Microsoft Anti-Trust Rulings Due Tomorrow

ewhac writes "The Associated Press is reporting that Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly will deliver her opinions on the Microsoft anti-trust suit tomorrow, after close of markets. Much speculation revolves around whether she will approve or reject the settlement negotiated by the Justice Department. Should she reject it, she can only offer suggestions for improvement; she cannot impose amendments. Watch this site for further developments :-)." Reader acacia points out that the opinions should be posted at this site, if you want a quick bookmark.

Comments

The missing element:

[intermodal]

how they intend to enforce the judgement. Try keeping tabs on the biggest information company in the world and you'll see where the problem lies.

Re:The missing element:

[guttentag]

how they intend to enforce the judgement. Try keeping tabs on the biggest information company in the world and you'll see where the problem lies.

The DOJ isn't going to enforce anything where MS is concerned because the company bought the Bush administration. It shouldn't have to babysit Microsoft anyway.

Microsoft's PR goons work hard to broaden this topic to derail any conversation non-lawyers might attempt, so here's the obligatory recap to head off the trolls and astroturfers:

1. It is not illegal to obtain a monopoly in a particular market. However, it is illegal to use that monopoly to crush competition and move into other markets.
2. Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson found Microsoft guilty of abusing its monopoly power and ordered to company split into two entities -- one would be centered around the Windows product and the other would be centered around Office.
3. An appeals court threw out the breakup ruling on the grounds that Jackson was biased (he granted interviews to reporters prior to releasing his decision, a practice that is frowned upon in legal circles but one that Jackson has championed in the past as important to keeping the public informed about the decisions made in the courts). However, it affirmed the judgment that Microsoft abused its monopoly.
4. The case was sent to Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly in search of a new, unbiased remedy. Kollar-Kotelly initially urged the two sides (Microsoft on one side, the U.S. Department of Justice and 18 state attorneys general on the other) to reach a settlement on their own, with a highly-regarded judge arbitrating. IIRC, these talks went nowhere and the case returned to Kollar-Kotelly.
5. A regime change took place (George W. Bush was appointed President of the United States, with a non-trivial amount of financial assistance from Microsoft and its employees), and the DOJ, which ultimately reports to the president, conveniently reached a settlement that:
   1. benefits Microsoft
   2. costs Microsoft nothing
   3. aids some consumers in the short term
   4. hurts all consumers in the long term
   Nine state attorneys general (who feel they have more important things to worry about during their terms in office) have signed on to the settlement. The remaining nine refused to accept the settlement and the case has essentially forked.
6. Microsoft tried to force public acceptance of the settlement by announcing that it has already met the conditions. However, Kollar-Kotelly has yet to approve the settlement.
7. On Nov. 1, 2002, after 4:00 p.m. EST, Kollar-Kotelly is expected to announce her opinions in both cases.

My View (as a journalist and engineer who has been closely watching this case for over four years)
Microsoft often complains that it's being "punished for being successful" to draw attention from the focus of the case, so let's get this out of the way: I don't care about punishment. I want to see a remedy that protects the market and consumers.

When a person is convicted of driving under the influence, the authorities don't just hand his keys back and say "we'll be watching you." They take away his license for the benefit of society.

Since MS has demonstrated that it can not handle a monopoly responsibly, an effective remedy must remove the company's ability to violate anti-trust laws in the future. It doesn't get any second chances (as an an irresponsible driver might) because its illegal actions were well-planned and driven by malice (with intent to destroy its competitors, illustrated by such colorful metaphors as "cut off Netscape's air supply").

If Kollar-Kotelly announces such a remedy, Microsoft will complain that the government is inappropriately interfering with a market it doesn't understand, and it will try to discredit Kollar-Kotelly by accusing her of bias or incompetence.

No matter what her opinions turn out to be, this will not be the end of the case. Whichever of the three sides is displeased will appeal to SCOTUS and it will be at least another year or two before we see a definitive decision.

However, tomorrow's news will help shape the central arguments of the SCOTUS fight.

Re:The missing element:

[Salsaman]

IANAL, but didn't the SCOTUS already have a chance to hear *this* appeal ? IIRC, they turned it down and sent it back to the lower court.

So when CKK gives her judgement, is it really possible to appeal to SCOTUS *again* ? Can one side or the other keep appealing indefinately ? Surely there must be a limit to appeals ?

Re:The missing element:

[guttentag]

IIRC, SCOTUS was asked to "fast-track" the case, bypassing some of the appeals process in the interest of time -- since a year or two is an eternity or two in the computer industry. They decided against fast-tracking it and said it should go through the normal appeals process before returning to SCOTUS. So they didn't reject the case, they just rejected the option of giving it special treatment.

Re:The missing element:

[Alsee]

Excellent post, though I would like to correct one point. You said:

An appeals court threw out the breakup ruling on the grounds that Jackson was biased

The appellate court actually said "we find no evidence of actual bias ". They overturned Jackson because he violated judicial standards about talking to the press which could lead to the appearance of impropriety.

-

Re:The missing element:

[Nightpaw]

Talk all you want about campaign donations and the like, not about a disputed election that has since been resolved.

So, if I kill your mom and manage to get away with it, you don't get to complain or talk about it anymore?

When the SCOTUS rules along party lines, against personal precedent, in order to install a POTUS, I think that's pretty much on topic whenever you're talking about the national judicial system.

Re:The missing element:

[poot_rootbeer]

(George W. Bush was appointed President of the
United States, with a non-trivial amount of financial assistance from Microsoft and its
employees)

Post proof that Microsoft donations made any difference in the outcome of the election, or retract.

I'd retract if I were you.

Re:The missing element:

[Overzeetop]

I don't believe it was stated that the donations made any differece. He was "appointed" by the supreme court, as they interpreted the election results which were in dispute. It is, clearly, a biased point of view, but one which is held by a plurality of the voting electorate.

Though I haven't seen the candidate's financial disclosure, nor the disclosures of those "independent" groups which campaigned on issues for which only GW Bush supported, I would expect that Microsoft and its employees made more than trivial contributions towards the goal of G W Bush ascending to the presidency.

I don't see where a retraction is necessary.

Re:The missing element:

[Sir Tristam]

When the SCOTUS rules along party lines, against personal precedent, in order to install a POTUS,...

Nice try. However, let's try to stay based in reality. Basic summary: US Constitution Article II gives the state legislatures sole and total discretion on how to choose the state's electors for POTUS. Florida Legislature set a deadline date of November 14 for certifying results. At the request of the Gore campaign, the Florida Supreme Court (1 Independent and the rest Democrat) legislated from the bench and extended that date to November 26. SCOTUS, along party lines, said correctly that the Florida Supreme Court did not have that power (remember--US Constitution gives total control to state Legislature). In a second case, SCOFL re-instated their November 26 date, and the election results were certified on that date. (SCOFL also went on to order certification of some votes after the November 26 date.)

After the results were certified (including only a parital recount of Miami-Dade), the Gore campaign contested the results. Because the SCOFL had moved the certification date from November 14 to November 26 while the date that electors had to be transmitted to Congress had not changed, and the fact that the law does not allow results to be contested until they are certified, the contest phase was shortened by 12 days. In response to the contest, a manual re-examination of undervotes was ordered. From the SCOTUS decision: "The (SCOFL ordered) recount process...is inconsistent with the minimum procedures necessary to protect the fundamental right of each voter..." Thus, in a 7-2 vote (see p.12 of the decision) the SCOTUS declared that the procedures set up by the SCOFL were unconstitutional. That's not a 5-4 party-line vote. However, at the same time this decision was handed down the SCOTUS decided 5-4 that due to the short period of time before the electors had to be certified on December 12, there was no feasible way to conduct a recount that would protect the Equal Protection rights of all the voters, and so the SCOTUS would not require such recount.

Two things here are really interesting. First, the SCOTUS vote that gets all the media mention is not the 7-2 vote that the SCOFL process violated Equal Protection, but the 5-4 vote to not issue a decision requiring the state to do something impossible. Second, what really threw the monkey wrench into the whole thing was the Gore campaign's request to the SCOFL to violate the US Constitution and extend the protest (pre-certification of the votes) phase at the expense of time for the contest phase. That basically forced the SCOTUS to issue the 7-2 decision that it did, due to the lack of time before the December 12 deadline.

So, yes, you can claim a ruling "along party lines", as long as you ignore the real ruling, or assume that the SCOTUS should make rulings that violate the Constitution.

Chris Beckenbach

Antr-Trust Suit... anti-trust suit.. antitrustsuit

[KFury]

You know, the more I hear those words, the more they lose their meaning.

I'm at the point where I picture an anti-trust suit as being the last thing you'd want to wear on a blind date. Basically, the opposite of a technicolor dreamcoat.

This is new...

[megaduck]

I can't wait to see how this turns out. I think this is the first time I've anxiously anticipated a Microsoft anything.

Re:This is new...

[mikeee]

Well, you know, anything to do with Microsoft won't work properly until version 3. By that logic, Kotar-Kelly's ruling might actually be right!

Re:This is new...

[Anarchofascist]

"... I think this is the first time I've anxiously anticipated a Microsoft anything."

It feels sort of like the night before the debut of an eagerly-anticipated movie adaptation of a favourite comic strip. "Will it be a stinker?" "Will this be a turning point in film/legal history?" "Will they get it right?"

Re:This is new...

[WNight]

If I see Jar-Jar in this one, I swear I'm going to boycott the rest of the series of rulings!

7 years later....

[hfastedge]

Now the browser is back into the OS really.

Hopefully court cases can start moving at a O(1) pace instead of a O(N^2) pace.

I do however think this situation is different from the big tabbacco lawsuits that we saw from "The Insider" movie (eg they have enough money and time to wait out a 15 year lawsuit) since the comp field is far more dynamic than simple ol cigarettes.

Re:7 years later....

[ceejayoz]

When did Linux unseat Windows, again? I seem to have missed out on it...

Re:7 years later....

[Codifex Maximus]

>When did Linux unseat Windows, again? I seem to
>have missed out on it...

Well, it's not something that people usually shout to the neighborhood. Guy just gets a copy of Linux from somewhere, begins to goof around with it, finds out how powerful it is then next thing you know he's posting on Slashdot.

Happens alla time.

Anyway, as I said, it's a quiet revolution from many user's standpoint. They just switch to it - they don't bother to be counted.

It's, also, a gradual thing... and from my viewpoint, Linux is on the uphill slope towards that all important critical mass point in the curve.

Shh... now keep that a secret ok?

Re:7 years later....

[Sylver Dragon]

The fact is - it is fact - you can run without MS on your desktop perfectly fine and do all the core functions and specialized functions that you can do with Windows. You can do it on Apple's stuff, you can do it on Linux stuff, and you can do it *BSD's stuff. And most of it can be done not only cheaper but FOR FREE.

Everything? If you are talking about business software, I'll agree, it can be done. Though I would question how far reaching the ability to play games goes. Sure, there are games that have been ported to Linux, but is it really happening at a pace to keep up with the really avid gamer? Not to mention, that the time required for a port would keep one well behind the curve for the latest games, assuming that a game they want gets ported at all.
As for the free part of Linix, that is a huge advanatage, especially for business desktops. Though I think this is ignoring the costs associated with re-training. Sure, Gnome, KDE, etc. are all very close to windows in function, and in many cases in usage. But don't fool yourself, they are not the same. Moreover, they look and feel different, and that is going to scare non-tech types. In the end, it would probably be worth it, if you are in a position to do so, to switch a company over to Linux, but it would not be a very easy transition to make, and may get killed by managment.

That's a fact. Linux as a collective has everything any individual needs to ditch Windows. Might they need a bit more RAM? Yeah, maybe. Might it be inconveinent? Yes. But this isn't about inconveince. From day one the argument was that MS is a monopoly, that no one else has a chance to suceed in the desktop space.

I think you have hit on one of the biggest problems facing Linux, convenience. You claim that this isn't about inconvience, I belive that you are mistaken. What are computers but a more convenient way of doing things? This is true of most tools humans have created, if not all. We want to be able to do something that we cannot do on our own. So we create a tool to do it. Eventually someone else comes along and improves that tool, and the older version slow fades, often kept around for those few times when the newer tool would be more trouble to setup and use.
Computers are the same thing, they are just a tool. We started off with the old punch-card machines, now we have a PC with a hard-drive. The Operating System is simply the handle for the tool, it allows us to use it. The current iteration of Windows is the most familiar way to use the tool, and most convenient, for a large number of users. Linux has been offered up as a replacement, but few people have bothered to adopt it because it requires far to much effort on thier part to use. They may see that, if they could use it, it would offer an advantage, but, for most mudane tasks, its too much trouble to bother with. People want simple, and easy to use. That is one of the reasons humans use computers, they make many tasks simpler. Sure, Linux offers some advantages, but, for most people, its not enough of one to go through the trouble.

Re:7 years later....

[Sylver Dragon]

The point is not if Windows is better than Linux or vice versa. The point is are they in competition. That is the point. The answer is yes. Therefore MS was right, and there is no monopoly.

I would agree, MS is not technically a monopoly. They do, however, have a dominant market position, which they have been abusing. While they do have the right to negotiate contracts any way they see fit, they are doing so from a position of having a huge advantage. That I think, is the main thrust of the whole suit against them. Imagine Best Buy, for example, they plan to sell computers, so they enter into talks with MS for an OEM license. MS can basically dictate terms, what is Best Buy going to do? Threaten to go to a different OS, not likely. Consumers want Windows, and BB is trying to put out a line of budget PCs for those consumers, so they either swallow the shit that is fed to them by MS, or are forced to jack up the price of the PC to cover the retail cost of Windows. When you are talking about a $500 PC, tacking on an extra $100 for the OS is a 20% increse in price, not something that they want to do, it'd push them over the price point that they wanted, and put them as more expensive than the competition.
I think that this is less about a true monoploy, than is is about abusing a dominant market position. Using that position to stifle competitors, and using it to break into new markets with a horribly lopsided advantage.
But that's just my take on this mess, I could be wrong.

Republican bias

[SexyKellyOsbourne]

Considering that Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly was appointed by the very conservative Ronald Reagan, and the Justice Department is under control of the reactionary John Ashcroft, you can expect her to rule in Microsoft's favor and reject the deal to let the lawyers for the DoJ and Microsoft water it down even further.

Microsoft will quickly get back to their old dirty tricks of forcing their products upon consumers, without fear of government penalties. At best, they'll get a slap on the wrist, and we'll see Palladium-enforced computers at every electronics store we visit within 5 years.

Re:Republican bias

[Anonymous Coward]

Considering that Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly was appointed by the very conservative Ronald Reagan, and the Justice Department is under control of the reactionary John Ashcroft, you can expect her to rule in Microsoft's favor and reject the deal to let the lawyers for the DoJ and Microsoft water it down even further.

Judge Jackson was also a Reagan appointee. And yet he took the time to "get it" (by which I mean that he managed to educate himself enough about the technology to see through the smoke screens Microsoft's lawyers put up), and his ruling ripped the company a new one.

So Judge Kollar-Kotelly may yet rule in favor of Microsoft, but her being a Reagan appointee doesn't guarantee that at all.

Re:Republican bias

[Gregg M]

Wasn't Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson appointed by Reagan as well? He threw the book at them!

