Iowa Court May Order Microsoft Refunds

dowobeha writes: "The Des Moines Register is reporting that thousands of Windows 98 users in Iowa could get $40 refunds from Microsoft. The Iowa Supreme Court has found the big boys from Redmond guilty of price fixing in violation of a 1976 Iowa law. According to the report, this is the first antitrust ruling in any state that favors 'indirect purchasers' (regular consumers who got Windows preinstalled on their newly purchased computer) rather than "direct purchasers" (manufacturers who license Windows to distribute on new machines)."

Comments

Yes, But That In No Way Supercedes State Law

[FreeUser]

Aren't sales from MS to Iowa residents interstate commerce and thus a matter for Federal antitrust law?

Yes, they are. They are also subject to state law where they sell their products. Being an interstate transaction adds federal jurisdiction to an already existing state jurisdiction, it does not in any way negate the state's jurisdiction.

In other words, it adds regulations Microsoft must follow, it doesn't supercede any. Just as California emissions standards apply to automobiles built in Detroit (but sold in California), so to Iowa's antitrust regulations apply to Microsoft's sales in Iowa, regardless of where Micrsoft is headquartered, or the floppies and CDs their shabby OS is distributed on happen to have been printed.

You're all wrong

[gidds]

As has been said, the first digital computer was Charles Babbage's Analytical Engine, though his design was never fully built (partly because the mechanical engineering of the day wasn't up to the job, and partly because the government stopped funding him).

As for the first electronic digital computer, that wasn't ENIAC, either. I know you USAns like to think that you invented everything, but Colossus here in the UK beat you by a few years.

The first binary electronic digital computer was German: Konrad Zuse's Z1.

And ENIAC wasn't even the first stored-program electronic computer: while ENIAC had to be programmed by plugboard, the Manchester Mark 1, aka `Baby', was storing programs in memory along with data, just as all current machines do.

Credit where it's due, please :)