Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Facing European Sanctions
Shakrai writes "CNN and Money Magazine are reporting that a draft decision by the EU committee overseeing the Microsoft investigation appears to recommend fairly severe sanctions against our favorite software company. The article states that the ruling will likely force Microsoft to offer a second version of Windows without 'built-in audiovisual software' (Windows Media Player) for EU customers. While this sounds like a good thing, the article also mentions that Microsoft has an appeals process and will likely get an injunction against enforcement while they pursue said appeal, which may take years."
I'm sure the average windows user wouldn't want to have to play around with selecting/installing video playback software when all they want to do is playback a clip they've downloaded.
My poor Mum!!!
...found within bundled software like IE, OE, Media Player and Movie Maker. M$ would voluntarily unbundle these components or run out of cash quite soon.
"The European Commission draft requires Microsoft to share proprietary information with rival server makers"
That's always my sticking point. I'm not as much bothered that they support video playback in their default system (they also support image playback and text playback, after all) as to their generally incompatible and excessively proprietary methods.
I personally don't like Microsoft... but you have to ask yourself if Media Player is removed who is affected by this in a negative way?
I think the 'normal users' will be hit hardest, a lot of them just want their media to play and in my opinion it is the place of the Operating System to provide the functionality. We might install something better, but it doesn't hurt us to have it there even if we don't use it. I think the same is true with IE.. it has helped the new users a great deal even if it is bug ridden and crappy.
Many distributions ship with software such as XMMS, mplayer and the gimp. Should Mandrake, SuSE, Debian and the like be fined for carrying this software?
Who are they trying to fool? When they said this about Internet Explorer I could imagine how this could be true, but what parts of Media player might be essential for other applications???
*EVERY* OS has had/comes with/includes a media player. It is a functional part of the OS to support the playback of audio/video sounds in everything from user-interface, alters, notifications and theme support.
Heck, its even part of the mandated accessibility/disability acts for people who require audio/visual/tactile feedback.
I for one preferr the free stuff then Real or even Quicktime.. atleast i don't have things popping up telling me useless facts (even after being disabled) or having mime type wars on my pc.
I bought windows because it was easy.
I bought linux and still do because it was powerfull.
Each has there own use, but this has got to be the most retarded lawsuit i've EVER heard of.
Advocates of free software claim to be advocates of freedom. If this were the case, they would only attack Microsoft on those terms. The WMP is not a freedom issue. If a customer doesn't like Windows prepackaged with WMP, there's nothing stopping that person from acquiring another OS.
This is just a bunch of government busibodies telling you how to run your lives.
Why doesn't Apple get any heat for including iTunes, iMovie, iDVD, QuickTime, Safari, etc?
:)
(Just wondering other ppl thoughts, plz don't flame me...
they would start development on their second OS right now. I don't live in Europe, but from what I read and hear on IRC, I get the feeling that M$ is not going to win any appeals, and eventually will be forced to sell their cut down OS. It would save them time and money. Why drag it out in court, when you're probably going to lose anyway?
geek n performer who performs morbid or disgusting acts, as biting off the head of a live chicken
After all, lots of people seem to use it and if there are better (commercial or OSS) alternatives, then it's up to Windows users themselves to go find them and decide.
However, this is good from a perspective of slowing down DRM. No matter what anyone says, DRM is creeping "in through the back door" and WMP is one of those "Trojan Horses" transporting DRM to the desktop. By the time Longhorn comes out, DRM'ed codecs will be the norm (if MS has their way) and we can say goodbye to MP3s on our portable players and PCs.
I would hope the EU goes a stage further and makes MS publish clear disclaimers and warnings that on downloading WMP, you will be subject to DRM restrictions on all the media that you play with it.
In the meantime, it's a good opportunity for makers of "free" (="non-DRM") players to get ready to push their software in the hope that this sanction goes through.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
Thank goodness. At least it shows the EU can see through the "dirty tricks" campaings that Microsoft uses. Perhaps they will realise they can't pull the wool over eveybodies eyes. Well done Europe.