Re: Republican bias

[Black Parrot]

> Considering that Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly was appointed by the very conservative Ronald Reagan

Judges sometimes show remarkable independence after being "packed" onto the bench.

> and the Justice Department is under control of the reactionary John Ashcroft

Judges don't generally suck up to whoever is running the JD.

Looking at her record would probably give a better prediction of her behavior.

Re:Republican bias

[Neumann]

She may be a little more impartial than you believe..

Re:Republican bias

[sakusha]

Umm.. Not really. Judge KK recently gained a bit of attention for her activities as head of the FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act) court. That's the secret court that supervises the DoJ and Atty Gen. Asscroft's shredding of civil rights. She nailed Asscroft to the wall for his lies and abuses. This is a woman that has already shown her willingness to stand up to the Atty General. Here's a typical story:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?p agename= article&node=&contentId=A51220-2002Aug22&notFound= true

Re:Republican bias

[HiThere]

Anyone who didn't know what it should be doesn't even read the headlines. Still, he should have played the game a bit better.

Re:Republican bias

[ceejayoz]

Jackson "got it"? IIRC he was pretty clueless about computers, and gave press interviews saying how awful MS was before giving his court ruling. That alone violates a bunch of ethical and legal codes.

Re:Republican bias

[mjh]

Microsoft will quickly get back to their old dirty tricks of forcing their products upon consumers, without fear of government penalties.

Who are you trying to fool? They're ALREADY up to all new, even worse shenanigans. How about palladium? How about licensing 6.0?

If you ask me, these guys are already acting as if they won first case, or at least as if there will not be any consequences for having lost.

Halloween

[Alien54]

Too bad that Friday isn't Halloween.

Beyond the obvious symbolic context, I wouldn't might being part of an unruly mob with pitchforks and torches storming towards the Bill Gate's version of Frankenstein's castle.

Re:Halloween

[jasonditz]

speaking of halloween, shouldn't some MSFT employee have leaked some sort of document by now?

Re:Halloween

[Istealmymusic]

Glad you mentioned that. Halloween is an interesting holiday, a mix-mash of cultural ideas from All Saint's Day and pegan rituals. Pegans believed this day had the highest amount of reality-to-spiritial connection, so they put out their fires and dressed in ghoulish dark clothing to blend in with the dead. Additionally, monks went house-to-house asking for a small amount of food to pray for the members of the giving household. These where termed soulcakes. Learn something new every day eh?

Re:Halloween

[Istealmymusic]

Finally, someone with a sense of humor.

Its too big

[Trevelyan]

My guess is that MS is too big a monopoly, that it would realy hurt US (and world) economy if it taken to pieces
But then again I was too young to know what the break up of AT&T did (in the short term), but in the long run it seems to me that it helped.

Re:Its too big

[snarfer]

Consumers STILL can not purchase a brand-name computer that has Windows and Linux installed.

Re:Its too big

[tchdab1]

Sorry, your reasoning is counterintuitive.

MS has been convicted of being a huge monopoly, and monopolies survive by stifling competition and innovation that threaten them. So hamstringing a huge monopoly is beneficial to the economy - it lets in new players, new technologies, new industries that are kept out by the big guy. Those new competitors will force down prices by virtue of their competitive products (a MS OS and an Office suite can now set you back twice the cost of the PC hardware), people will buy more technology, the recession will end, there will be peace and dancing the the streets, and dinner will be hot and on-time every day.

Go Colleen!

Re:Its too big

[NetGyver]

Not to disagree with you, because i'm not sure myself about this. But my logic goes like this, for example:

If someone said my company enjoyed "Monopoly Power" and it was true, based on findings of fact, wouldn't I have to be a *MONOPOLY* to be able to enjoy "Monopoly Power"?

Based on your reasoning, it's like saying that I have presidental power, for example. Wouldn't I have to be a president to enjoy those powers?

Unless someone clarifies this for me, it's only fair to assume that in the findings of fact of Microsoft, the court did pretty much say Microsoft is a monopoly.

Re:Its too big

[Thurn und Taxis]

Exactly! One of the first questions a decent VC will ask you if you're trying to get funding for a company is "What's the barrier to entry?" I.e., what will keep another company (with potentially much larger resources) from just duplicating what you did and selling it for a cheaper price (since they didn't have to do the R&D or the market testing)? With a company like Microsoft in the picture, the answer for software companies is typically "nothing." VCs don't like to hear that answer, and consequently many good ideas never get off the ground. The net result is that the ideas these enterpreneurs had never see the light of day, because no one could be convinced that they would be profitable. Preventing Microsoft from squashing smaller companies like bugs (if only they would squash bugs the way they squash smaller competitors, but that's another story for another thread) could potentially go a long way toward promoting innovation.

Re:Its too big

[AntiNorm]

A government decreed break up of a company worked for Standard Oil [us-highways.com].

Then why is the government letting S.O. re-form itself? Just look at all the huge oil companies that are merging.

Re:Its too big

[ClosedSource]

Actually, comparisons between the old AT&T and MS are a bit absurd. If MS was like the old AT&T, all computer hardware and software would be owned by MS (which you couldn't buy, only lease) as well as the Internet infrastructure.

Actually, the present day AT&T is a closer match to MS than the old AT&T monopoly was.

Re:Its too big

[ClosedSource]

"MS has been convicted ..."

No, you're wrong. This is civil case, so it's not possible to get "convicted".

As far as monopolies being so bad is concerned, keep in mind that most of the innovation in computers in the last few decades came from the AT&T, Xerox, and IBM monopolies. I know that Xerox and IBM were not found to be monopolies by the courts, but there was at least as much evidence of them being monopolies as there is for MS.

Re:Its too big

[tchdab1]

You're right, convicted is the wrong legal term (sorry).
In a lawsuit brought by the US Department of Justice against Microsoft, Microsoft was found to be a monopoly and in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act, having acted illegally to preserve its monopoly.
The original penalty ordered by the judge, the breakup of Microsoft, was overturned by the appeals court after talking down Judge Jackson for inappropriate comments; the Supreme Court picked Judge Colleen to revisit the penalty phase, and that's apparently where we are.

(thanks for the opportunity to re-educate myself in the details of the case)

Re:Its too big

[ClosedSource]

Last time I checked, MS didn't charge a monthly fee for their software which is what leasing is.
Licensing issues are a different subject.

The legal issues surrounding CDs and DVDs etc. are really more about the music and movie industries than about MS. Perhaps this means that a few media companies control the market, but it has little to do with whether MS is a monopoly in the AT&T mold.

Re:TCan't wait to see how it turns out

[tomhudson]

With all the slashdotters hitting the site, we may end up crashing it, and having to wait until Monday anyway ... nope - queso reports they're running Reliant Unix, not Winblows ... (sigh of relief)

.

Re:Antr-Trust Suit... anti-trust suit.. antitrusts

[prockcore]

I'm at the point where I picture an anti-trust suit as being the last thing you'd want to wear on a blind date.

No, it's something you wear in a cleanroom.

Oh wait, that's an anti-static suit.

who?

[Xtifr]

Try keeping tabs on the biggest information company in the world...

What does IBM have to do with the Microsoft antitrust trial? :)

Re:who?

[mbogosian]

What does IBM have to do with the Microsoft antitrust trial? :)

I don't know, I thought he was talking about GE....

The next "Switch" ad.

[Hawthorne01]

I was writing the judgement on the PC, and it was like "beep beep boop beep beep", and then, it was like, half of my judgement was gone, and I was like "Huh?".

It devoured my judgement.

It was really a good judgement.

And then I had to do it again and I had to do it fast so it wasn't as good. It's kind of a...bummer.

I'm Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, and I'm a judge.

Re:The next "Switch" ad.

[loggia]

That is hilarious!

Re:The next "Switch" ad.

[Hilary Rosen]

That is great!

its our money

[skydude_20]

You and I still don't have to buy anything Microsoft, so we do it ourselfs, get them with our pocketbooks and this administration with our votes.

Of course....

[PhtmNoble]

Wait a sec... isin't Microsoft that small time company that makes Office.X ;-)

Basically this is going to be pointless, she has no juris-my-diction to do anything except change there closing price!! What is the point?

Ahh well, if all else fails, maybe everyone else can just convert to Macintoshes and run Darwin :-)

Worried because of the stock price

[brw215]

I wonder if this could finally be it. The importance of tommorow's decision will affect all software developers for years.

While I am hopeful, I am also fearful because Microsoft's shares rose in price today, meaning Wall street doesn't have to much faith in Judge Kollar-Kotelly.

Re:Worried because of the stock price

[donutello]

The announcement was made after the close of trading today. MSFT is trading down 67 cents in after hours reflecting the general uncertainty about the outcome.

Re:Worried because of the stock price

[Jonny Ringo]

Do not trust the current stock price. No one knows what's going to happen tomorrow. Unless you have a magic crystal ball. Do you? it is Halloween.

If MS does get a ass kicking tomorrow and the stock market reacts negatively.. DO NOT WORRY. Short term fluctuation of the Market is not as important as the long term.

she can not impose?

[lingqi]

Wait, so it's possible (hopefully unlikely, but nontheless possible) that DoJ completely ignores her suggestions and let Microsoft get off EASIER?

wow gotta love this government... Judges cannot impost judgements =)

Re:she can not impose?

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe that if she rejects, they have to come up with a NEW agreement. The DoJ can not just go and randomly impose whatever they want. They would have to go redraft a new settlement.

Her recommendations, if she gives them, are simply "here's a framework for what this settlement should look like. You better be close to this next time you show up here in my courtroom".

Re:Antr-Trust Suit... anti-trust suit.. antitrusts

[Dr Caleb]

No, it's a Teflon(tm) suit that nothing sticks to.

it's a fair settlement

[evil-empir3]

I expect the judge to accept the proposed settlement and be done with it. Microsoft has been complying with the settlement already and that's good. I predict that this decision will spark the beginning of a giant rally in the stock market which will be good for everyone.

A bad omen for the NBMers

[Spawn-Of-Cujo]

They are really whistling in the dark now. The announced departure of Charles James from the DOJ portends a complete undoing of the "settlement" he was dictated by Redmond. Bush had to find him a cushy job from his oil-field cronies to get him out of the way.

Re:A bad omen for the NBMers

[ajakk]

It is amazing that the one actual insightful comment on this entire issue is stuck down at the bottom without any moderation at all.

The DOJ sold out on this settlement with Microsoft. I have no doubts that a Gore administration would have done just the same, but Charles James really screwed up on this one. The major indicator of how crappy the settlement was is that none of the career antitrust attorneys at the DOJ signed on the settlement. That is an act that is never done by the DOJ. The Washington Post ran a story that was obviously leaked by the career attorneys talking about how Charles James insisted that he should be the only one negotiating with MS, so he and the MS lawyer were sitting in the room together with the MS lawyer dictating what the settlement should be.

One major question that no one has thought about is how this decision will affect the races for Attorney General that are going on now. The elections are on Tuesday, and three of the resisting AGs are in very tight races. I suspect that the settlement will be rejected, and the judge will state that she thinks there should be a more stringent settlement. Microsoft will then appeal this ruling to the DC Cicuit, where her decision will be upheld. Then, the appeal to the Supreme Court will be VERY interesting.

Re:A bad omen for the NBMers

[Caktus]

Please, dear moderators, moderate the parent post up. I'm sick of seeing that all posts that are +5 are "Funny". Please, give a chance to interesting and insightful posts.

The moderation ability of a person is based on how his posts have been moderated. When most +5 posts are "funny", we get moderators that just know what funny is, not what insightful or interesting is.

Please, remeber that this is not segfault.org.

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[NanoGator]

"The problem is that they are forcing machine makers to ship Windows as-is and punishes them for shipping otherwise."

I can't help but think that the bigger PC retailers weren't exactly kicking and screaming over an exlusive arrangement like that until MS's anti-trust allegations came around. If you think about it, 1 OS was good for places like Gateway or Dell or even IBM. Only one OS to support. Computers only needed one OS installed. That one OS ran everything people wanted on their computers, including games.

If you think about it, MS didn't always have the power to dictate who can use what. I think the odds are pretty good that the retailers themselves were happy to get into those agreements, early on at least.

Anti-Trust Not-Yet-News

[Istealmymusic]

Am I the only one who thinks its premature for a news site to put out news before it becomes news? What's next, Halloween Due Tomorrow on the 30th?

Re:Anti-Trust Not-Yet-News

[Istealmymusic]

True; but unlike yours, my comment was (and still is!) independent from time. Timeless!

Talk about your stock gamble.

[Flamesplash]

Just imagine how much money you could make/loose from Friday to monday. Are you the gambling type?? :)

Supreme court next

[ToasterTester]

No matter what happens Microsoft will appeal to the Supreme Court. That will drag everything on even longer, and be exactly how Microsoft has handled all their dealings. Drag it out until it doesn't matter that much whatever happens.

Actually Microsoft is punishing themselves more than the court probably will with their new licensing.

Re:Supreme court next

[GlassHeart]

No matter what happens Microsoft will appeal to the Supreme Court.

That doesn't mean the US Supreme Court will even hear the case. The Supreme Court's job is to hear cases that are good examples of bad (poorly written, overreaching, etc) federal laws. For example, a federal law interpreted differently in two lower courts might be a good candidate.

So if it's just a matter of not being happy with a unanimous ruling, it's not likely to reach the Supreme Court at all. They're not there to right every wrong, even if the verdict was in fact wrong.

Re:Supreme court next

[marauder404]

Obviously you don't know how the courts work, because nearly every court proceeding takes several years to kick in after all the delays, hearings, and appeals. Microsoft will have done nothing unusual if it takes a few more years for something to come out of this.

Re:Supreme court next

[ToasterTester]

It's more than even law suits Microsoft uses delay tactics for. Classic example is what they did to Quicken. Microsoft was in talks to acquire Quicken and drug the negociations out. As part of the talks they asked Quicken not to release their new verison they just finished. Microsoft talked and talked and Quicken was getting upset, they needed to the revenue the new product would generate. Finally months later when Quicken said they couldn't wait any longer Microsoft broke off the negociations. Quicken released their new version, and a couple weeks later MS Money was released. Microsoft just wanted time to finish. Quicken was in deep sneaker for the next year or so before they eventually got back on there feet.

What about the 9 dissenters?

[Amazing Quantum Man]

How does her ruling affect the 9 dissenting states? They didn't agree to the RPFJ, so how can it be binding on them?

Re:What about the 9 dissenters?

[Amazing Quantum Man]

Sorry, I should have been more clear. I was referring to this: "Should she reject it, she can only offer suggestions for improvement; she cannot impose amendments".

How will this ruling (when it comes out) affect the 9 rebels? Will they be bound by her ruling, or will that segment of the trial continue?

Re:What about the 9 dissenters?

[manyoso]

She is reponsible for two different rulings. The email today that she would deliver her 'Opinions' (see: plural). The first ruling is whether the settlement is in the public interest. This she can only accept or reject. The other opinion is far more detailed. She could very well break up the company with this other ruling. Hope that helps.

Re:What about the 9 dissenters?

[Salsaman]

Erm...she hasn't given her ruling yet.

Re:What about the 9 dissenters?

