republicans repeatedly criticized Clinton for using public opinion polls...I guess they think that those corporate campaign contributors are much more worthwhile to listen to (DISCLAIMER: I am not a Clinton supporter or apologist, nor do I believe for a second that Clinton wasn't beholden to corporate interests...I'm merely pointing out a hypocrisy). Those $4M USD in campaign contributions will grab the attention of the DOJ over the public interest any day.
Someone with time on his/her hands should index these comments and come up with some statistics: how many of the comments were (a) for or against the settlement, (b) how many were form letters, (c) how many were submitted by corporations vs. individuals. Not that these are terribly meaningful, but they would shed some light on the DOJ's summary comments.
By the way - notice the .htm extension on all these pages. Netcraft says they're running Netscape-Enterprise 4.0 on Solaris, but I wonder if they didn't use Front Page to create these pages...
"You done taken a wrong turn."
-Bill McKinney, in Deliverance
Suddenly, I'm wondering when I'm going to get an email from my manager telling me I'm fired because I do not support one of my company's major business partners.
I *know* that if Microsoft is broken up, it will mean bad, bad things for the company I work for.
I also know the difference between right and wrong. And if punishing the wrong means my company suffers, and I lose my job because of that, so be it. But now I'm worried that having my opinion and real name exposed publicly like this might be a threat to my career.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
From the list:
;)
MTC-00001595 0001 root@usdoj.gov
MTC-00019283 0001 root@ut6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00000209 0002 root@wt4.usdoj.gov
MTC-00000673 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00000252 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00000290 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00002095 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00001577 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00002191 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00009661 0001 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00000292 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00000301 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00000669 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00001125 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00001791 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00002038 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00002499 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00002523 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00002671 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00002732 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00004479 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00004530 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00004581 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00004710 0002 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00001067 0003 root@wt6.usdoj.gov
MTC-00000127 0001 Root@wtb.usdoj.gov
MTC-00025815 0003 root@wtg.usdoj.gov
Guess they're counting mailer-daemons or the likes.
This message is provided under the terms outlined at http://www.bero.org/terms.html
From Disclosure Of Communications Protocols : Right. No point stopping them from leveraging their desktop monoply into a server monopoly, huh? I thought that was EXACTLY wht this case was about - leveraging one monopoly into another. Right. No point letting those Commie Free Software and Open Source people in on the info, even though in many areas they constitue the ONLY remaining competition to Microsoft - because this settlement isn't about punishing or limiting Microsoft. It's about making the case go away by doing as little as possible because the jagoffs running our government don't believe in antitrust law.
Classic maneuver by Republican regimes - if you disagree with a law or regulation that you can't get overturned legitimately, just appoint assholes who will refuse to properly enforce it.
The only explanation is that Fucking DOJ is so far into Micorsoft's pocket that they taste dick everytime they open their mouths.
"that's not encryption - it's a new perl script that I'm working on..." - from some Matrix parody
Searching for "Roy Stogner", roystgnr, or permutations thereof comes up empty. I'm not too disappointed: I suppose if they weren't going to pay attention to my comment anyway, not reading it at all isn't too big a step down.
Apparantly I'm "Roy Stogner" in the (emailed) comment text, but "Stonere, Roy" in the index.
I do appreciate this level of openness by the DOJ, but it would be more convenient for all involved if they just put a "We're goddamn morons" disclaimer at the top of the page, rather than requiring us to perform significant investigation to ascertain that ourselves.
I have no idea about the others, but Red Hat submitted a comment. See the list of "major" comments at http://www.usdoj.gov/atr/cases/ms-major.htm
they should have set up a filter.
any comment which has a body exactly like another comment should be thrown out.
why wasn't this done?
then again... it's not like my comment ultimately matters in this case.
:(
Perhaps. So now some perl-savvy Slashdotter should write a script to mirror the site into a database, and post the resulting URL. Shouldn't be more than an hour or two of work for someone who has the skills...
... just credit me and link to my site, OK?
http://weston.canncentral.org/msdoj/lookup.php
This lets you look up any comment by name, or comment ID (if you know it).