If only everybody realised that in the long term the illegal, monopolistoc practices that Microsoft use will do nothing but harm the computer industry and its users.
Ahh, so windows would still come with a video player. So can't OEM people install real, etc before selling at the moment? Guess not.
If only is were inferior quality, you might have an argument.
However:
Linux runs faster and more stable than Windows, with more features.
KDE runs faster than Windows with many more features and a better look, although only equally stable.
MPlayer plays back more video types than Windows Media Player, and also is more fault-tolerant, uses less resources, is easier to use, and is more stable.
Mozilla renders more accurately and has better features than IE, but runs slower and doesn't support a few pages (none that I have ever needed to use)
Konqueror runs faster than IE with more features but tends to render worse (sometimes on pages that matter)
The only sticking points are MS-Office and lots o stuff from Adobe and Macromedia (although I am not happy with the rate of improvement in Dreamweaver and Adobe Acrobat is pathetic compared to ghostview, except for a few really complex PDF files)
So, if I were paying an equal price, I would still go with the free software solutions most of the time. The biggest sticking point of all is games, and that is starting to change.
P.S. The economy can go fuck itself, Capitalism is almost as bad as Communism. We need a general revamp.
It is a good idea. It happened with IE and should happen with any other Windows endorsed products. There is no reason to ship them pre-installed. The argument that Linux do that is false because XMMS and The Gimp are seperate entities from the distribtuion.
Not exactly difficult. The so called "sanctions" taken against MS in the U.S. were meaningless to the extent that most observers believe there was a secret backroom deal. Frankly, I cannot see what the Europeans propose having much effect on MS's monopolistic practices either.
Of course it's convenient to get all of that stuff included with your operating system. But if you remember, there used to be a market for things like browsers and video playback software. That market is all but gone, thanks to Microsoft including these products with their OS. I know, there is something called Mozilla for us staunch MS-haters. But good luck trying to sell (or even give) your alternative browser to the public at large.
I don't feel too bad about MS including such things with their OS, even though I am sure producers of, say, video editing software are having nightmares about MS including that functionality with Windows in a few years time. it's hard to draw the line: sure, no one would argue against operating systems needing a decent file manager, for example. Yet people used to make a living developing and selling separate file managers, a long time ago.
What I do have a problem with, is that MS sometimes not just includes browsers and video software with the OS, but made sure that it was rather hard to install an alternative product as well. That is what they should be punished for... but this ruling doesn't really accomplish that. As far as browsers and video playback software is concerned, it's all water under the bridge, and you correctly note that it will be consumers who will be hurt by removing these from the OS. MS probably doesn't care a great deal.
I would have preferred a big fine for MS, to make it clear what is unacceptable behaviour. It has to hurt if it's to heal.
If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
Hmmm. Maybe we should rework the "Every time you fap god kills a kitten" cliche to "Every time Someone exposes a bug Microsoft pays a dime"
"Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
--Dr.W.Edwards Deming
WMA becomes widely installed, and is the default.
People start recording their music as WMA.
Companies sell in WMA (for the wide user base).
Stations start broadcasting in WMA (ditto).
People buy WMA devices.
People are locked into WMA forever now their media is all in WMA form and they own WMA devices.
WMA works best in Windows (and DRM WMA only works in Windows), and is a barrier to changing platforms.
Profit. Monopoly extended and locked in, and entrenched in a totally new area. Desktop monopoly (and all the other monopolies that perpetuate it and are perpetuated by it) made more secure.
THIS is why a bit of user convenience has to be sacrificed. Made media player (and all the other integrated stuff) come uninstalled on a second CD so that at least the user has to think if they want to use it.
Otherwise they will expand their monopoly one niche at a time - desktop, office, server, media, handhelds, music players, gaming consoles, televisions, cars, watches, the whole world... untill it is too late to back out.