[manyoso]

Sorry, breaking up the company was thrown out because of Jackson's appearance of bias. Nothing prevents Kollar-Kotelly from imposing this ruling if she deems it is the best recourse for the illegal acts.

Re:What about the 9 dissenters?

[Thurn und Taxis]

Sorry, but breaking up the company has already been thrown out. That can't be an option. Thanks for playing though. Hope that helps.

Actually, that's not true. Judge Jackson's ruling has been thrown out, because of questions over his impartiality, and the case was sent back for re-evaluation. However, Kollar-Kotelly is perfectly within her rights to decide that a breakup is the right thing to do after all. Of course, she's a different person and may have a different opinion than Jackson, but she's certainly allowed to have the same opinion.

Re:What about the 9 dissenters?

[Alsee]

She could very well break up the company with this other ruling. Hope that helps.

I'm confused, did you mean you hope your answer helps, or that you hope breaking up the company helps? :D

-

My suggested ruling

[Ethelred Unraed]

I would like to suggest a ruling text for Her Honor.

[Picture of Bill Gates]

Off with his head!

Signed,

Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly

Cheers,

Ethelred

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[ImaLamer]

If you think about it, 1 OS was good for places like Gateway or Dell or even IBM.

Yeah, IBM was soooo confused... "OS/2 Warp or Windows?"

If you think about it, MS didn't always have the power to dictate who can use what. I think the odds are pretty good that the retailers themselves were happy to get into those agreements, early on at least.

The problem isn't even really with the OS. Remember at one time it cost money for Netscape (because it was [imho:is] the premier product). If someone wanted to strike a deal with Netscape and put it right on the installed OS's desktop... they can't! AOL? Out of the question! Now you must pay more because you haven't given Microsoft the mindshare they wanted.

I guess this is why Dell complained about these things at trial?

Companies always want to be told how to do their business.

Opinion...

[Zildy]

Opinion...

Judge: Settlement approved. Microsoft, you're naughty.

Microsoft: I want a second opinion.

Judge: Ok, you're ugly, too.

Ba doom boom...

MS is immune

[kaltkalt]

One of the flaws with antitrust law is that once a monopoly is allowed to reach a certain critical mass, it becomes immune to antitrust laws. MS is well beyond that level. Antitrust laws simply do not apply to it. The only thing that can be done is to break up monopolies before they reach this critical mass. Whatever this judge may say tomorrow is irrelevant and will not affect MS in the slightest way. The government will win the "war on drugs" before it will ever be able to break up Microsoft.

Re:MS is immune

[kaltkalt]

AT&T is still pretty darn powerful if you ask me. Still the largest long distance carrier in the US. Breaking up Standard Oil was the purpose of the Sherman Act. MS is much more powerful than Standard Oil was, and the Sherman Act is much weaker today than it was when it was created for the sole purpose of breaking up Standard Oil. Also keep in mind Standard Oil had two US presidents basically campaigning for its breakup, so they could be seen as tough "trust busters." What was relevant back then is completely irrelevant today, and antitrust law doesn't have the power that it once did. In fact, it's pretty weak (in part as a result of subsequent supreme court cases limiting the Sherman Act's power since the Standard Oil days). Sorry, it really sucks, but MS is immune from antitrust laws; at least in the USA.

Re:MS is immune

[Planesdragon]

Whatever this judge may say tomorrow is irrelevant and will not affect MS in the slightest way.

You mean being forced to split up (like AT&T was) won't have a single effect? Man, what was I thinking...

The government, if it decides do, can easily break up MS. All of this--every single legal minutes spent by lawyer or judge since Jackson's ruling--is just the government asking itself "how hard do we want to smack them?"

MS is hoping that its crying and grimmacing will let it get off with a severe warning, rather than a charter-breaking slap.

Re:MS is immune

[istartedi]

No. MSFT isn't a monopoly. If MSFT was a monopoly, then Linux isn't an operating system and a Macintosh isn't a Personal Computer. We don't need to get more aggressive with anti-trust. Coke and Pepsi do the same crap that MSFT does, and they are not monopolies. Car companies--same thing.

What's needed is business reform. First, there need to be some rules about what kind of contracts are valid. Companies should have to publish a price schedule, and apply it uniformly without prejudice. By "without prejudice" I mean without regards as to whether or not their customer is purchasing from a competitor, whether or not they said something bad about the CEO, and possibly other condtions.

Next, corporations need to be stripped of some of their personhood status. Only individuals should be allowed to participate in politics.

Of course none of this is likely to pass because the political process is so hamstrung by corporate interests. A revolution at the hands of a bunch of pot-smoking, flag-burning, paper mache puppet marching anarchists isn't the answer either.

The only real way to bust an oppressive company is to replace their product. Alternatives to Windows are coming, and recipes for soda that tastes a lot like Coke are easily found. It just takes someone with vision and determination. Trouble is, few have it, and most see more profit in whining than actually doing something. Sad thing is, whining pays.

Re:MS is immune

[ewhac]

Whatever this judge may say tomorrow is irrelevant and will not affect MS in the slightest way.

Really? What if the court said this:

"It is the order of this court that Microsoft's copyrights on all versions of Windows, and all software normally accompanying Windows, are hereby revoked."

Microsoft's abuses against citizens the world over proceed from a government-sanctioned monopoly in the form of copyright. Therefore, the government need only rescind its sanction and let the much-vaunted Free Market take over. Implementation and enforcement costs to the government would be nil.

Schwab

Re:MS is immune

[Paul Komarek]

"No. MSFT isn't a monopoly".

Both previous courts disagree with you. In fact, the appealate court was unanimous that MSFT is a monoplist. You're probably not considering the exact same market as the courts were, which includes a certain time period.

-Paul Komarek

Re:MS is immune

[drinkypoo]

The government is winning the war on drugs (IE, the US Gov't vs. the People of the United States of America) every day it continues. I doubt they ever thought they'd be able to carry it on this long. I do wonder if it's the only thing keeping the country out of a depression sometimes. I do think they can keep it up if they legalize marijuana, though.

The government could probably break up Microsoft but I don't think it will change things much. Instead, let's make them pay the difference to make macs as cheap as PCs. :)

You know what we need?

[serps]

A /. poll so we can guess the outcome.

What do you think the judgement will be?

• Not guilty. Doh!
• Monetary fine
• Disclosure of APIs
• Breakup
• Forced to hire CowboyNeal

Heck, that's worth wagering on. Anyone for SlashBet?

Re:You know what we need?

[Amazing Quantum Man]

IIRC, "Not guilty. Doh!" is not an option. The appeals court upheld the FoF, we're just arguing about whether to give MS a timeout or whether they're grounded.

Re:You know what we need?

[Alsee]

Forced to hire CowboyNeal

That would really really suck.

Shut down Windows
What do you want your computer to do?
0 Stand by
0 Shut down
0 Restart
0 Restart in MS-Dos mode
* Uload all porn files to CowboyNeal

[OK] [Cancel] [Help]

-

Money guarentees we won't get a proper result

[hellfire]

No, its not because Microsoft can buy high priced lawyers.

A report I have not seen on slashdot lately, and unfortunately I cannot confirm, is that Microsoft was eyeing major Real Estate in Canada around the time the White house and Attorney General's office was making the transistion to Bush/Ashcroft.

This action would have scared the shit out of the Clinton admininstration, even if they didn't act on it. The current administration probably felt it wasn't worth it to try to completely kill Microsoft and lose billions in tax dollars. They also probably saw that $40 billion war chest and said "Crap, that's enough money to move them out of the country, and we won't see any taxes on it."

If anyone has anything that could confirm this I would appreciate replies added (and a mod up to show them to everyone ;))

Re:Money guarentees we won't get a proper result

[Stonehand]

You're full of it.

(1) Microsoft has, at the Redmond campus alone, over 30K employees if memory serves. They are paid sufficiently well to generate taxes for the town, state, and country. They move, others lose.

(2) Microsoft has considerable assets in the area, such as property which the city could tax if it chooses (I don't recall if Redmond does). If such a major employer leaves, that might also affect property values...

(3) Take a look at Yahoo's pages on MSFT finances. Hmmm. I don't know about your math skills, but to mine, $718M (income tax expense for the quarter ending 30-June) is a hell of a lot bigger than the 0 you're claiming -- and there's no such thing as a negative income tax in the long run unless you're an individual so poor that you're paying squat and getting the Earned Income Tax Credit, in which case you're getting a form of welfare c/o Congress.

Re:Money guarentees we won't get a proper result

[DAldredge]

I was wrong. I could have sworn that I read that somewhere. I

Re:Money guarentees we won't get a proper result

[csnydermvpsoft]

One problem with this strategy - the Canadian government is more liberal than the US government. The question is: would Canada have the balls to prosecute them?

Re:Money guarentees we won't get a proper result

[DoctorFrog]

Why would MSFT be concerned about a transition to Bush and Ashcroft? Bush hasn't exactly set himself up as the defender of the poor against those nasty ol' rich folk, has he?

Re:Money guarentees we won't get a proper result

[SerpentMage]

I do not even think Canada would want them. Lets see MSFT deemed illegal, MSFT moves to Canada. Canada likes this? Doubtful since Canada has enough issues with the US on trade issues (lumber, oil, pipelines, etc). MSFT would be another thorn that Canada would avoid. In other words they would say sure come to Canada, but you are still liable for decisions in the US.

Why the ruling took so long

[FearUncertaintyDoubt]

Every time she tried to type her ruling against Microsoft, Clippy kept popping up with "It looks like you are trying to type an unfavorable ruling. Do you want some help?" When she clicked no, wouldn't you know it, one of those darn crashes would happen!

Re:Why the ruling took so long

[Soul-Burn666]

Who said she is using M$Word at all?

Sure, your post is funny :) but does it have grounds in reality? (well, rebel clippy is pretty much believable ;)

If it's approved...

[namespan]

I'm going to start learning German, French, or Dutch, and I'm going to move to a sensible socialist democracy. Or maybe Costa Rica...

OK, I guess there's Australia and Canada...

Re:If it's approved...

[sharkey]

Try Namibia

Re:Running XP?

[dattaway]

I have seen a bit of everything microsoft, with old trusty gpl'd wget...

resdcn.gtwy.uscourts.gov - - [30/Jul/2002:08:34:03 -0500] " stuff HTTP/1.0" 200 2054 "stuff" "Mozilla/4.51 [en] (Win95; U)"

rchdcn.gtwy.uscourts.gov - - [17/Oct/2002:16:33:52 -0500] "GET stuff HTTP/1.1" 200 1184 "stuff" "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.5; Windows 98)"

rchdcn.gtwy.uscourts.gov - - [16/Oct/2002:16:11:20 -0500] "GET stuff HTTP/1.1" 200 4706 "stuff" "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.5; Windows NT 5.0; T312461)"

resdcn.gtwy.uscourts.gov - - [08/Oct/2002:08:26:30 -0500] "GET stuff HTTP/1.0" 200 31748 "stuff" "Wget/1.8.1"

Re:Halloween Documents 2

[Chromonkey]

All judgement decisions of publically traded corporations are released after the market closes.

Just as earnings statements are released after market close.

Re:This is insanity.

[the eric conspiracy]

Then they will say that MS is a monopoly.

You have got to be kidding, The term monopoly in this context has a specific legal meaning. During the first trial Microsoft was proven IN A COURT OF LAW to be a Monopoly, AND to have violated the law by illegally using that monopoly position to stifle competition.

This appeal is related to determining the penalties for the abuse of monopoly power by Microsoft. The issue of whether Microsoft is a monopoly has been determined.

Just To Get You Started...

[E-Rock-23]

Anyone interested in MS's Political Contributions? Or how they've fluctuated over the years? Check out This Page to get started.

Up ontil the antitrust investigation began, MS didn't give diddly squat to political campaigns. Even before then, they gave their cash to whoever had control. It's not that hard to figure out from the graph that whichever party had the top position (ie The President) got the most moolah from Bill and Company. After Dubya was "elected", the donations got wildly lopsided in favor of the Republicans, since it was the Democratic Government, under Speedy Willie Clinton, that started the antitrust hearings, It's not hard to guess why they started getting the short end of the MS tit to suck on.

Just thought that might interest you all, seeing as how this particular "ruling" is about to be handed down. And just in case you want to see what kinds of contributions are being made by tech companies these days, check out Open Secrets.org. Handy little refference page for the coming Nov. 5 (my birthday, of all days) Elections...

Re:Just To Get You Started...

[swillden]

since it was the Democratic Government, under Speedy Willie Clinton, that started the antitrust hearings

The anti-trust hearings were started under Bush Sr.

Re:Just To Get You Started...

[ceejayoz]

MS can donate all the money they want, but as a company they can't cast a single vote on election day.

And that matters? Doesn't matter who gets elected - they listen to money once they're in office.

Re:Just To Get You Started...

[Stonehand]

You miss the point. The sole purpose of the money is to advertise to voters to get votes -- there are pretty strict limits, for instance, on gifts given to the politician instead of the politician's re-election campaign, so personal bribery is not an option for those who do not relish joining Trafficant in jail. If the voters actually were to care about issues, and to take things a bit more seriously, instead of deciding on the basis of 30-second spots, then the advertising dollars would make a hell of a lot less.

Re:Just To Get You Started...

[istartedi]

Yes, but how many people voted for Ike because of all the "I like Ike" crap? The more money the candidate has, the more crap he can create. Unfortunately, voters are attracted to crap like peahens to plumage. Only solution is to ask people why they are voting for somebody and if the answer is "I like their commercials" then discourage them from voting.

Re:Just To Get You Started...

[marauder404]

Is this surprising? You're basically saying Microsoft is behaving like every other major company in corporate America and like thousands of other organizations -- trying to buy some influence. No need to single out Microsoft for having done this -- there are many others that are just as guilty or worse. Welcome to American politics.

Re:Just To Get You Started...

[tshak]

I think the real point of this fact is that Microsoft (unlike many corporations) kept it's hands clear of political nonsense and just ran their business. Once the government started bugging them (for a somewhat good reason, albeit the DOJ doesn't have a clue about what they've gotten themselves into IMHO) then Microsoft started the political contributions as a defense mechanism. If the DOJ would have let the market be, it would have A) corrected itself (see a real Unix Desktop: OSX, and a soon to be real Unix Desktop: Linux/Gnome), and B) MS wouldn't have been forced to "play the political game".

Re:Just To Get You Started...

[snafu_tew]

Actually JFK was about to be the one to initiate proceedings, but he got shot.

Re:Just To Get You Started...

[swillden]

The FTC opened and closed an antitrust probe in 1992 under Bush sr. The current antitrust case didn't start until 1997, or 5 years into the Clinton administration.

But the current case is a direct descendent of the previous case. The first case resulted in a Consent Decreee, which Microsoft signed, limiting Microsoft's anti-competitive behavior. The 1997 case started, essentially, as prosecution of MS for violating the Consent Decree.

The Clinton-era DOJ should have been slapped for allowing MS to violate the decree for five years before doing anything about it.

Re:This is insanity.

[Prince_Ali]

I would give you such a wedgie for using the term "Microsoft apologist".

too true

[Anonymous Coward]

Assume that dividing microsoft into separate divisions is successful in giving competition a chance. More products will be introduced to the market, and software prices could go down.

Now you might argue that increaced price competition in the software industry will only cause further harm to an already sick area of our economy, but I disagree.

