U.S. Faults Microsoft Licensing Compliance

An anonymous reader writes "In a written report card on how well Microsoft is complying with its 2001 antitrust deal with state and federal prosecutors, Justice Department lawyers said they might need the court to force Microsoft to act more quickly." The DOJ's court filing is online if you want to wade through it.

Comments

The whole settlement was a joke anyway

[McAddress]

If the government had really wanted to do something about Microsoft's monopoly, they would have broken it up like they did to the Bell's. Once they decided not to, it only became a question of "How much are we going to pretend to care about this?"

Their answer as seen from the settlement, and the lack of compliance is "Not very much."

Re:The whole settlement was a joke anyway

[McAddress]

Since the Bell breakup, prices on phone calls have dropped dramatically. Interstate calls used to cost $0.25 a minute (not adjusted for inflation). Now you can easily make them for less than $0.05 a minute.
More phone companies have also been able to form, allowing users more choice than ever.
Imagine where the celluar phone industry would be with only one company. Calls would cost upwards of a dollar a minute. The networks would not be so big. Cell phones would be as rare as car phones were.
The government has an interest in controlling monopolies. Microsoft has used it's monopoly on operating systems to stifle competition. Just look back to this. Microsoft commits actions like this all of the time, but the DOJ has just turned the other way.

Translation

[IGnatius T Foobar]

Translation:

Microsoft's substantial contributions to George W. Bush's 2000 campaign fund were very helpful in getting him into the White House. Bush returned the favor by allowing Microsoft to escape unscathed from the big antitrust suit.

Now, Mr. Bush has begun the process of raising funds for his 2004 campaign, and it's time for Microsoft to pay up again.

Re:You call this a capitalist society?

[LordKaT]

The problem is that Microsoft, being as influential as it is, doesn't allow "free market" in certain enviornments. In a sense, they control the market. So, in a capitalist enviornment, it is more beneficial to have them broken up thus allowing for more competition.

Remeber, having a monopoly is not illegal, having a monopoly and abusing your influence, such as the case of Microsoft, is illegal. Actually, I wouldn't be surprised for the courts to find that Microsoft has "pierced the corporate shield" with all of the tactics and tricks hey use.

Then again, the republicans are in power ... ;/

--LordKaT

Re:You call this a capitalist society?

[Trepalium]

Anti-trust laws were originally made because the free market usually works well, there are times when it can break down and cause harm to consumers. Competition is what the free market is all about, but when a profitable monopoly is established, they tend to bleed dry any competition, either by buying them up, or bludgeoning them to death with lawsuits.

People would nolonger aspire to become as rich and successful as possible? Is being greedy a crime?

Guess what? Not everyone wants to have so much money that they could never spend it within their lifetime. I have no idea how someone could ever use 40 million dollars in their lifetime, let alone 40 billion. Personally, all I need is food, clothing, shelter, and something to do with my time that I enjoy. I don't need a fast/expensive sports car, an automated do-everything house, or my own aircraft.

Shock and awe

[Realistic_Dragon]

Not only is Microsoft not complying, they are in fact way in excess of the monopoly position that they were in when they started.

They have been busy leveraging their monopoly into new markets (cell phones and games consoles to name but two) and reverse-leveraging their new market share in these industries back into the PC market for greater lock in (Outlook integration that is closer than 3rd parties can obtain for example).

They have been investigating hardware lock in techniques (palladium style) and trialling them on consumers (Xbox) to prepare for the next wave of monoplising efforts. They are busy fundng other companies attacking their competators (SCO). They are proping up Bush econmic policy (share dividend at an advantageous moment) in return for special consideration (legal proglems decrease).

Lets hope to God this triggers another investigation - there is such a huge increase in their deliberatly destructive antics now that even a half blind judge would break them up.

Except that they will prbably buy him off too.

Microsoft is immune to their whiny court orders.

[kaltkalt]

Antitrust law is a good thing, but if it's not used quickly enough, a monopoly can get so big, rich, and powerful, that laws no longer apply to it. It can afford to buy its way out of any problems it may face. Microsoft is just such a monopoly. It should have been broken up around the time of Windows 3.1. But it was left alone for years after that, and now it can fart in the faces of the justice department and there's not a single thing they can do about it (other than whine to the press).

And on the 4th of July, too

[Rogerborg]

A day when we celebrate victory in a civil war that began as a protest about taxation without representation.

Say, how much representation do your taxes buy you? Wouldn't it be neat if we could all choose to pay "campaign contributions" to buy laws and fat federal contracts, instead of paying taxes to whoever we decided was probably the least bad of two candidates?

I'm in agreement with George W that the only way to deal with oppressive unelected regimes is to replace them forcibly. I just think we should clean house at home before building any more aircraft carriers.