Beep beep.
And I'm not sure why anyone would post that this isn't fair, if you can't see MS is once leveraging it's desktop monopoly to control yet another market, you are blind or at least obtuse. Do we really want another Netscape on our hands, it's taken 5 years for the likes of Mozilla, FireFox and Safari to revive browser innovation while IE 6 has remained a stagnant, insecure and non-compliant piece of junk. Killing competition in browsers hurt the web, although it will be years before the useless business analyst get around to acknowledging this. We don't want the same thing to happen in media players/codecs, instant messaging or a raft of other technologies. Time to stop MS now. And vote with your damn wallets, if you don't like what MS does then switch to Mac OS X or Linux and put your money where your mouth is!
How is this insightful?
If monetary penalties were imposed on security bugs (or any other bugs for that matter), it would wreak havoc on the software industry. And the free software community would be one of the first to burn from the full heat of it. Microsoft will still have some cash to spare, but most organizations/people that produce/write free software have limited budgets.
Don't quote me on this.
Looking back at history I'm thinking about Rockefeller and Standard oil. How is that situation any different from Gates and Microsoft? Standard oil was broken up by the government why shouldn't we do the same now to Microsoft? Its irrefutable that Microsoft controls software for the personal computer from the operating system, office applications to now digital media/rights. Even before the SCO/Microsoft fiasco it was obvious that Microsoft devoured its competitors to preserve its stranglehold on the industry.
Has anyone ever thought about making MS open their windows update functions to their competitors?
Unbundling is useless if you are forced to download eleven and twenty patches after installation and media player looks like one of them.
90 percent of the world couldn't install or get around Linux's UI on a average day so who the fuck cares if it runs faster + more features?
you think MS will reduce margins if they get fined or will they pass that cost to the customer either indirectly (format lockin/upgrades etc) or directly via product price increases ?
doesn't really take a MBA to work out what they will do, fining them will not punish them at all, especially with the worlds richest people at the helm.
Perhaps Microsoft's heavy-handed tactics against Lindows in Europe (and everywhere for that matter) will not go unnoticed by the European courts and/or regulators...
This example was written about Office, but it's relevant to this argument:
Say that Office was a seperate company to Windows.
Office the company would see that making their product available on every platform would make them more money. Thus it would be so. Windows the company would have no incentive to build in special APIs for Office. Office would compete on it's merits and so would Windows, and competition COULD and WOULD exist effectivly in the marketplace.
Now, say that Office and Windows are made by the same company.
Office would by and large see that by making their product only available for Windows they would make less money but it would be worth more because every copy sold would also sell a Windows license. Windows wants to make sure that everyone who buys Windows chooses office so they do what they can to make it seem to run faster, better etc. Consumers get screwed by lack of choice.
(Obviously Office is also available for Mac, but this is due to historic pre-monopoly reasons. The same decision might be made today, but only to dodge having the AntiTrust people looking at them too sharply. If Office had been split off from Windows it would likley be available on IRIX, HPUX, AIX, Linux, BSD etc today as well as Windows and OS X.)
Beep beep.
As much as I hate to say it...
MS has what, $56bil on hand? That's 560,000,000,000 dimes. A normal install of Windows is at most, say, 5 gigabytes (haven't done it in a while). That comes out to 42,949,672,960 bits. In other words, they have more than 10 times as many dimes as bits.
There are 11 types of people in the world: those who can count in binary, and those who can't.
I despise Microsoft, but I can imagine any number of things that might have to go through Media Player, or use it's core technology anyway. If OS X shipped without Quicktime ,multimedia previews in the finder wouldn't work, games wouldn't launch, etc. Maybe the solution would be for Microsoft to license Quicktime as the default media framework on Windows. They get the requisite functionality and can yell loudly about the fact that a core technology to modern consumer operating systems, is from a direct competitor. Average user won't know the difference, and Microsoft will lose no nothing.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again:
Microsoft should not be allowed to sell Windows with any additional apps whatsoever.