For example.

Our company provides custom programming services to shopping malls. If our shopping mall clients could save $3000 dollars from their annuall operations budgets by spending less on Microsoft products then they now have $3000 more that they can give to me.

Of that $3000 bucks I give Uncle Sam $800, and now have $2200 to save of spend. I know that money sitting in the bank does our economy no good so being a good citizen I go out and buy a new iBook.

The money keeps circulating in the economy.

Money that is not spent on Microsoft products will be spent elsewhere. Trust me if Microsoft crumbles (and it won't any time soon)the economy will survive. Increased competition might even help it.

Re:too true

[ceejayoz]

the fact is that today absolutely anything that can be done with MS can be done without MS

You mean like running AutoCAD, right?

Oh, whoops. Forgot, Slashbots don't understand the realities of the real world.

Re:too true

[killthiskid]

You mean like running AutoCAD, right?

Compatiability with a specific package is a feature. The general point of AutoCad is to do electronic design, drafting, etc etc. Can you do that with MS? Absolutely. It might be harder, or more expensive, or a little bit less documented or whatever, but if you want to, I guarantee you can do it without MS.

Woah... hang on there, buddy... what product does microsoft produce that can do anything near what AutoCAD can do?

Having personally administrator a set of 20 drafters and architects who use autocad on a very daily basis, I KNOW that autocad is very deep in it's abilities... and there is nothing, NOTHING, that MS puts out that comes any where close to what AutoCAD does.

I'm willing to say this: you CAN NOT do with MS software what you CAN DO with AutoCAD. Period.

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[the eric conspiracy]

An illegal tax-avoidance scheme.

Terminology Lesson:

Tax avoidance is perfrectly legal; i.e. contributing to a 401K plan is tax avoidance.

Tax evasion on the other hand is illegal; i.e. claiming extra exemptions on your income tax.

The phrase "illegal tax avoidance scheme" is actually an oxymoron.

What bias?

[CaptainCarrot]

Whatever led you to think Judge Jackson was biased? His "injudicial" remarks to the press happened near the end of the trial. By then he'd been lied to, railroaded, condescended to, and evaded often enough to strain the patience of a saint. No wonder he needed to blow off some steam.

Which makes me wonder. If Microsoft had really been trying to win the case on the merits, then their legal team was so incompetent they should all have been fired. I haven't heard they had, though, which makes me wonder if this all went more or less according to plan. Maybe they wanted to infuriate Judge Jackson so much that he would make just the kind of mistake he wound up making. Doesn't it seem to anyone else that from that point on, the MS lawyers suddenly started performing like the legal Dream Team they were supposed to be instead of the fuckups they'd been up to that point? If that's true, they must have been deeply disappointed that only Jackson's penalty was vacated and his finding of fact was left to stand.

This may surprise those of you who believe that conservative judges always rule politically, like liberal activist judges, but many conservative judges prefer to rule based on fairly strict constructions of the actual law rather than legislate from the bench. No less a towering conservative figure than Robert Bork, Reagan's Supreme Court nominee, believes that MS should be broken up, and he literally wrote the book on the conservative approach to antitrust law. Based on the stories I've read about the trial so far, I expect Judge Kollar-Kotelly to come down rather harsher on MS than some of you seem to fear.

Re:What bias?

[ClosedSource]

"Whatever led you to think Judge Jackson was biased? His "injudicial" remarks to the press happened near the end of the trial."

A judge, like a jury member has a legal and ethical responsibility to keep an open mind until all the evidence is presented. It doesn't matter how late in the trial he failed to live up to his responsibilities.

Re:What bias?

[CaptainCarrot]

I challenge you to name a single judge who fits your definition of "liberal activist judge" who "always rule[s] politically".

I thought something looked odd there, but I couldn't put my finger on it. Of course, activist judges don't always make politically motivated decisions, and that's not really what I meant to say. They are prone to, however. The most recent notorious example that springs to mind is the New Jersey Supreme Court opinion in The New Jersey Democratic Party, Inc., et al. v. Hon. David Samson, et al. where they decided to out-and-out ignore the plain language of the election code (19:13-20) which only allows political parties to nominate substitute candidates before the 51st day prior to an election. This was so that the Democrats could run the popular, but heretofore retired, Frank Lautenberg in place of Robert Toricelli, who had dropped out of the race amidst a cloud of scandal. This could not have been anything other than a political decision.

As for Bork "working for" Netscape at the time he evaluated the case against MS, I think you'll find it's pretty much always customary to pay a lawyer when you're asking for his legal opinion. It's his job, you know. Significantly, perhaps, he did not advocate breaking MS up as you might have expected him to if we was merely acting as Netscape's mouthpiece. And long after he dropped off the payroll, he continued to write against MS in publications like National Review even though his opinion on this subject is unpopular to the political right.

Re:What bias?

[sheldon]

Exactly how was the NJ decision a "political" decision?

Ruling in strict adherence to the law would have meant that the law trumped the voter's rights. Is that what you want? Is that what the Justices want? Such a decision would be pretty damn partisan if you ask me.

By bending the law slightly, they threw the decision back into the hands of the voters where it rightfully belongs. This is one of the fundamental purposes of a Democracy.

I'm from Minnesota, and as such we're pretty familiar with this issue. We've lost candidates twice now in the past 15 years only two weeks prior to an election. Once because the IR candidate for Governor dropped out when it was found he engaged in pedophilia, and then again just this past week when our DFL Senator died in a plane crash.

BTW, our Minnesota Court just overturned an election law to provide absentee voters a chance to vote. Due to time constraints it's probably not going to be very practical, but it was the intent that counted. The law was in place so that voters wouldn't play games, but in this case the circumstances were outside of the voters control and it was unfair to penalize them for that.

Re:What bias?

[sheldon]

"It seems to me that it's not fair to change the rules in the middle of the game."

Ok, on the surface this sounds like a valid argument, it even has a certain liberal tone to it.

But who are you being fair to? Candidates, or the voters?

It sounds like you think we should be fair to the candidate, that he entered the race expecting to compete against Mr. White... but now Mr. White has dropped out. So Mr. Pink steps up to the plate. Well that's not fair because our anti-White candidate doesn't know how to compete against Mr. Pink?

That's not fairness, that's simply incompetence on the part of the anti-White candidate.

Money sitting in a bank

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, money sitting in a bank is loaned out to people who want to buy houses or start businesses. The money then goes on to build something that will generate income which will require income tax payment. So money that is not in your hands because it is in the bank is actually out earning more for the government than your spending it would.

In the market, money is a limited resource. In the bank, the money is growing. The more money grows, the more taxes the government can take in the long run.

Don't be fooled by elementary economics.

Re:Money sitting in a bank

[fferreres]

Simply not true. Money in the bank can be unused. If your economy is growing to fast, you'd see few "idle" bucks at the banks. If your economy is "cold", you'd see a _lot_ of idle money in the bank. Reinforcing these, when investors see that companies earnings at expected to go down, they sell but NOT to buy another hopefully underpriced stock, but to put it in the bank. (Just look at the interest rates falling. And that's also why the fed lowers rates, but they try to lower them beforehand, before people decide to cancel proyect as a countermesure of getting colder than needed. If they cannot prevent the ice formation, at least there is less incentive to sit the money on bacnks, and olso the projects VAN is measured against this rate).

Buy money owners couldn't care less earning less from having the money sitting in the bank, they are now "safe". Also, many projects are canceled in real life, because demand falls and thus you have extra capacity (you only need capital reposition, if anything). So new projects get postponed because of lack of oportunities.

So what would be desirable? To let companies AND people that will NOT sit their own revenues or even wealth. Of course, we all know that these are companies that either do reinvest all their extra earnings and people that consume all their income.

When this start getting cold, you need the "rich" individuals to start spending money (thepoor have already DONE that! They have no choice) and the rich (=very profitable) companies as well (the others are already speding all their income!)

So your argument COULD be not wrong. But it is in fact wrong. People cannot really find very good project to start right now. And the only ones that can decide to use that money ANYWAY are the ones that own that money. That is Microsoft et al (money bank sitters).

If they don't do it, then the goverment must do it. So you can expect a lot of deficit. And many taxes raised (so they can take away profiting power from the profiters that are not spending it, and then Spend It Right Away. Of course, this hurts companies that where not very profitable). Well, all this means inefficiency and can be a very dangerous game.

I don't really know how can people speak SO HIGH when there a lots of capable human beigns unemployed all over the countries, and a lot of factories underutilized. Is this an efficient use of resources?

And no, money is a limited resource only when it is beign used! Not when sitting in banks. (and if you want to force loans at near 0 interest rates and such, you'll see banks collapsing after a while, because loaned money will be used in stupid projects that can't pay the loans back, and the low margin of intermediation will not compensate the loses.).

So no... the right thing to do is not to profit from monopoly and make it sit on the bank for the "goodwill of the US citizen". The thing is to actually have them to use the money. And they don't want that (after all, shareholders can simple just SELL the stock if they want cash).

no, really flamebait

[feed_me_cereal]

A lot of widows and orphans have their retirement accounts with investment houses that hold large amounts of Microsoft stock.

If Microsoft gets torn apart, their stock is going to drop like a rock. The people whose 401Ks and 403Bs hold MSFT will take the brunt of it.

Since when were people assured that their money was safe in stocks?!?!?! No one is forcing you to be involved with microsoft's stocks, only their software :) Shareholders should take responsibility for the actions of their company. If they don't represent the crimes microsoft is guilty of, then they should sell their stock. And if you're talking about mutual funds, same difference. If the death of microsoft toples a mutual fund, then they were very very very very bad investors. This is extremely unlikely. AT&T is still around, and breaking up microsoft would be much easier than it was to break them up. In the long run, (to use your emotionally loaded argument) it's neccesary so that we don't have even more starving orphans and widows. Microsoft hurts the overall economy by cornering the market.

There are a lot of people rooting for Microsoft. The people who root against them are the same as people who rooted for the beating of Reginald Denny.

Oh lord, I can't get over this quote. Reginald Denny was a fucking INNOCENT!!! Microsoft is the AGGRESSOR!!! This would be a lot more like the grand dragon of the kkk getting pulled out of his truck and beaten, and yes, I would be loudly applauding that. I didn't applaud the beating of Reginald Denny, and unlike you who seems to hold some reservations on the subject, I thought it was an utter disgrace. To me, racism is racism. You don't attack innocent people because of their race, period. Anyway, now I'm as off-topic. It seems like everyone thinks the economy will tank even further if microsoft is broken up. What we're all failing to notice is that microsoft is stifiling competition in the market. They're also sweeping into new markets. If anything, breaking them up will HELP the economy. There'll be more market to pass arround, and trust me, there are a lot of companies out there that can do a lot better than microsoft has in the OS market.

Re:no, really flamebait

[fferreres]

A lot of widows and orphans had their retirement accounts with investment houses that hold large amounts of Netscape, Lotus and Novel stocks.

Microsoft torn them appart by illegaly abusing a monopoly position, and their stocks droped like a rock.

How many widows and orphans own stock of good companies that have/are seing/will see their revenue streams destroyed because Microsoft leverages their monopoly position?

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[spectecjr]

The problem isn't even really with the OS. Remember at one time it cost money for Netscape (because it was [imho:is] the premier product). If someone wanted to strike a deal with Netscape and put it right on the installed OS's desktop... they can't! AOL? Out of the question! Now you must pay more because you haven't given Microsoft the mindshare they wanted.

This is a common misconception, and I have no idea where it comes from.

For example, the Packard Bell computer I had at work in 1998 came with Netscape Navigator pre-installed.

The issues wasn't putting Netscape on there - it was that you couldn't put Netscape on there and remove the shortcut to Internet Explorer.

Similarly, most copies of Windows come with an AOL installer built in. The issue isn't putting it in there - it's that Microsoft want MSN to get the same exposure.

So it's not quite as cut and dried as you seem to want to make it out to be. The OEMs *can* do all of these things -- they just have to leave Microsoft's stuff in there as well, as prominently advertized as the alternatives.

Simon

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[NanoGator]

"Pre-emptive Netscape strike. Someone will inevitably point out that Netscape lost market share because it produced an inferior product. While that's partially true, Netscape started losing major marketshare while their product was still superior (they lost marketshare to IE3 forgoodnesssakes!), and now that they've got the superior product again, they're not exactly regaining marketshare. Something other than product quality caused this. "

When did Netscape stop being inferior? It's still slow and it's a memory hog compared to IE. Not only that, but they waited 2 years to release a new version. They tiptoed along while MS was happily updating IE, making new useful features, and making it error-resistent.

Sorry, Netscape lost because they didn't keep up. Pity, they could have easily fought off MS if they had actually put some thought into fixing the problems that users found annoying.

Re:Post this again (original thread parent went -1

[MsGeek]

There are a lot of people rooting for Microsoft. The people who root against them are the same as people who rooted for the beating of Reginald Denny.

OK Anonymous Retard, listen up. I live in LA and was watching in abject horror in 1992 as Reginald Denny was beaten by a group of thugs. I didn't like the verdict but the riots were inexcusable.

As far as the starving retirees, widows and orphans who might be inconvenienced by an adverse verdict against a very deserving Microsoft: there was ample warning that MS had done something wrong, they could suggest to their broker to put them into something that did not contain the offensive stock. There were literally YEARS to prepare for this moment. Besides, anyone who didn't get out of tech stocks in 2000 was a fool.

Besides, all indications are that MS will only get a slap on the wrist and a half-hearted "don't DO that!" They 0wn the Department of Justice. Who's to say they haven't already bought and paid for a favorable verdict here too?

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

A little lesson in MS programming...

[Anonymous Coward]

//mslegal.cpp

bool winCase();

void goAppeal() {
if !winCase() goAppeal();
}

bool winCase() {
if (current.getStranglehold()>prev.getStranglehold () && current.getIncome()>prev.getIncome() && current.getPower()>gov.getPower()) return true;
else return false;
}

Re:A little lesson in MS programming...

[os2fan]

Get with it....

10 REM MSLEGAL.BAS
20 WINCASE=0
30 IF WINCASE=1 THEN 100
40 CALL APPEAL("LODGE"): APPEAL=0
50 CALL STRANGLE("MARKET")
60 CALL GETMORE("MONEY")
70 CALL GETMORE("POWER")
80 CALL APPEAL("DELAY"): IF APPEAL=0 THEN 80
90 IF WINCASE=0 THEN GOTO 30
100 SYSTEM
110 LABEL APPEAL
110 IF HEARING=1 THEN APPEAL=1
120 RETURN

Re:A little lesson in MS programming...

[Soul-Burn666]

void goAppeal() {
try:
if(!winCase()) goto try;
}

GOTO ?????????
argh... and try is a reserved word in C++ (they used // so it must be C++)

This is better:

void goAppeal() {
while(!winCase());
}

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

What do we want?

[macdaddy]

I can't decide what's better. Accepting it or rejecting. I live in KS, one of the states that told the DOJ and MS to stick it. I *think* it would be better to see it rejected which might make our case stronger. Thoughts?

Re:This is insanity.

[aardvarkjoe]

The issue of whether Microsoft is a monopoly has been determined.

...By a legal system which slashdotters consistently claim makes mistakes and knows nothing about tech issues.