I also threw in the ability to let you look up comments by minimum number of pages.... this lets you look at "substantive" comments quickly.
The code that I used to do all this is located in the directory. Feel free to take and mirror
(Alas... I lost my mods for this thread when I decided to post this... my apologies to the parent poster and the sibling poster who made the comment about database programmers sleeping in -- at first you both amused me, and then you inspired me...)
Tweet, tweet.
A friend of mine just put together this search form after reading this story.... you can search by name (no wildcarding yet, so it has to be exact). Or.... if you want to find the really substantive comments you can search by minimum number of pages! Try searching for pages > 30 ... it's interesting stuff.
Libertarianism is rich wolves and poor sheep playing gambler's ruin for dinner.
The problem is, the biggest "whine" was from "poor Netscape" regarding the browser war.
Well, actually Netscape has some of the best arguments against Microsoft when it comes to breaking antitrust laws.
Antitrust being defined as "when a company with a monopoly uses their monopoly proceeds to undercut their competition in other markets by selling below cost." For example, Standard Oil did this in the earlier part of the century (when gasoline was a new market, kind of like software is today) by obtaining a monopoly in certain cities, then jacking up the price of gasoline so that they could undersell everyone else in other cities, repeating the process as needed. They could have easily extended this monopoly ad infinitum to completely different markets, like cars or electric razors if it pleased them, and noone would have a hope in hell with competing with them. Thankfully the DOJ bitchslapped them and broke up Standard Oil before they started making electric razors. Microsoft used the funds they generate in operating systems to fund development of Internet Explorer. Microsoft then gave Internet Explorer away for free, among other things. This is a product that Microsoft has spent millions of dollars developing, but "out of the goodness of their hearts" they gave it away for free. You might argue from a completely subjective point of view that "noone ever bought Navigator" but Netscape Inc says otherwise, with the books to prove it (which were used in court as evidence by the way). Navigator was a significant source of revenue for Netscape right up until they had to give it away to compete with Microsoft.
Now, you also argue that Netscape died due to its own bungling and IE's technical superiority, rather than because Microsoft went out of their way to kill it, but you might have noticed that development of IE has slowed drastically since Netscape was bought by AOL. Why is that? Microsoft has already clinched the market through exclusive licensing deals, their control over OEMs and "special deals" with big businesses that ensure that they wouldn't dare buy another browser from anyone else ever again. They no longer have to invest in a money-losing market by actually developing software. The internet explorer design team now probably consists of five guys in a forgotten office somewhere who occasionally fix bugs not when CERT says it's a good idea, but after a billion script kiddies take advantage of some security flaw, bringing the internet to its knees with unintentional DOS attacks. (Okay, maybe that's really exaggerating, but to say the least, MS doesn't care about IE much anymore, and is allowing it to stagnate because there's no competition and there never will be either.)
So the process? Microsoft spends millions of dollars on a product that eventually stagnates, for no other reason than to put Netscape out of business. Those millions of dollars didn't come out of thin air, they came out of the lucrative monopoly Microsoft has on the desktop. And that's Antitrust boys and girls.
"No problem. I have the capacity to do infinite work so long as you don't mind that my quality approaches zero."-Dilbert
Yeah, it can be humbling. I seem to have got _two_ comments, one of which was serious and one of which was the flame. I remembered making the flame, but I hadn't remembered the serious one (it is a single succinct point). Though for all I know they ignored both of them...
And Microsoft didn't even have to pay a $1 fine this time!
Is there no justice? Oh right, I forgot.
I'm letter number 588. Cool.
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RESPONSE OF THE UNITED STATES TO PUBLIC COMMENTS ON THE REVISED PROPOSED FINAL JUDGMENT
... < only if > its unlawful conduct increased or extended Microsoft's monopoly ... neither the District Court nor the Court of Appeals found this direct causal connection between the conduct and the continuance of the monopoly.
... Microsoft did not impose the unlawful IAP contracts in the early, pre-IE days of Navigator, but rather started to impose them in late 1996 at a time when Microsoft was trying to build IE's usage share.
This sucker is BIG. With one exception (the first item), I worked from the bottom of the document and therefore only cover the FOOTNOTES.