With Linux you have different distributions, why can't Windows work on the same principle?
You don't get Mandrake saying "Oh, we're not going to put into our distro, why should we put other people's apps in our distro's?"
The whole point of distributions is that you get loads of apps from loads of developers, and you get to select exactly what you want from the best available apps.
Having Windows distributions is the only way I see of overcoming Microsoft's anti-competitive monopoly.
Linux/Open Source/Anti Microsoft News
Given that Microsoft is a large American company, this European anti-trust process could certainly be seen as partly political. Just think of the new era of non-cooperation, tit-for-tat, economic retaliation, etc. in the wake of the split over the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
Unfortunately, this means the Bush administration is likely to line up squarely behind Microsoft on this issue ("we can prosecute them for anti-trust, but I'll be damned if those French bastards are gonna get away with it"). Even if the goal of the European action is entirely admirable, say, they want to improve competition and open up standards, the administration will for political reasons end up opposing it.
This will result in them doing spiteful things that tend to favor proprietary software and disfavor Free software.
I guess it's not surprising that powerful people will oppose anything that lessens the control they have over others.
Whenever you visit the Microsoft webpage (windows update), they will have a video of how to install patches. This video will be only available in media player format. A few other pages on the web like this (through partnership) and it will not dent the "market share" one bit.
If I were the dictator, MS would be forced to document the file formats it is using (including all WMV formats, of course), all network protocols, and to provide sufficient NTFS documentation so that I can finally can mount /dev/hda2 with read-write soonish.
oh yeah its America's economy being flushed down the toilet
80 percent of the world couldn't install windows.
70 percent of the world could get around Linux if it were a decent distro (SuSE, Ark).
And, most importantly, I'm not part of those percentages, so why the fuck would that affect what I use?
An open letter to antitrust, competition, consumer and trade practice monitoring agency officials worldwide.
The role of trade practice and antitrust legislation is to provide the consumer with protection from abusive business practices and monopolies. In one of the most serous cases of monopolization in the information technology industry, the agencies charged with protecting the competitive process and the consumer have utterly failed to stem the offending corporation's anti-competitive practices.
The Microsoft corporation has been under continuous investigation by antitrust policing agencies since 1989. Despite this scrutiny, the Microsoft corporation, using covert and overt anti-competitive business tactics, has maintained an unabated campaign against alternatives to Microsoft Windows operating system platforms and Microsoft applications.
For years the Microsoft corporation has earned around 70% to 80% net profit from sales of its operating systems and application software. Only in areas like Thailand where Linux on the desktop has just begun to gain a foothold has Microsoft stated that it will release versions of its operating system platform and application software at a lower price to Original Equipment Manufactures (OEMs) and retail consumers than is available in the rest of the modern world. Consumers benefit where real competition exists.
The world desktop operating system market remains predominantly monopolized by Microsoft. Over the last decade, Microsoft continued to lever its desktop platform monopoly to the point where it now holds a dominant position worldwide in the application office suite and web browser software markets. On its own, the current USA Department Of Justice (DOJ) settlement with the Microsoft corporation has failed to bring about any restoration of serous competition to the desktop operating system market. Microsoft continues to use similar anti-competitive business tactics in an attempt to monopolize the digital media player and the desktop services server markets. Competing vendors increasingly find that they can no longer compete with Microsoft if they limit themselves to only the traditional closed source model of software development.
In the last six years information technology vendors have adopted techniques and resources from two existing movements geared toward the construction of software. The newer open source movement, represented by the non-profit Open Source Initiative (OSI) corporation, emphasizes the licensing of software in a manner which encourages its collaborative development in an open environment. The older free software movement, represented by the non-profit Free Software Foundation (FSF), focuses on the ethical issues surrounding the licensing of software. The free software movement emphasizes freedoms which are often taken for granted outside of the field of software: the freedom to use, study how something works, improve or adapt it and redistribute.