I agree with the OP.

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[os2fan]

OS/2 Warp or Windows

This product was intended to be installed on a system that has an existing Windows installation. What it did was add a few files to an existing Win31 setup, so that it could run under OS/2. This means that you did not have to migrate your Win16 apps to the os/2 install as well as the windows install.

Netscape

Anyone who was familiar with pre-netscape internet would probably know that browsers supported http:, and for other sessions like ftp: or gopher:, you needed other applications. Netscape integrated this into a user-friendly browser, and charged money for their bit.

Microsoft fielded IE, and charged money for it, too. But when MS did not get the market share they wanted, they first dropped the price, and then bounded it to the OS.

It's not difficult to make a Windows 95b install that has no internet browser on install. It took me an afternoon to patch the install to do it. It works quite well. It just shows that the ties are artefacial, not technical.

Re:courts fair and balanced?

[chemmathguy]

Actually, as it has been mentioned above, U.S. courts do not usually reveal verdicts concerning publicly traded companies until after the markets close. This is done to prevent the market from severely fluctuating at the news (whether good or bad). It is also interesting to point out that the ruling will be available on a Friday after the markets close. Methinks that this ruling is going to have some serious impact....

here is the judgement

[u19925]

justice delayed is justice denied. BTW, the court at best can only reject settlement which means more delay. So what is the use of judgement in either way? Head Microsoft wins, tail customer loses.

DOJ will email you the decision

[BroadbandBradley]

http://www.dcd.uscourts.gov/microsoft-2001-email.h tml

Re:DOJ will email you the decision

[DoctorFrog]

Nope, site says it comes in .pdf format. :)

Why an effective monopoly is bad

[Thurn und Taxis]

You're not drawing a distinction between sole-source and monopoly. Most definitions of the word monopoly refer to exclusive ownership or control, but one definition says "a commodity controlled by one party" (from m-w.com). From the US government's point of view, having a 95% share in a market constitutes an effective monopoly (okay, I pulled that number out of my ass, but it's probably about right in this case). Sure, there are alternatives, but they aren't practical in most cases (see my example below).

You say "A company shouldn't be penalized for being successful...." This is entirely true, and this is why anti-trust laws were written very carefully. Companies are not punished for being monopolies. If your company makes product A so well that no one else can compete, great! However, companies are punished for using their monopoly in one market to wedge their way into other market rather than competing based on the merits of their product. This is exactly what Microsoft did with Internet Explorer (which, if you remember, was distinctly worse than Netscape Navigator until Microsoft used their monopoly powers to force IE on everyone).

I'm sick of hearing from people who think monopolies are bad, or who think this case is about Microsoft being a monopoly. It's not. This case is about Microsoft abusing their monopoly to gain control of other markets. The true importance of this case only comes to light when you consider that just about every company in the US (and maybe in the world) depends on Microsoft software to run their computers, and thereby to run their business.

To put it in concrete terms: let's say you want to start a business selling widgets. You've come up with and patented a method for making widgets that are twice as good and cost half as much as those of your competitors. Now you just need to set up a computer network to control your manufacturing, sales, and distribution network. Since you're a big fan of open-source software, you've built your distribution system using FreeBSD, Linux, or your OSOS (open-source operating system; not to be confused with ZOSO, a popular name for a certain Zeppelin album) of choice. However, you find that the available talent for your secretarial pool (or, in this day and age, the temps you hire) only know Windows, so you buy them a bunch of computers running Windows FU. Suddenly you get a cease-and-desist letter from Microsoft that says that under the terms of the license agreement (which the temps you hired that day clicked through when you set up the machines), you're only allowed to sell widgets if all of your computers have up-to-date licenses for Windows FU, and then you can only sell them at the prices Microsoft dictates. Suddenly you're in a position where Microsoft is controlling your business practices, but you can't tell them to sod off because your secretaries only know Windows. Admittedly this is an extreme example, but without control, Microsoft could have somewhat more subtle but no less disturbing effects on the global economy. Before being broken up, AT&T could've done the same thing. If we need laws to make sure that the companies supplying phone service obey common decency, then why should we be surprised to need similar laws in the computer industry?

Re:Why an effective monopoly is bad

[Dixie_Flatline]

Being Canadian, my knowledge of American anti-trust law all comes from reading slashdot (which makes me far less than a trustworthy source). However, I was under the impression that anti-trust law is meant to punish companies that use their monopolistic powers to stifle competition in ANY field.

So, Microsoft has made it a practice to punish companies like Dell who want to offer alternative OSes on their boxes. Microsoft is apparently a huge part of the reason why BeOS died a horrible death. It wasn't just that they were breaking into new areas and killing the competition there, but they were sitting in their own area and slaughtering any new competitors that came up.

Sure, you've got a few holdouts, like Apple and Sun, but arguably, both of those companies are in the business of selling hardware. The software is just something that completes the package. The only real competition for Windows on x86 right now is Linux and BSD, and Microsoft is always trying to find ways to use their strongarm tactics to stifle the expansion of those, too.

Re:Why an effective monopoly is bad

[tshak]

This is exactly what Microsoft did with Internet Explorer

No, why Microsoft did is add a very obvious feature to their OS, therefore increasing value for thier customers. Think about it. Should we sue MS for including explorer (file browser) because it put the people who made all the "treeview" apps for DOS out of business? Or how about removing DUN and PPP from Windows because it removed the need for Trumpet Winsock. Using the WWW is one of the most common tasks of a desktop computer - why shouldn't the OS have the ability to browse it as a native feature. Technology changes and puts people out of business all the time. What was once a Niche (the browser "market") is now ubiquitous functionality. Of course, it didn't help that Netscape 4 absolutely sucked and was farther then IE ever was from the W3C standards (disclaimer: I was a hard-core NS follower and even put notes on my sites saying that IE users needed to "upgrade" to NS since IE was so broken pre-4.0).

Re:This is insanity.

[Edmund Blackadder]

Good point. I would like to add to this, that if any one thinks of making that "they are only punished for being succesful" point should read judge Jackson's findingd of fact, and explain why is it ok to let a company that did every thing that is shown there to be let go unpunished.

Problems

[dh003i]

The problem with breaking MS up is that once you break them up, you can no-longer impose punishments on the individual broken up parts. But that is no matter if you break them up in the proper way.

The proper way to break MS up isn't breaking it into hardware, software, and OS parts. That's idiotic, and would just create 3 more monopolies in the hardware, software, and OS areas. What you need to do is split MS up vertically and horizontally. That is, split it up by departmental lines; then also split up each department into multiple companies.

If they're to be split up, they should be split up into software, hardware, and OS components; then the software, hardware, and OS components should be split up further. This way, several MSlets would be competing in regards to an OS. This destroy's the OS monopoly.

Of course, the problem with this is that Windows is so universal that their products might still continue to dominate by inertia, even though they're inferior. Thus, careful consideration needs to be taken in deciding whether to split them up or punish them harshely.

If we're to punish them, we need to demand they release the source for their standards, and release the source for the various parts of the OS which programs directly interact with; this will allow competitors to make products which can compete against MS natives on MS Windows. We also need them to open up these specifications so other OS's like Linux can offer better emulation layers for Windows. You need to prevent MS from blackballing OEMs and the like. You need to give OEMs the right to modify Windows any way they choose before selling it. You need to ensure that MS can't enter into any contract with OEMs which would prevent or dissuade them from also offering Linux or BSD on their computer. Also, large fines should be imposed on MS, the money from which would be used to bring drivers and software to competing OS'. The only way that GNU/Linux, BeOS, Amiga SDK, and *BSD can compete with MS is if they have alot of software support and alot of hardware support. The problem is that software and hardware companies won't offer their software/drivers for alternate OS' unless those OS' are popular; and those OS' won't become popular unless they have large software and hardware support. Hence, a hellish cycle which favors the current monopoly, MS. The main consideration of the government should be to break that cycle and allow all OS' to compete on their merits.

Re:Problems

[epukinsk]

Instead of splitting them up, I'd rather just see a judgement that says "Microsoft has to provide any and all information requested by any body necessary for interoperability with Microsoft products."

That means Samba can can go to some court-appointed committee and say "we need documentation on protocol X" and the Linux-NTFS team can say "we need documentation on file system Y" and Gobe and Corel can say "we need documentation on the .DOC format" and Ximian can say "we need documentation on the Outlook->hotmail interface" and so on.

How come I never hear about this as a proposal? A nice open ended "you can't have intra-application secrets" clause.

Erik

Re:Problems

[dh003i]

I agree, and think that's a good idea, in addition to forcing many things (as I mentioned) to be opened up right away. I'm leaning toward thinking that the best way to solve this problem is by imposing strict punishments and sanctions on MS, as well as stringent requirements, as opposed to breaking them up. If you break them up, all of the subunits (even if you split the OS department into several pieces) can continue acting in the same anti-competitive ways, loosely cooperating with eachother through "united fronts".

Re:Settlement...NOTHING

[Edmund Blackadder]

Ok tell me what "the spread of technology that microsoft helped spread" is.

If by helping spread technology you mean byuing or killing a company that has a certain technology and then taking the technology then yeah MS spread a lot of technology. But how did that benefit me?

Imagine a world run by OS2

[Raiford]

IANAMF (read I am not a MS fan) but as I remember the other companies with competing OSs did not step up to the plate and court the PC clone companies like MS did in the early game. There is the reason for the present monopoly situation. If IBM had the foresight with their own product (the PC) everyone (except the Linux and Mac users) would be running OS2 right now with their bundled browser on every manufacturer's machine. If Sun had focussed on x86 platforms, Sun OS might have made some headway. The fact is the OS market was pretty much devoid of ANY competition really back then until now and look at what the competition is: an open-source OS which has already cut deeply into the server market and making nice headway into the desktop market.

The other guys have themselves only to blame for a lot of this.

Re:Imagine a world run by OS2

[os2fan]

Just compare the two before you speak this.

OS/2 has "bundled" features, not "integrated" ones. You can replace features, or uninstall the features. It comes with two browsers, you don't have to install either. Unfortunately, both of them require some sort of network protocol, and not just the rendering engine. You can't set it up to use a browser with a locally set-up html pages. WebExplorer does not need the underlying protocol.

Certianly, IBM never stopped alternate vendors competing on the desktop. What happened here is that the utilities bundled with the OS is more OS/2 can boot to a command prompt, without the WPS loaded. You can boot it off diskettes. In this form, it still supports long-file names.

There are several different shells available that do not have the resource load that PMShell does, even when the GUI is loaded.

Re:Imagine a world run by OS2

[ClosedSource]

"IANAMF (read I am not a MS fan) but as I remember the other companies with competing OSs did not step up to the plate and court the PC clone companies like MS did in the early game."

The fact is that there wouldn't have been any PC clone companies were it not for MS. The only reason they exist is that MS insisted on the right to license DOS to 3rd parties and IBM foolishly agreed.

I suspect that had IBM decided otherwise, personal computers would be more expensive and Apple would have a significantly larger market share.

Re:Imagine a world run by OS2

[NanoGator]

"I suspect that had IBM decided otherwise, personal computers would be more expensive and Apple would have a significantly larger market share."

Not to mention that there'd be several dividing lines. Life was hard enough when you had to pick between Atari and Commodore. Heh.

Re:Imagine a world run by OS2

[os2fan]

Hon. Please learn the truth before wrangling with me.

IBM were a convicted monopolist long before OS/2 appeared on the scene. IBM is a hardware company who make software. Their software is none the less good.

For being such a loser product, it does a pretty good attempt of staying alive. Its community is every bit as vibrant as that of Linux, despite being a closed source operating system. Why. It was the firstest with the mostest. OS/2 v 3 now has USB support. Hmm. Not Windows NT 4.

IBM also complied with the antitrust people.

It must never be forgotten that the roots of Linux lies in yet another anti-trust case: that of AT&T. They developed unix, and the source code for unix was released under assorted agreements and restrictions of antitrust. This became the foundation of the open-source stuff.

On the other hand, MS tightened the screws in every way they are legally allowed to, such as using massive reserves to literally capture markets with loss-leaders. I do not trust MSFT.

Re:Imagine a world run by OS2

[os2fan]

Hon. The OS/2 community is quite alive, even if IBM is not pushing OS/2 at them.

You forget, the browser bundled with OS/2 4.x (the on-ramp to the internet) is webexplorer. It does alright as a front-end to pages on a cdrom.

It was not the first with USB, but IBM added support for USB in fix-pack 40 or something.

Ok, OS/2 may be jerry-rigged. So is Windows, Linux, BeOS. Why. So that people can run jerry-rigged apps. I mean, the investment in computers is not the OS but the apps. OS's run them, and they acquire a fair bit of crud over time. Just the way the world works, hon

On the other hand, OS/2 was the first really big prime-time OS to hit the market. It did so in 1992. At that stage, internet was not a big thing, and mosaic (ie webexplorer) was bleeding edge browser. Ditto tcp/ip.

History Lesson?

[glubbs]

I don't have my computer history down ... where was the competition in the beginning? It was an Apple/Windows thing, wasn't it?
Why didn't anyone take the platform Windows was using and do their own thing then?
The history of computers/OS' as I know it is first the Apple, then Microsoft, with little to no others until Linux. I'd rather focus on customer-type computer info, rather than the server-type ... it has more to do with what's going on today, I think.

Re:History Lesson?

[Stonehand]

Er, there were certainly others, at least in the DOS days. Hell, there was even a DOS clone back then, called DR-DOS (DR = Digital Research; if memory serves, it was later bought by Novell, then by Caldera). There were other multitasking environments back then, such as Desqview and GEM Windows. There was even an IBM-Microsoft partnership -- recall OS/2? Of course, that was before MSFT basically stabbed IBM in the back...

But as for developing a /new/ system -- interoperability would be critical.

(1) Nobody wants to migrate their entire application base, especially if it's impossible because the devs won't port it because the market is too small (Catch-22 here).

(2) Nobody wants to lose access to their documents or ability to exchange files with others, when the porting fails and nobody successfully, completely re-implements the different formats.

If you can't interoperate with the dominant software (e.g. Microsoft Office and its document formats, WordPerfect w/n the legal domain) you'll have serious problems spreading.

ObSimpsons

[nurightshu]

But what about tax avoision?

I don't say evasion; I say avoision!
--Kent Brockman

This is an offtopic comment. Thank you.

[windex]

It's funny, I own a bunch of the Teflon coated Dockers (whatever the new marketing campaign calls them). I find myself wishing that shirts were made with the same process. If I could have spill proof shirts, I'd be all set, I'd just need one shirt and one pair of pants a month.

It is funny, though, to intentionally spill water/soda on your pants arround unsuspecting coworkers. The look on their face is priceless.

Great idea!!

[Edmund Blackadder]

Think about it if they stop selling windows - it is all over!!!

Think of what the world would be like if there wasnt a newer version of windows, in an year or two.

I would have to use my old version of windows. I wont have a new version of windows to painfully slow down my comp while i am writing email. So then i wont need to buy a new comp. I will not be able to take advantage of innovative licencing schemes where i periodicaly pay microsoft money.

So I will be forced to live with thousands of dollars of extra money burdening me.

This is too painful to just contemplate. Please anything but that.

PS i havent even mentioned all the new viruses that I might miss out. And dont get me started on palladium.

