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EU Rejects Microsoft Settlement Proposal
Karl Cocknozzle writes "European Union antitrust officials have dismissed as insufficient Microsoft's offer to settle their most recent antitrust problem in Europe. Spokespeople for the European Commission and Microsoft declined to comment on a report in today's Financial Times that Microsoft had offered to include rival media player software from Apple and Real Networks on a CD-ROM packaged with personal computers to help resolve the case. Previously, the EU had demanded that Microsoft either unbundle Windows Media Player, or also bundle rival media players with Windows. It appears that Microsoft might get more than a slap on the wrist this time around."
Apple has never strong-armed its vendors into bundling quicktime and forced them to drop competing products... Because Apple doesn't have any vendors selling OS X systems.
Apple is very friendly towards Real, and Real Player. A little less so since RealPlayer started playing quicktime on the PC (that pisses Apple off... a LOT), but they're still civil about it, and Apple knows that people want RealPlayer for OS X.
There was never any attempt to block the product from working with the OS (quite the contrary, we got lots of help making it work w/ the OS, and even got some time @ Macworld to show it off. I worked @ Real on the product) I don't think Apple has any kind of obligation to include the player, given their position in the market, vs. MS's
My sig is blank, I typed this by hand.
You clearly do not understand what a monopoly is and isn't. Don't feel bad, as neither does a substantial portion of the /. crowd.
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This is absolutely nothing like your example with BMW. To correct your analogy, the Microsoft BMW would
1) Enforce strict legalities on BMW dealers that they are not allowed to switch out the radios. Doing so can lose them their rights to deal in BMW products.
2) Design their engine so that if you removed the radio & replaced it with another, the engine would no longer start.
3) If a 3rd-party radio manufacturer finds a way around point 2, include legalities with your car's "license" (owner's manual/lease papers) that replacing the radio, even if it works, nulls and voids any manufacturer's warranty on the car.
4) Since no radio manufacturer is going to produce radios for that line of BMW because of 1-3, perhaps an end-user will attempt that. Assuming they are intelligent enough to bypass point 2, and careless enough to ignore point 3, BMW would not release technical specifications for how the radio actually plugs into the car's wiring system. In fact, they would intentionally make the wiring as confusing as possible, so that you have little chance of creating a radio that works as well as the factory radio.
I don't mean to start a flame war either. I'm just tired of hearing poor analogies like these that only indicate a lack of understanding of what a monopoly actually is.
Finally, let me point out that most countries agree that monopolies are perfectly ok, as long as you don't illegally use your fortunate market standing to maintain your monopoly.