(236) IE or the IEAK [Internet Explorer Administration Kit] free of charge or even at a negative price
DOJ specificly permits Mocrosoft to charge MORE for buying a version without InternetExplorer.
Every item below here is a DOJ FOOTNOTE:
(50) The United States does not believe that there are determinative documents in this case
Legally, we have to show the public the evidence that proved Microsoft is guilty. There isn't anything that proves Microsoft is guilty. Therefore we don't have to show any evidence to the public.
(68) Nor may relief in a civil antitrust case be punitive.
Our job is only to restore competition. Microsoft gets a free pass on anything they've already done.
(70) "terminat[ing] the illegal monopoly" and "deny[ing] to the defendant the fruits of its statutory violation"
Microsoft did illegal stuff, but uhhh... none of those illegal things 'increased or extended Microsoft's monopoly'. So we can't end the monopoly or remove the 'fruits' of illegal behavior.
(256) < would Section III.G.2 have protectd Netscape while IE was under developement? > if Navigator did not compete with IE because IE did not exist, then Microsoft would have no reason to give an IAP benefits on the condition that the IAP not use Navigator.
This one basicly says it's OK for microsoft to play dirty while they are developing a product. Competition does not exist yet. We only protect competition.
(292) Maddux 13 (Microsoft should be required to publish on Slashdot (slashdot.org) and Freshmeat (www.freshmeat.org).
LOL! Had to include this one!
(338) < re: Subsection III.I.1 > United States does not believe that the circumstances support royalty-free licensing. Compulsory licensing, but with a reasonable royalty, will be sufficient to achieve the remedial goal of ensuring access to necessary information for interoperability.
Our only goal is to restore competition, no matter how restricted it may be. And Microsoft may earn profits on it. We don't give a damn about that free software nonsense.
(383)the suggestion of an open-ended decree, subject to review after five years (see Gifford 9; Litan 73), or contingent upon Microsoft's market share decreasing (see Thomas 6), would create undesirable uncertainty in the market
And uncertainty in the market is a BadThing. We are at war, remember?
The source for this footnote is "Antitrust Division Manual's general guidance that 'staff should not negotiate any decree of less than 10 years' duration although decrees of longer than 10 years may be appropriate in certain circumstances."
(384) Contrary to these commentors' assertions, the possibility of the two-year extension of the RPFJ's requirements and prohibitions will help dissuade Microsoft from violating its terms and conditions. The United States believes that this potential sanction, which is supplemented by its traditional enforcement and contempt authority, will provide a significant incentive for Microsoft to comply.
Our plan is good enough. We're tired of reading letters from idiots that keep saying they don't trust Microsoft. We've been eating lunch with their lawyers every day for months. They say it's long enough. We believe them.
(404) originally alleged that Microsoft engaged in unlawful monopolization, in violation of Section 2, with respect to Microsoft Office. However, the States dropped this claim prior to the trial.
Any "bad behavior" that was dropped before trial, not proven at trial, or in any way hampered by the appeal ruling is off-limits for remedy.
This minimalist view of what they can/will do seems to a recurring theme.
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I would like to know why they didn't submit comments either. How about Alan Cox?
Comments were only welcome from US citizens (though as others have mentioned little attempt appears to have been made with verification). Many open source developers are not US citizens.
It appears that they at least tried to handle the concerns of the 47 'major' commenters,
Exactly how have they defined these "major" commenters? In terms of the number of points they raise or in terms of who they are? If the latter they appear to have missed a rather important document, known as "The US Constitution".
Anyway, the points of mine I didn't see addressed had to do with the ease with which it appears MS can technically exploit the loopholes of the settlement. For example, MS Office is not middleware,
Is the term "middleware" actually used in computing outside the context of this court case?
A lot of comment like this: ..."I would like to express my support for the revised proposed Final Judgment in the U.S. v. Microsoft case. This lengthy litigation has cost my fellow taxpayers and me more than $35 million..."
So dosn't this mean that the judgement should at minimum include a fine of at least $35 million plus interest. (Since this has been going on for nearly a decade that is rather a lot of interest.)
Wrong url - try this
OS/2 - because choice is a terrible thing to waste.