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RealNetworks Sues Microsoft Over Antitrust Issues

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the not-gonna-take-it-anymore dept.

jamacdon writes "Yahoo! has an article about RealNetworks Inc. filing an antitrust suit against Microsoft, claiming that MS has violated antitrust laws. This claim appears to revolve around how PC makers are restricted from including competing media players. Very similiar to the Internet Explorer issue, but different content. Will the results be the same?"

10 of 491 comments (clear)

  1. It might werk. by irokitt · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Real has a case there, because Microsoft is using the same tried-and-true approach that made IE what it is today. And the fact that they make it almost impossible to remove WMP in XP will make the case that much more believable.

    --
    If my answers frighten you, stop asking scary questions.
    1. Re:It might werk. by squiggleslash · · Score: 4, Interesting
      Real on OS X and Linux is lightyears away from the Windows implementation. I'm not sure if RealOne improved things, but Real did become infamous at one point for the amount of sheer crap in the player. Loading it took an age because of the ads, despite the fact it was "already loaded" having put itself in your system tray on start-up.

      I always quite liked the Linux version. The OS X RealOne seems to be fairly similar and, thankfully, fairly free of spyware. Oh, sorry Gator Corporation, I meant "privacyinvadingware", because as we all know, if you say somewhere what you're doing, no matter how slimy, it's all perfectly ok to do it.

      --
      You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
  2. Incompetent DOJ by Jesus+IS+the+Devil · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Seems to me the DOJ is doing one lame ass job in enforcing antitrust laws.

    Ask yourself, how FAIR can competition be when one application gets deep penetration into the consumer market while others are locked out on purpose?

    --

    eTrade SUCKS
  3. Violation of the settlement? by hoytt · · Score: 5, Interesting

    One could argue that Microsoft uses their monopoly position to strongly urge the OEMs not to include Real software. This would certainly be a violation of the settlement. It seems that Microsoft is still pulling the strings when OEMs need to decide what software to include with their computers. That's not a good thing.

  4. Is that really why Real Player died out... by chrispyman · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I dunno, I think that the real reason Real Player died out is more or less due to a lower quality program. True, Microsoft's bundling may have caused Real Player usage to decline prematurely, but it was inevitable that it would die out sooner or later.

  5. I have four words for them. by melted · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Mind your own business. Never in my life I've seen a piece of software as intrusive, spyware and ad-ridden and poorly written as Real Player. Face it, fellas, even if you force Microsoft to bundle RealPlayer with Windows it isn't gonna fly. First thing the customers will do is they will turn this piece of crap off, because it will try feed insane amounts of ads to them and pop up the god damn notification thingy to remind you that even though it's not doing anything useful at the time it's still taking up 10M of RAM and some processor resources while also trying to upsell you on the crap you could care less about.

    Good god, I don't want them to win. I'd hate to have to remove this shit from my newly purchased PC.

  6. Re:FUD!!!!!!!!1 by Michalson · · Score: 3, Interesting

    >>It no longer has spyware. Real Networks has stated that a number of times. However there seems to be a pattern of people using packet sniffers and discovering that RealPlayer sends out machine specific identifiers and urls to Real's network. To which Real replies "opps, guess we missed that one"

  7. Re:Blah. Who to root for? by pla · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This is like a steel cage match between bin Laden and Hitler. Who the hell do I root for?

    Y'know, I just pondered this for a moment, and find it somewhat odd...

    Years ago, back in the prime of the dialup days, we just couldn't hate any company more than AOL. Anything involving them might as well have had leprosy, as far as geeks felt.

    And yet now, with this tossup (WMP vs RealOne), I just realized that I currently use both a browser (Mozilla) and a media player (WinAmp) heavily funded by AOL.

    Strange, how times can change. And yet, if you asked me my general opinion of AOL, I'd still say they suck - But I suppose I have to thank them for sponsoring two pretty nice programs.



    Scary thought - Perhaps some day, we'll have to thank (gasp!) Microsoft for creating something nice for us? Eeeek. Time to go hide under the bed for a while.

  8. Re:Parent is a troll. by DigiShaman · · Score: 4, Interesting

    You haven't used Real Player before have you Mr AC? Last time I had it installed, a TSR program if it would always be running in the background even when I never use it. Thus, everytime I opened up Winamp, Real would pop up a window asking if it really want's me to use Winamp to play MP3s.

    And it get's worse, no matter how many times I rip out that little Real startup program from the registry, it always gets added back somehow. To hell with that I say. Real Player shall be forever baned from my PC.

    --
    Life is not for the lazy.
  9. Re:Dear Real by gcaseye6677 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    No shit. In fact, I've always said that RealPlayer is the original spyware. Before this term was even coined, RealPlayer would take over your entire machine, send data about your usage back to the mother ship, and was a real bitch to get rid of. And no matter how many preferences you unchecked (be my default player, load on startup, run all the time, etc.) it would STILL be running in the background.