Re:Great idea!!

[Edmund Blackadder]

The impact of the tech sector that would cause is that there will be an opportunity for other os's to be sold. That will probably cause a boom in the tech sector. Further more the application sector would improve, because developers will no longer be scared that their apps will be incorporated into office or windows. And one might even be able to go into Circuit city and have a choice of operating systems on a new computer.

If you patch for a windows exploit you usually create a new exploit. Some times you might even get a new "rights manegment" feature.

By the way when you say "Gates would probably enjoy the satisfaction of telling the govt. to shove it" it shows that you dont understand what is going on. The government is currently trying very hard to make gates happy. They just want to do it while mainting a pretense of rule of law. Gates has no reason to be pissed at them right now.

Re:Great idea!!

[arkanes]

You're a nitwit. If MS even hinted that they might do such a thing, every OEM in the world would start funneling R & D money into making a new desktop OS - the main reason that things like KDE and Gnome don't compare in usability to OS X and Windows is because nobody really thinks they can unseat Windows, so there's very little funded development. MS threatning to pull Windows would pretty much eliminate that - Palm would quickly revive the BeOS codebase, and either sell it to someone with lots of funds (IBM?) or borrow money to develop it themselves. Hardware manufacturers would scramble to proved driver specs. Things might be a little rough for a year or so, but after a short but intense development period, you'd have at least one, and possibly more, mature, technically superior (Linux, BSD) OSes, with excellent desktop support.

On to your libertatian bullcrap... the government has both the right and the responsibility to act in the public interest (that is, in fact, the entire purpose of having a democratic government). If you choose to run a buisness, there are certain regulations and guidelines you must follow, in the interest of society. It's kinda like how we have laws against killing people and taking thier money (which is MUCH more efficent than trying to get them to buy something - muggers are the ultimate capitalists). Bill knew this when he got into buisness, but decided that he could break the rules anyway, much like alot of people (I'd imagine you as well, assuming you actually own/run a buisness of your own).

Don't sell the Judge short!

[stox]

A careful study of Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly demonstrates that she is well versed in the law, and spends the necessary effort to research her opinions. I like this is in a Judge, even though I may not agreewith their opinions. IMHO, Microsoft's behavior, to date, has been a clear demonstration of why anti-trust law was created to begin with. I deeply hope that Colleen Kollar-Kotelly is able to see from a similar perspective. If we're lucky, she'll decide that Judge Jackson was far too restrained, and hand Microsoft ground butt in a handbasket. But, then again, I've always been a hopeless optimistic.

Ironic

[AstynaxX]

Ironic, isn't it, that the parent post was written by someone using a variation of 'Evil Empire' as a nick?

On a more sober note, the best outcome, for innovation, competition, and especially the ability to be done with M$, would be to force them to open -ALL- APIs and file formats currently in use in their products, and to publish into the public domain, -concurrently with product releases-, any updates to and/or newly created versions of the above, for a term of years equal to the sum of the number of years the anticompetitive behavior occured and the number of years they have delayed a proper solution through legal chicanery. Not that this will ever occur, but it is quite balanced (M$ is free to 'innovate', gets to do as they like with their product, and gets to keep all the ill gotten gains, yet the community will have a window of opportunity [no pun intended] to wean itself from the M$ teet through compatible products).

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[the eric conspiracy]

Tax avoidance can be illegal.

Nope. The definitions I stated are correct. Here re a references.

http://www.arnettbroadbent.com/avoid.html
http: //www.demon.co.uk/mitreho/abeco/newslet/n9803 2.htm

This judgement is not very important

[Edmund Blackadder]

Judge Jackson's decision was important because back then it looked like the government and the judicial system were ready able and willing to enforce the law.

But this DOJ has shown no interest to enforce the antitrust law. This makes the case a farce - a conflict between two parties that basicly agree on the issues, but only want to pretend to disagree.

The judge can refuse to approve the agreement but what if she does - if the government doesnt seek sanctions she wont impose them. The best she may do is elicit another agreement, which is guaranteed to be just as inefective.

On top of everything the judicial system has responded in a very unprofessional manner. The appelate court chose not to try and overturn judge jackson on the facts ( they will need to write a good logical justification, based on the evidence, to do that) but to pummel him with ethics accusations.

The current judge knows very well that Jackson got punished for rendering a certain decision and she is unlikely to do anything similar if she cares about her career at all.

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[the eric conspiracy]

i don't see how thats tax avoidence at all, since you pay taxes when you withdraw your money from your 401(k).

Two reasons. You are paying the taxes with future dollars, which any accountant will tell you are worth less than current dollars for a variety of reasons, and you are paying the taxes after you retire so that your income and likely your tax rate will be lower.

The result is less tax.

Re:MS should go on strike

[tqft]

MS owe the public responsibility conferred by their monopoly power granted by the public. Monopolies are granted allowed by governments patent/copyright law which MS uses, but constrained by anti-trust legislation - which has not changed much in 100 years. So do not say they do not know what they were getting into. I hope you live in california and your lights go out and you freeze when your utility/generators supplying the power/gas goes on strike because you are not paying them enough money. If MS goes on strike - hmm no virus/anti-hack updates, severe personal/economic damage. Even without a major hack there are possible fatal consequences if hospitals cannot get at records because MS networking has crashed and no MS help is available, or who knows what else. Electricty and gas infrastructuure is regulated because it is a monopoly. Are they allowed to go on strike? Can they force you to buy gadget XYZ but not ABC because it works better with their electrons? This known as "third-line forcing". Can utilities negotiate any contract with you they want? No - because they have monopoly power. Monopolies are legal - abusing the power it confers is not. In gas and electric - the costs, methods and detailed procedures for using the system must be published and easily available to anyone who wants them (in US and Australia at least). El Paso is in trouble in part for not telling shippers (customers) how to get more use of their system at lower cost - which by law they are required to do. What do you think of this for MS - add up the lines of code, multiply by a benchmark cost per line, multiply by a WACC (weighted average cost of capital for MS)= maximum allowed revenue per product. As is basically done for gas pipelines/electric transmission lines.

Re:Settlement...NOTHING

[(void*)]

Microsoft helped spread technology? How about Intel, Lotus, and Novell? Let's attribute all the last 20 years of computer innovation to Microsoft and forget about the rest of the other companies.

Ascendent star, what you are?/One amongst many from places far!

-- from "The Songs of Aulerka"

costs/benefits/lost productivity&national secu

[zogger]

IMO at this point in time microsoft costs the nations economy "more" than what is represented by their cash holdings and daily vig they squeeze. They are a net drag on the economy now from lost productivity and the effects of at least a decade of squashed innovation from their monopolistic tactics. They created an empire of wasteful and inefficient BUSYWORK not real work. In IT, they have single handedly slowed down software innovation by obscuring anything but their profits. They are in a grab/control/control/grab cycle, their so-called "innovations" aren't offset by any increaed over-all productivity by the businesses and consumers they "serve". At one point, yes, they were a useful company, now they exist almost totaly on inertia and locked in propietary "solutions" that are putting other companies in a WTF? scenario on whether or not it's even worht it to keep their stuff or lose a million now to save millions and millions later. entire industries existing on fixing stuff that comes pre-shipped broken is NOT productive for the over-all economy. If that model was useful we could all get rich by bulldozing down new buildings and constantly rebuilding them. In meatworld that's ridiculous but that'swhat companies suckered into using microsoft are faced with now. throwing good money after bad because now even the dullest of the dull are "getting it" on their companies need to make widgets, not exist to support microsoft. They also have contributed WAY more to weakening the over-all national security/defense by continually releasing INsecure products. This COSTS us way more than they are worth, unfortunately we won't know thefiull and total cost until some mega microsoft based attack/worm thing hits.

Think on this, they have 40 billion cash in the bank-how much better might their software be if they had spent 20 billion-only 1/2-on actual p[re-release engineering and making their products secure and less buggy? They'd still at a MINIMUM have 20 billion in the bank, a most respectable sum, but still....they'd have much better products, no one mad at them, and would have probably made even more money. See? Greed clouds judgement, business or personal, mega scale to personal scale, greed is NEVER good.

They got greedy, that's the bottom line-there's normal ETHICAL and responsible capitalism, then there's blood sucking mega-jerk greed, they crossed the line into being "bad guys" some time ago.

Gates and the next 99 guys below him need JAIL TIME. Not just ripping off stockholders and consumers to pay some joke fine, they need to get a dose of hard reality that no one is above the law, and that buckets of cash don't mean you are able to skate on being a criminal, nor should ANY of them be able to hide behind the creation of a fictitious person called a "corporation". That's nonsense on the face of it, that entire "corporation" concept needs to be on trial as well, every rank greedy decision they made was done by HUMAN BEINGS, identifiable people with names, it's those human beings who broke the law, ergo, human beings need the sentencing. Corporations-the concept-are a joke, again, IMO. I hope they get nailed, and hard. This nation locks people up for MUCH less than what they have done, daily.

Along with the lay's of enron types, these guys need to see steel bars, not vistas from mansions. they need blank walls to stare at, not the iew from a corporate jet or luxury office. I hope the next several years sees thousands of corporate fatcats and their tame poodle politicans imprisoned. Enough's enough on the "greed is good, screw everyone else" philosophy. I don't want microsoft to be fined one thin dime, nope, I never even wanted "microsoft" itself to be on trial, I wanted to see those bozos in charge on trial and charged and prosecuted and convicted and hauled off in cuffs, stripped of their armani's and chucked in the pokey, and the underlings who move up to replace them get 'scared straight' by this experience and to see the light on RESPONSIBLE corporate practices, and to serve as an example to every other fictitious-person "corporation" owners out there that their days of hiding behind that legal fiction and being blameless are OVER.

Re:No, Maam. You are the one who's crazy.

[Prince_Ali]

If a company does not want to sell a laptop without Windows or they made an agreement with MS to not sell non-Windows laptop that is there decision. Just go to another place that fits your needs. That is the beauty of the free market. Nobody forces you to buy anything, so you shouldn't be able to force anyone to sell anything.

Re:Settlement...NOTHING

[Stonehand]

"Help" does not mean "is the only one responsible for" or even "is the primary factor in".

Re:This is insanity.

[the eric conspiracy]

This socialist doctrine undermines the ideals of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness that the US was founded on. What right has the govt. to interfere in the trade of individuals within the US?

Trusts concentrate great economic power in the hands of a few individuals. When they exercise that power in certain ways, that power can prevent the pursuit of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Upton Sinclair documented this quite thoroughly in The Jungle. Others have done so as well.

There is nothing in the Constitution that outlaws Socialism. And the Constitution does give the following power to the Congress to regulate commerce, i.e. interfere with the trade of individuals:

Article 1 section 8:

To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes;

In addition to this most States have laws forbidding certain restraints of trade by monopolies.

English history also has much to say on the topic:

http://voteview.uh.edu/antitrst.htm

Finally, you should read the history of the Presidency of T. Roosevelt and the problems with trusts in his era.

Re:costs/benefits/lost productivity&national s

[ceejayoz]

Think on this, they have 40 billion cash in the bank-how much better might their software be if they had spent 20 billion-only 1/2-on actual p[re-release engineering and making their products secure and less buggy? They'd still at a MINIMUM have 20 billion in the bank, a most respectable sum, but still....they'd have much better products, no one mad at them, and would have probably made even more money. See? Greed clouds judgement, business or personal, mega scale to personal scale, greed is NEVER good.

And if they had $20 billion in cash reserves you'd be saying they should have spent an extra $10 billion. And if they had $10 billion you'd say they should have spent an extra $5 billion.

Come on, give a logical criticism of MS, not some bullshit one.

Re:This is insanity.

[the eric conspiracy]

By a legal system which slashdotters consistently claim makes mistakes and knows nothing about tech issues.

All legal systems make mistakes. No system made by man is error-free. Are you saying that we should not have laws, or try to enforce them?

As far as tech issues, the question of Microsoft being a monopoly, or whether they abused their power as a monopoly is NOT a tech issue.

Re:MS should go on strike

[Edmund Blackadder]

wow this naive notion of laize faire just wont die. And i dont care if i spelled it wrong.

The CA electricity blackmail happened just after the much publicized deregulation. That obvious fact shouldnt even escape you.

If they allowed free market forces to take over there would be still exactly one company that runs wires to your house (because running new wires would be prohibitevly expencive if not impossible), and that company will charge you for electricity as much as they can get away with.

Re:Antr-Trust Suit... anti-trust suit.. antitrusts

[Cyno01]

i don't get those new teflon coated dockers, i dont think you'd be able to sit without sliding out of your chair

Re:Settlement...NOTHING

[(void*)]

In that case, I too helped the revolution along by being interested enough to upgrade PC's, then learn programming using MS Tools. Me and MS were in this together for a long while, until I got into Linux. Should not the government look out for me, now that MS has demostrated a willingness to screw with the options I, as a consumer, have?

It is not the choice of words I am protesting. I am addressing the one-sided nature of the argument made.

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[Stonehand]

Judging from the IRS's inactivity on this, I would suspect that they vehemently disagree with you.

Keep in mind that MSFT does face quite a few potential large-magnitude cash-draining expenses, such as the very large number of options floating around that will cost them when the options are exercised. MSFT, INTC and others are extremely opposed to any "count options as expenses when issued" rule because of the sheer amount they give, and the impact this would have on their reported net income, so it's not exactly a small amount.

Anittrust Ruling

[hackus]

Expect the following:

1) No real motion to do anything about Microsoft's monopoly on the desktop. They (MS) already bought most of the legal system to insure the ruling stands, regardless if it is legal or not.

So don't expect any of that to change, now or in the future. Yes, the legal system in the US is that bad, even after Enron.

2) Expect however, for Microsoft to set a number of legal precendents (such as the keeping of its monopoly power by this judge and others sure to come) that insure other very large companies to consider the same tactics to consolidate thier power in other markets in the US outside the tech industry. (i.e. clothing, energy, automotive ...)

I expect as this unfolds, the US economy to become even MORE monolithic, and even MORE depressed as more innovation moves offshore to escape the corporate monoliths of invincibility in this country.

3) Expect other companies to use the same illegal tactics Microsoft has, and then use court rulings to either make "the law" (i.e. specifically anti trust law, cohesion, cartle laws..etc) irrelevant or insure the the legal costs are so high, defending companies will not intrude on companies with 51% market share anywhere.

Don't expect good news people. It is sad because I want my country to return to the good times. But that won't happen, when companies like Microsoft can sit on 30 Billion in capital and lock it away for the specific use to buy court rulings, and congreessional leaders. SInce this money isn't returned into the economy startups can't use it, ideas don't get funded, and little Johnny will continue to see the cost of the OS increase to the point it is 70% the cost os a home computer! (Which is comming by the way, as hardware prices continue to decline, Microsoft licenses continue to increase at never before seen rates...)

Monolithic economies, like the US, do not spur innovation, because large corporate entities who already own most of the market don't have to innovate anymore. They just sit on huge amounts of capital, and do nothing with it except harrass competition, startups, and illegally appropriate technology from other companies and figure out how to price fix thier products in the market place.

The harm that does to the technology investment sector in the US is incalculable, and the job losses are staggering.

Think about this while all you slashdot IT people sit at home unemployed.

