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Microsoft CA Settlement Claim Forms Hit Mailboxes
mattOzan writes "So I got my Standard Claim Form in the mail today from the California State Superior Court, as I assume many other California residents did as well. This is the mechanism to get a chunk of the US$1.1 billion settlement Microsoft reached with the state of California for their anti-trust lawsuit. All the legal details (PDF) can be obtained online.
Some of the fine print: the money will be doled out as vouchers based on what qualifying MS software you or your company obtained between 1995 and 2001 (nothing for 'server computers' or Macs). Two-thirds of all unclaimed money will be given to low-income California schools for computer purchases, and vouchers may also be donated to charity."
You can get Lindows to do the leg work for you for the next 8 days.5 1,10006232,00.htm">here</a>.
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<a href="http://msfreepc.com/">MSFreePC.com</a>
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The attempted shutdown was reported <a href="http://www.silicon.com/software/os/0,390246
Beep beep.
That's not a settlement, it's a joke. This way, Microsoft will end up earning more money... Eventually. Give some computers to school etc... Laugh all the way to the bank when they start upgrading/buying additional MS software... Again, this is a joke.
Kudos have to go for the plan to give unused vouchers to the state's schools. I wonder how many will go on computers that come preloaded with Windows though? Will we see a story on Slashdot about a school tech trying to use the vouchers to buy a computer that *isn't* preloaded with a Microsoft OS?
When the big MS antitrust case was running, at the very beginning, I believe MS was trying to make a very specific point about the relationship of IE to Windows. MS was saying that their HTML rendering engine was a component of Windows (much like Gecko was the rendering component of Netscape) and that IE was a thin application shell that wrapped around that engine to create the behavior of a browser like Netscape. Other Windows applications can use that rendering engine, such as their help. So they could construct help files like web pages, but the app that you see them in is a help tool, not a browser.
That architecture is different than Netscape who carried their own rendering engine along with many other components as a bundle in their app. That difference in architecture is where the rathole regarding "taking IE out of Windows" comes from - removing the shell (as the CMU prof demonstrated) is relatively trivial, but if you object to the presence of the rendering engine, then the removal of that is not only painful but breaks other parts of Windows such as help.
Of course, it doesn't help that MS was also being an ass about this all.
Netscape (actually, I think it's other plantiffs such as Sun's Java) would complain that their ability to interact with the interfaces of these internal components was disadvantageous vs. Microsoft's own access and ability to enact change in the interfaces.
The remedy to this solution would have been hard to implement I think - you have to force Microsoft to publish and commit to a set of public interfaces and functionality, make them available to all comers, and create some mechanism through which MS can't have back-door entry. In practice, quite difficult to do, especially in areas like this, subject to significant evolution.
Once again, it doesn't help that MS was being an ass about this too.
OK, now flash forward to Eolas. For competitive reasons, MS got pulled into having plug-in interfaces. Later, they took the ball and moved it beyond where Netscape had already set it. Today, those public plug-in interfaces are the way that Real audio can be a pluggable replacement to Windows Media, or that Macromedia in some future Flash will become yet another option. Again, to a lesser extent, these kinds of plug in interfaces are what allows Sun to build a pluggable JVM (although I believe this is a pretty different mechanism).
So, if MS decides to lose the EOLAS case, that pretty much gives them carte blanche to slam the doors through the existing public interfaces shut and switch back to proprietary interfaces of their own, and their own control. In Soviet Russia, you don't plug into the brower, it plugs in to you (sorry, couldn't help it)! In a post-EOLAS world, poor Microsoft can't publish an API that allows Quicktime or Flash or RealMedia to appear in a window because they can't afford the license. But that won't stop them from doing a non-infringing implementation of Windows Media will it?
I think this is definitely NOT a case where the enemy of my enemy is my friend.
So get off your lazy ass, write to some California schools, and explain the alternatives to them. Bitching on Slashdot will accomplish nothing.
What is "linux hardware?"
The way I look at it forcing Linux or MacOS [only] on students is just as bad. I think students at an early age should get experience with all three. Really by time a student is 16 or so they ought to know how to use at least two of the prominent desktop OSes.
Tom
Someday, I'll have a real sig.
You didn't mention the serious questions that the claim form REQUIRES: Last 4 digits of your Social Security number or a copy of your driver's license. WTF?!?!?
Such arrangements are extremely common in class action suits. For example, the one recently settled with some music company (last year, reported here, dont remember when or who) would give something like $5 credit for a CD purchase, with the unclaimed balance going to schools and libraries.
Manipulate the moderator system! Mod someone as "overrated" today.
Ok, give someone a voucher - the person holding the voucher quite likely already has a Windows machine at home, and maybe needs that new "Student & Teacher Edition" of Microsoft Office.
Chances are, people are going to blow the vouchers on more Microsoft software. Even then, the vouchers aren't *that* much - the average Joe probably doesn't have his proof of purchase for old software anyway. A business might, and they could use the $$ they get back to fund their Windows XP upgrade.
Sorry, but I highly doubt that any company is going to say "Yay! Now we can switch to Linux!" - they're just going to add it to the existing IT budget & buy more MS stuff.
That said, I find it very interesting that the younger generation seems to rely on computers for all jobs, all careers and their very existence. In reality, there are many many more jobs now that require the use of computers, but the level of education required to run those systems is minimal. It's no different pressing a sandwich selection button that it was looking at a price tag and punching buttons on a cash register, except that you don't have to be as careful because the machine does most of the work for you.
On the other hand, managerial, design, programming, and other technical jobs require more training than ever before. But the bottom line is that people will still be trained on whatever the company uses for equipment, regardless of whether or not they've ever used it. The reason for getting the training in school isn't as important to the actual job anymore, but rather in most cases it's simply used as an indicator to see if you're trainable.
I wish we'd stop forcing more and more technology on our people and instead insist that the basics are concentrated on first - the ability to think for ourselves, and be able to right those thoughts down on paper in a way that others can read and understand it. The level of spelling and grammer accuracy is falling at a staggering rate in our schools and it's showing up in many areas now.
I use and like all three platforms (although I hate the Micro$oft company philosophically) because they are all easy to use desktop GUIs that have a place and a purpose in our computing lives. Having been taught initially on a mainframe, I like and appreciate the command line very much as well. I get a real kick out of people that say "what's a command line?".
Have you hugged your penguin today?