Don't buy Microsoft products. Force Microsoft to return that ridiculously large pile of cash back into the tech sector.

Who knows, if the are forced to use all of it, maybe they will make a decent product with it, or improve the alpha quality of the .Net code I have been tinkering with. :-)

Hack

Re:Anittrust Ruling

[JordanH]

• 1) No real motion to do anything about Microsoft's monopoly on the desktop. They (MS) already bought most of the legal system to insure the ruling stands, regardless if it is legal or not.

  So don't expect any of that to change, now or in the future. Yes, the legal system in the US is that bad, even after Enron.

On what do you base this cynicism about the US legal system?

In the Microsoft case, for example, there's been nothing but well thought-out opinions handed down, thus far. I even agree that Penfield showed the appearance of inpropriety.

Re:Anittrust Ruling

[hackus]

Look at todays ruling by the Judge.

Was I wrong? No, clearly not.

Cynicism about the US legal system? Have you been living in a cage lately?

The very same government who "legally" decided to allow Microsoft exist as a corporate entity, has broken the law. Thats why.

The very same government who's many tenticles that extend beyond and into everyones lives outside business also is destroying this country.

Case and point, the US government and its satellite governments who make LAW up on the fly about business practices and just about everything else, including the sniper case that killed many people.

The INS made thier own laws about who to accept in this country and disregarded what the law written on the books.

Many are dead now, with millions of people's lives who have changed forever in the DC area.

Tell me what law means in this country anymore if you don't have a dime or are not orchestrated above and beyond in the realm of priviledge in Washington these days?

Gimme a break guy. The US legal system is in crisis right now of porportions not seen since Nixon's days and his cronies in washington.

You my friend, need to take part more in reading and actively listening in your countries affairs because at the moment you are clueless and Rome is burning.

-Hack

Re:MS should go on strike

[geekee]

The price that the consumer is charged per Kilowatt in CA was always controlled by the CA govt. That is NOT deregulation, no matter what anyone tells you. Right now there are a lot of companies with long distance networks, and that has proven to provide a cheap source of long distance. The same could work with electric power if the govt. would STOP regulating.

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[(void*)]

I would say that IE became comparable to Netscape 4.77 features wise at about IE4.0. When was this? I don't know. 1998?

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[fferreres]

The thing is Microsoft can just kill ANY software product that needs a profit to survive. Netscape this or that, could put could not put blah blah. Microsoft doesn't need to argue. They can decide they want Netscape to die and just invest X money on a bundled broswer. That's it, Netscape HAS to close.

So as long as you don't control the entire software bussiness, you are in risk of getting your revenue stream killed by Microsoft. If they REALLY want to, they could kill you. If you depend on a revenue stream, better not get in the way of Microsoft. It doesn't matter how innovative or well done your product is (ICQ, webmail, whatever), they will just put it free.

No wonder why AOL can't make revenues and Microsoft can. Because Micrsoft just needs 2 or 3 products to be sold to compensate ALL the loses in ALL the other fields (read: Office + Windows + some other products pay for everything).

And then they keep on "embracing and extending". That's why they must be stopped. They MUST be split, so they cannot leverage their positions. I lve Windows, I love Office, I love Explorer, I love . But I don't love them leveraging that so wipe competition. I can only lose in the long/mid term.

Re:This is insanity.

[aardvarkjoe]

Are you saying that we should not have laws, or try to enforce them?

No. To quote your previous comment:

"You have got to be kidding, The term monopoly in this context has a specific legal meaning. During the first trial Microsoft was proven IN A COURT OF LAW to be a Monopoly, AND to have violated the law by illegally using that monopoly position to stifle competition."

Your only support for your position is that "the legal system says so." Therefore, your conclusion is only as good as the legal system. If you want to argue that Microsoft is a monopoly, then use some real evidence, rather than relying on what someone of dubious reliability says.

Re:MS should go on strike

[adminispheroid]

When the NASDAQ falls through the floor and hundreds of companies go out of business, and thousands of people are laid off, maybe then you'll realize the govt. has no business telling people how to do business. It didn't work in the Soviet Union and it won't work here.

OK. Now that is breathtakingly naive. It is one of the most essential roles of government to set the rules under which business is done. To make the simplest example, if you sign a contract with a company, that contract is only useful because you both know that the government will enforce it for you. Now suppose we didn't have those pesky government rules about contracts -- how would you do business? The answer is, you couldn't.

Since you bring up the Soviet Union, perhaps you've noticed that since the USSR is gone Russia has not exactly seen an economic boom. And the reason is that the government is failing to enforce business law, and the resulting anarchy is enriching a few crooks but generally sending the economy into a shambles.

So although the more mindless conservatives like to talk about government regulation like it's the plague, the fact is that business absolutely relies on it. The tricky part is, they have to be the right rules.

Re:Post this again (original thread parent went -1

[fferreres]

Your post strikes my as non insightfull... I am not modding it because if preffer to reply (after all, if someone mod it up, there are lots of chance others might agree with him).

Also, I don't know if they have bought or not the DoJ. So I can say they have't, as far as I know. You need to have a little trust. And if you the your representatives not agreeing with you, you'll just need to start educating people and start forming a political group.

Complaining and whining doesn't get you anywere.

Jumping the gun

[fava]

I wonder how many people are (will be) hacking^h^h^h^h^h^h^hsearching through the website in hopes of finding the judgement before its officially published?

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logic not bs

[zogger]

--no, I wouldn't be criticising them now, BECAUSE if they had really spent an extra twenty BILLION dollars on software engineering, concentrating on bugs and security and function, chances are pretty high that that, combined with an ethical business model as opposed to their now proven unethical business model, it would have resulted in a much superior product, increased sales for them, increased productivity for the commercial concerns that use their products, which would have lead to across the nation improved economy, and a much more secure internet infrastructure and national defense.

I will repeat it in an even more simplistic analogy, planned obsolence and obfuscation and misrepresentation of goods and services offered for sale is a flawed business model long term, and criminal by nature. and coercing other companies and individuals into going along to get along by your sheer size and influence is akin to blackmailing or extortion. this is criminal and unethical behavior, any size, any company that does it, and human beings are responsible, not some typed words with an "inc" in the title. Humans. People. Criminal activity..
Microsoft is planned obsolence carried to an extreme. And like I said, I think they started as a perfectly normal company, some good, some bad, over all "good", then got greedy as the zillions piled up, their mindset changed, their practices changed, they morphed to the "bad", bad got 'worse", it went from the top on down and sideways, now they are in court. You got to really screw up bigtime for a corporation of their size and influence to get put in court for years, and they sure did it. Thankfully, this attitude and social experiment in letting mega corporations skate all the time when they screw up on purpose to just rake in more loot is changing, this is the only good thing to come socially out of the dot com bubble years, the turning over the rocks to expose the scam men and the liars for what they are.

Now, with that said, to answer what you allude I might be doing had they spent the money and stayed ethical, no, most likely not ragging on them, BUT, I WOULD be ragging on maybe some other company or politician, human nature being there is always corruption, and as such is my ranting posting and writing nature which I never deny. So, if microsoft had done as I suggest, nope, I wouldn't be ragging on them today, give it because it's speculation a 99 percentile probabilty rating. 20 bil is a lot of cash to put engineers to work with, not to accumulate ill gotten piles of cash and put lawyers and sales people and various thugs to work. Me, I think it's better idea to put engineers to work in a software company, and give them instructions that they make quality, secure, functional products and it doesn't leave the shop until it's the best, not close enough with eye candy razzle dazzle on top. Applying bondo to rust doesn't stop the rust, and frankly, it's better to paint better and rustproof in advance of the rust showing. Microsoft has 40 bil in the bank from selling bondoware, not quality steel.

I'm not against them because they are "big", I'm against them because they are proven greedy malicious conniving bullies who endangered the national security and put our economy at risk and ripped off millions of consumers. That's not even debateable at this point, they have been to court and it has already been *proven*, all that's left is the punishment, I advocate bill gates and the next 99 top level bosses below him in PRISON. then let the stockholders who care about something besides short term unethical profits elect some ethical business people to take their places.

Microsoft can continue as far as I am concerned, the market will adjust itself if some fatcats go to jail. Like, who's buying enron stock right now or doing business with them? the nation has woken up that just because some company or individual is "rich" or "mega successful" doesn't mean they are "decent people". Crooks and gangsters like expensive suits and flashy cars and mansions too, same as people who make their living honestly.

Times change and rapidly, microsoft managers and decision makers can find out that big bullies can fall hard same as their previous victims, and that any level fatcat can go to jail. I hope it happens, too.

MS & Trust

[rixstep]

Who was it said the only time 'Microsoft' and 'trust' can be used in the same sentence is when the word 'anti' is also there?

Re:MS should go on strike

[tqft]

I started the CA power crisis analogy so lets take it for what it is worth.

1) Ask someone in san Diego if their power bills were capped by the CA govt - they weren't, they got charged market rates ("pass-through") on the cost of powerr.

2) microsoft does not let anyone use their "pipe" (OS) as they do, they would have to publish all the api's &/or source code to allow that. Under the licence conditions MS imposes I am not allowed to even find out how it works without paying MS big bucks, so I can't run wire to power my computer properly.

3)"When MS sells you a copy of Windows, you get what they promise" - easy to use? user-friendly? - I am ROFLPML

4) yes proper deregulation without any monopoly would mean more power for CA and lower bills, with big power stations popping up all over the place, huge gas pipelines being dug in across the state, and Ca $ going out of state - this will happen but only after the cost of electricity and gas goes through the roof this winter - $4.35/BTU at the Southern California Border pricing point as at 31 October 2002, and climbing. In analogy this would mean that Microsoft can turn around and demand payment at any time from anyone for any amount they want, you would go from a product provided at a fixed cost forever to a daily lease with cost depending on whatever MS decided to charge that day - ie if Bill needs another million to fly the MS development team to Aspen, guess who is going to pay. With users desperately seeking alternative software to (the new power plant part of the analogy) do the various jobs. Ah no rules, MS changes the api's and auto updates you, all the alternatove software no longer works - this happens. They got a monopoly fine, but play fair. Standard Oil and US Steel would own almost all the USA if the US gov had not broken up these monopolies.

3) FERC wants to set rules for everyone to play by (CA gov doesnt want them). Try no rules - wash trades, 'Death Star' and 'Fat Boy' and more.

Maybe function points rather than lines of code for the estimating the capital base for the regulated return in my earlier post.

Simple but effective decision...

[Bryce]

The best thing the court could do IMHO to solve
the problem would be to require the government
to no longer use MS software. This would have
a cascading effect as major gov't contractors
are forced to start including use of alternative
software, etc.

The U.S. government is probably THE biggest
software company in the world, I'd wager, and
its purchasing practices are probably many times
more powerful than anything the court can do.

Solution

[whereiswaldo]

Here's what you do:

Force all the head honchos from Microsoft (Bill Gates, etc..) to leave the company and to have no financial stake in Microsoft.

Of course, being as greedy as they are, they will create a rival company to Microsoft and have billions to put behind it. Now that would be interesting. I wonder if any of Bill's hired henchmen could possibly be more evil than he is?

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[vsync64]

The thing is Microsoft can just kill ANY software product that needs a profit to survive. Netscape this or that, could put could not put blah blah. Microsoft doesn't need to argue. They can decide they want Netscape to die and just invest X money on a bundled broswer. That's it, Netscape HAS to close.

Then how does Opera Software stay afloat?

I used to be a huge fan of Netscape. In many ways, NS3/X11 was (and still is) one of the best browsers ever made. Back when the phrase "browser wars" had any relevance, I consistently rooted for Netscape, and I have always and likely will always despise MSIE.

But the sad fact is that Netscape lost because they got overconfident and started sucking. Badly. NS4 was an unadulterated pile of tripe on every platform I've ever had the misfortune to see it running on. (I'm of the firm opinion that Netscape's sending JWZ to play on other projects was a large reason for this.)

From extremely unstable Java, JavaScript, and plugin handling, to a broken DOM, to broken font handling, to simple unmitigated flouting of Web standards, NS4 was a nightmare for developers, system administrators, and end users. And let's not forget that NS4's claim of implementing CSS, while deploying the most insane and broken implementation known to humanity, singlehandedly held back the Web by 2 or 3 years.

My experience with Netscape, the company, seems to bear this out. When I worked for a large company supposedly in a "strategic alliance" with them, they refused to even answer the phone when their phones showed it was us calling. I personally knew several people tasked with deploying Netscape products at the enterprise level, and the painful and unsupported hacks we had to put in place leave me cringing even now. We were supposed to be using the iPlanet server everywhere, but my manager had us use Apache and a third-party servlet engine after Netscape refused to implement basic Java servlet APIs and their configuration manager trashed our configs. When I later worked at a startup, we had one of the Netscape execs at our company, and he was still convinced that his old company's server products would win the day. Netcraft statistics meant nothing to him -- it was as if they didn't even exist -- and he seemed puzzled why everyone refused to mouth platitudes about it.

I use (unbranded) Mozilla now, and I'm very happy with it, but keep in mind that this is basically a complete redesign and rewrite of Netscape, years too late. Mozilla, Opera, Konqueror, and other browsers may win back market share, but it is far too late for Netscape, the company, and for good reason.

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[sheldon]

"The thing is Microsoft can just kill ANY software product that needs a profit to survive."

It's interesting because we obviously have the example of Quicken.

Maybe Intuit's Quicken doesn't suck? Could that be the difference between them and Netscape?

"But I don't love them leveraging that so wipe competition."

Every morning in Africa a gazelle wakes up and knows that it will have to outrun the fastest lion or it will be killed.

And, every morning in Africa a lion wakes up and knows that it will have to outrun the slowest gazelle or it will starve to death.

So, in Africa, it doesn't matter if you are the lion or the gazelle. When that sun comes up, you had better be running.

The very thing you want to prevent is actually what we call competition.

Uh, sorry, thanks for playing.

[oGMo]

No. MSFT isn't a monopoly. If MSFT was a monopoly, then Linux isn't an operating system and a Macintosh isn't a Personal Computer.

Bzzt. You lose. Microsoft is a legal monopoly. Acquiring this status does not require you hold 100% of the market; rather only something like 85%. Even this is probably a little lenient. Being a monopoly is also not illegal, as long as you don't abuse it.

We don't need to get more aggressive with anti-trust. Coke and Pepsi do the same crap that MSFT does, and they are not monopolies. Car companies--same thing.

Nice logic. Coke and Pepsi do bad things and aren't monopolies. Microsoft does bad things. Therefore, MS isn't a monopoly.

Humans eat food and water, and aren't cows. Cows eat food and water. Therefore, cows aren't cows.

(business reform stuff snipped)

Yeah. This should happen. You don't go quite far enough, but we're at least on the same page here.

Unfortunately, you're rather naive if you think monopolies should be left to run unchecked. In a perfect system, either monopolies couldn't happen, or they would run their natural course and die.

The problem is, this isn't a perfect system. Look at the RIAA, MPAA, even Microsoft lobbies; when corporations can fund lawmaking, legislate their business model, and outlaw their competition, the system doesn't work.

The checks and balances are there for a reason. You take those away, and everything topples. Right now, it's leaning precariously.

Re:Uh, sorry, thanks for playing.

[istartedi]

Nice logic. Coke and Pepsi do bad things and aren't monopolies. Microsoft does bad things. Therefore, MS isn't a monopoly.

Your therefore not mine. I linked the two statements with "we don't need to get more aggressive with anti-trust". You should have inferred that anti-trust is ineffective at preventing corporate abuse, not that MSFT isn't a legal monopoly.

How you inferred that I think monopolies should be left to run unchecked I can't even fathom. It looks like your inference unit is broken.

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[os2fan]

Hon, you must see what I say....

Microsoft fielded IE, and charged money for it, too....... MS never charged for IE. I have seen this on the shelves, IE in a retail box, and all. At the time was tossing up whether to buy netscape or ie. The pricetag was in the order of $25 us.

It just shows that the ties are artefacial, not technical. ...... Wrong again. All of 2K and 98 - the brunt of the efforts I was actually talking about Win95b, and yes, I did remove IE from it in an afternoon. IE in win98 can be removed, partly by patching a number of files, including notepad, write, explorer. 98lite does this nicely.

I'm not sure what 'artefacial' is. It means to claim some feature is essential, when it really is a separate product lightly hacked into it. I mean, the fax software in Win95 is actually a separate product very lightly hacked in.

No, he didn't throw the book at them.

[Hektor_Troy]

He threw an entire library AND a Boeing 747 at them.

Unfortunatly he was labled a terrorist, his ruling was overturned and he has since been dissapeared from the public!

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[Alsee]

The appellate court said "we find no evidence of actual bias ".

Part of Jackson's rulings were overturned because he violated judicial standards about talking to the press which could lead to the appearance of impropriety.

As for a proper solution, that's a tough one. Microsoft anti-competitive tactics are rampant throughout their bussiness dealings. Simply fixing the OEM licensing contracts isn't going to accomplish anything.

I don't know if a break-up is a good idea or not, but it is about the only ruling I can think of that would be sweeping enough to keep them from continuing with anti-competitive tactics that aren't on some short list of prohibitited activities.

A truely massive financial penaly might be enough to put some fear of breaking the law into them, but I think that may not be an available option.

-

Re:This is insanity.

[SerpentMage]

Socialist undermines? Hmmm, if this system was socialist then there would be no meddling. Because socialism would say that MSFT was the ideal company to continue and they would buy all of the arguments that MSFT makes; Innovation, lowest cost, etc, etc.

Actually the issue at heart is that it is a capitalist system. Capitalism is a system where you have resources scattered and with time it begins to concentrate in the hands of the few. Natural cycle of business. But anti-trust is required to break the large corporations control of the market when concentration reaches a too high percentage.

Is MSFT not putting a gun to your head? Yes they are... Let me explain, I develop software on Windows and Linux and what stress me out is when MSFT introduces new API's.

I develop software and want to know the homepath of the user. In the good ol days it was the HOME environment variable. Well that does not work anymore. About a year ago I had to upgrade my Platform SDK to get the headers for the Shell API. Ok so I am happy and get the home path. Recently I decided to format my computer. I reinstall everything and I get the latest Platform SDK. I compile and nothing works. I look and look and find out the latest Platform SDK has 64 bit support and my app breaks because it is not 64 bit compatible. WTF! My app is a client app that will never see the 64 bit light of day. So off I go and try to hunt down a Platform SDK from about a year ago. I find it and it works.

But and this where monopoly comes into effect. Lets say MSFT introduces a new API that I need (like the special shell api to get the users home path), well then I am shafted because I have to integrate the unwanted 64 bit support. Or I could move to .NET and not have the problem. But .NET is a Windows only (mainly Mono is not yet ready for prime time) toolkit. So now when I originally had a cross-platform client I have to make harddecisions on whether this is feasible. THIS IS MONOPOLY POWER!

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Dogbert at Microsoft trial

[frank249]

I wonder if Scott Adams wrote today's Dilbert with Microsoft in mind?

Dogbert the attorney: 'Your Honor, is it too late to change sides? '
[next panel]'After hearing the evidence I want to punish my client. ---No?'
[last panel - to client]I expect some awkward silences during the next break.'

Re:Antr-Trust Suit... anti-trust suit.. antitrusts

[MindStalker]

I don't think they are actually teflon coated, I read something somewhere about pants covered in microscopic hairs that repell liquids. But I'm not positive that is what the dockers are. Anyways

Look at how MS treated Compaq

[TheConfusedOne]

The issue with the OEM's wasn't ship Windows or some other OS. The issue was thet MS was using the Windows club to control other software they were shipping with the PC's.

For instance: Compaq was going to the extra time and expense to include Netscape on their PC's. Obviously they felt that that was what customers wanted at the time. MS wrote them a nice letter informing them that their OEM license was being cancelled.

Another example: IBM was shipping some machines with Win 3.1 and OS/2 installed on them. Additionally they were shipping machines with Smart Suite installed on them. MS dragged their heals when it came to negotiating a license for IBM to do OEM installs of Win 95. They went so far as to keep IBM out of the preview and testing groups so that IBM couldn't work out any issues between Win 95 and their PC's until almost the shipping day of Win 95.

I think you're mistaken

[TheConfusedOne]

The "PC Clone market" emerged when Compaq successfully reverse engineered the PC BIOS and built the first fully license-free PC.

That had absolutely nothing to do with MS and the licensing of DOS. Remember back in the old days the question was: "Is this PC 100% IBM compatible?"

Frankly, back in the day there were multiple companies selling DOS. There were even some successful GUI's before Windows 3.0.

The thing that got the clone market going was the fact that you could in fact clone the IBM PC.

Re:I think you're mistaken

[ClosedSource]

How many PC programs do you know that used only the PC BIOS and not DOS? Yes, some reverse engineering of the PC BIOS was necessary, but that was sufficient only because DOS was available. DOS was a big part of "100% IBM compatible". Customers demanded that PC applications run on the clone machines and that required DOS.

Much later in the game you had products like DRDOS, but only after the clone market was well established.

Re:I think you're mistaken

[TheConfusedOne]

Yes DOS was required to run the programs, but there was a pretty vibrant market for different versions of DOS. While I can't verify it completely, this timeline (http://www.powerload.fsnet.co.uk/timeline.htm) shows a rather vibrant market for various DOS's and GUI's during the days before Windows 3.0 and 3.1.

Again, the clone market was dependent on the breaking of IBM's last IP choke hold on the PC design (BIOS).

Re:I think you're mistaken

[ClosedSource]

By the time even Windows 3.0 was released, the clone market was well established. Look at it this way, which early, sucessful PC clone makers bundled a non-MS PCDOS compatible OS with their systems? Sure, there were other non-PCDOS compatible OSes availible for the PC early on, but running them on your clone would not provide "100% IBM Compatibility" and they died fairly quickly. There was no market for a non-MS PCDOS compatible OS until the MSDOS based clones made that market possible.

Bench legislation....

[siskbc]

Basically, the judge disagreed, so threw out the decision. I mean, there are very specific things that are allowed to be considered for an appeal, and I do not believe "talking to the media" is among them. This just followed in a long string of bench legislation. I mean, IANAL, but still...

Re:Bench legislation....

[siskbc]

in fact it was perfectly reasonable to consider Jackson's judicial ethics when evaluating the case on appeal. And, communication about a decision that is PENDING before you has been considered as bad behavior in the past

"Bad behavior" may deserve a reprimand, but the question is not 'Was Jackson an idiot' or 'Is Jackson a Microsoft-basher,' it was 'Was Jackson biased.' And if Jackson wasn't biased, then his ethics, or lack thereof, are not relevant to the case. This is a question of law, not of popularity. I really don't see, under LAW, how it is possible to simultaneously find that he was NOT biased and overrule his decision. As for his finding of fact, I don't think that's appealable (IANAL!!!), or they probably would have. In fact, I vaguely recall Jackson structuring his decision in this way to prevent the entire decision from being overruled.

Basically, I want to know on what legal basis this decision was made. Appeals courts are not supposed to be a "Round 2, try again," it's supposed to be whether sufficient LEGAL improprieties were committed to require an overruling of the case. If they say no bias existed, I see no reason for overturning it. I'm not saying I agree - I think he may have been biased - but I'm using the court's decision. And this would not be the first time that a multi-judge panel bench legislated. I'm sure we can all think of examples, but I don't want to leave unintentional flame-bait.

sorry, sometimes it seems like every single word in a /. commentary makes me sputter with disbelief.

And every single response to a ./ commentary makes me wretch at the dripping arrogance involved. Seriously, people, this self-superior attitude pervading a large portion of the ./ community is not attractive.

Re:Bench legislation....

[Alsee]

I really don't see, under LAW, how it is possible to simultaneously find that he was NOT biased and overrule his decision.

It is important for people to trust the court system. Not only must a court case be fair, it has to look fair to the public. This is what they mean by "appearance of impropriety". The appellate judges looked at the case and said everything was fine, except that it looked bad.

When they overturned some of Jackson's rulings it didn't mean the rulings were wrong, it mean those issues can be decided again by a new judge (who will likely rule almost exactly the same way). That way nobody can say Microsoft didn't get a fair chance.

-

Re:This is insanity.

[cthulhubob]

Just to clarify (or nitpick, if you prefer - but please consider it constructive criticism) the first part of your post there:

...if this system was socialist then there would be no meddling. Because socialism would say that MSFT was the ideal company to continue and they would buy all of the arguments that MSFT makes...

That's a common misconception, thanks to the Cold War era speeches made by people such as McCarthy, as well as earlier rhetoric by Marx and Engels attempting to exclude Bakunin and other anarchists from the International.

Socialism, or "state socialism" (concentration of power in the hands of the state) and socialism (concentration of social assets in the hands of the workers, achieved to its full potential only by direct democracy) are two vastly different things. Please use "S"ocialism when referring to a government such as the defunct U.S.S.R., wherein the state encompasses all capital and productive labour thereof. "s"ocialism is a much nicer animal :)

You can look here Anarchist FAQ, Section H: Why do anarchists oppose state socialism? for more details and a more scholarly discussion on the differences between the two.

Re:MS should go on strike - (Promise?)

[MercuryWings]

They should be able to negotiate any contract they want as long as it doesn't involve force (i.e. point a gun at someone).

You see, that's the problem - they do have a gun pointed at everyone - the economic equivalent of a gun called monopoly power. And your suggestion to pull Windows from the market is akin to cocking the hammer and squeezing the trigger.

But......

Believe it or not, I agree with you - Microsoft should do exactly that. Though I doubt you'll like my reasons for agreeing.

Windows is the metaphorical bullet in the gun. Once they pull the trigger, they'll have nothing left to threaten the marketplace with. The market will complain about being shot in the groin (personally because I believe that's where Microsoft likes to aim), but it's not a fatal wound. Once the market gets past the initial shock, they will realize there is nothing stopping them from going to alternate apps, alternate OS'es, and alternate licensing schemes.

Pulling Windows from the marketplace will ultimately give the market the impetus it has been wanting for a while now to restore balance and competition. No more Windows, no more dependence on Microsoft. Distributors/retailers will no longer feel pressured (or bullied) into offering only MS product, nor will competing companies feel like they have to hide from 'the giant boot'.

So....I'd love to see MS pull Windows. Unfortunately the gun they wield is double-barrelled, with one barrel aimed at themselves. They can't shoot you without shooting themselves. Their monopoly is their lifeblood - and they know it.

Lower prices

[nuggz]

Excellent, prices will drop, I can upgrade my computer even more cheaply.

If MS windows went away today, something would step in fast. Why? because they can make a profit, that is how the free market works.

SC Decides Their Case Load Not MS

[EXTomar]

Appeal if they like but historically the Supreme Court tends to reject hearings on cases like this where no Constituional questions are asked. Unless Microsoft's defense is that Anti-Trust laws are unfair and unconstituional the Supreme Court probably won't hear the case. It is of course their right to appeal as many times as they want but more than not the Supreme Court finds that the lower courts were in order and refuses to hear the case.

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Re:Not really flamebait

[Overzeetop]

Actually, I believe the financial potential of MicrosoftOS and Micorsoft Office Suites (yeah, I'd made 'em up) would outstrip the current Microsoft. Your widows and orphans might actually be better served with a breakup. (I own a good deal of MS through S&P500 tracking funds, and I'd rather see them burn in hell and put off retirement for a couple of years).

If they really wanted to kill half the company, force them to sell Office to Novell.

(Obsure WP reference, in case you didn't get it)

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A nice look back at the trial

[msouth]

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/8.11/microsof t. html

This is a great writeup from a guy who had a lot of access to the players with the understanding that he wouldn't publish until after the trial. I wish it would get turned into a book.

My favorite part about this is how it shows you the isolation that Gates and others live(d) in--he really seems to think he was innocent.

Another interesting revelation in this is that Gates micromanaged the law team.

Re:This is insanity.

[Waffle Iron]

By copying someone's work without his permission, you are infringing on his property rights, and turning him into your slave, to work for your benefit, rather than his own benefit.

Nobody's holding a gun to their head and making them author shiny plastic disks. Therefore, they cannot be slaves.

Ms K-K flipped the finger at the world instead

[Anonymous Bullard]

So what do you think about her now?

She may have followed "the letter of the law" but that is always the prerogative of judges. They have the power to either hand out justice or, as is the case here, allow unrepentant serial offender go virtually unpunished and unhindered.

Can the fucking American establishment possibly get any more arrogant!!??

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[fferreres]

Because they didn't let MS buy it and Quicken has support from finantial institutions (they don't personal finance to be swallowed by MS).

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[ImaLamer]

When did Netscape stop being inferior? It's still slow and it's a memory hog compared to IE. Not only that, but they waited 2 years to release a new version. They tiptoed along while MS was happily updating IE, making new useful features, and making it error-resistent.


Funny thing is, there wouldn't be a Netscape today if they hadn't sold out to AOL (and the fact that they moved to server markets).

They had 0 chance to win the game against Microsoft. Basically, if you have a good IPO they will come after you.

I mean, is IE really that much better? I don't see why. Sure, it beats the heck out of Netscape 4.7 but the newest versions + Mozilla + Phoenix + etc are getting a lot more attention. Soon the only thing MS will be able to do is release a new OS to fight it (uhmm... Win95 all over again!).

Yeah, you think IE is fast, you think it doesn't use much memory... but what if Netscape was basically built in from the kernel up? IE is a part of Windows now and it can't be seperated. When you PC is booting into Win2K or XP... it's booting up IE also. There is always part of it in memory because the "integration" between the two products.

Fine... you can say integration is a good thing, I might agree. But the browser hasn't improved and the browser doesn't deserve the praise... the OS does for swallowing up such a product and using it from the file manager to displaying help files and even the desktop!

IE is fast, it booted up before Windows did. In fact I'd bet if they had to kill IE or ship it seperately that would kill their OS not their browser market.

Re:Considering how biased the first judge was

[NanoGator]

Ummm okay. Heh. Opera is quite fast. It's not built into the kernel. IE is the most stable and compatible browser on the web. Mozilla and Phoneix are riding a "we hate Microsoft!" hype wave.

Frankly, I think Opera's a better browser than all of the ones mentioned in your post. Sadly, though, I can't completely remove IE from my workflow because some sites still play better with it. Netscape never had the drive to innovate, that's what killed them.