The Free Software Foundation offers two software license schemes which are compatible with their own goals and those of the Open Source Initiative: The GNU General Public License (GPL) and the GNU Library General Public License (LGPL). Essentially, the GPL and LGPL licenses grant the recipient extra rights than that granted by copyright law. Both licenses insure that a contributer or distributer of a GPL or LGPL licensed work may not further impede downstream recipients the rights granted by the same license. Many developing software in an open source manner have realized that this benefit offered by the GPL and LGPL licenses outweigh any potential losses. The licensing also insures that no contributing or distributing vendor or group of vendors could potentially monopolize the market, insuring that real market competition dictates price. Just as the automotive industry can commonize on standards for the production
Media software makers, or Microsoft?
This is not going to change anything. Microsoft will pressure the manufacturers to install their software. The consumer will never have a choice. Another total win for Microsoft.
I see alot of fellow slashdot posters slamming on "Why only WMP?". Well, the outcome of this sanction is wider than WMP alone, much wider. It will leverage future sanctions on other software bundled with Windows in speed and decision power. By taking this case as an example, it will become much easier to make sanctions against other monopoly misuse. That is what the real power of this decision is all about.
This is a replacement signature.
MOZILLA IS NOT SLOWER THAN IE!!!
Mozilla startup takes more time than IE, IF and only if you don't consider the time it takes to start IE at system startup. Other than that, Mozilla, and Firefox especially, literally kick the pants off of IE. There was a wonderful page I found that simply drew images and removed them repeatedly that demonstrated this, IIRC IE took about 10 times as long as Mozilla.
There are 11 types of people in the world: those who can count in binary, and those who can't.
So for now just speculate and pretend MS will have to abide by the sanctions. By the time the ruling does take place users will be familiar enough (if they are not already) with WMP that it would be hard for anything to take its place. If a user has purchased any addins for WMP it is unlikely for them to prefer another player. Personally I think this is more of a burden for the users because they will have to find the newest WMP to download then its 4-5 patches.
I think its great that Microsoft includes basic functionality like a media player, word processor, calculator, internet browser, etc.
I hope that we all realize that the PROBLEM lies in preventing the uninstallation of said items without "crippling" the OS.
I think MS should be allowed to include whatever they want, as long as the no-install/uninstall option is there and its real (as in really uninstalls the files, not just "hiding" them).
Why can't Microsoft see how easy it would be to fix this? But then again, that sort of tunnel vision is what has gotten them into the hot water they are in.
Is the juice worth the sqeeze?
I think the EU is going in the wrong direction, saying MS has to unbundle Media Player is the stupidest thing I have heard of. If thats the case all OS's should unbundle Media Players, Mac's, Linux, whatever. Why play favorites, aren't they trying to make things equal. Maybe they should unbundle notepad and calculator as well, their are 3rd party applications out there. Hell I don't even use the newest media player, I use media player classic. But I have to say its nice to have common apps installed as soon as the OS is installed, so you don't have to go searching and downloading all this stuff. What if you don't have access to the internet what are you going to do then? Their is a reason MS bundles these, to make it easy for users. by removing any applications they just make it really really hard for consumers. Yes they should have an option to uninstall anything you don't want. *sarcasim* --> But I say why stop with MS and Media Player, I say NO OS's should bundle any Apps, No quicktime on Mac's, no Notepad in Windows, no OS's can't have any application pre-installed if their is a 3rd party version out there. *end sarcasim* What the hell is wrong with people, this won't hurt MS at all, only hurts us and fellow consumers.
I can't believe this is marked as insightful. For the record:
The EU decided to impose sanctions on the U.S. for giving tax preferences to exporters after the World Trade Organization repeatedly ruled this out of bounds.
The tax breaks, now known as the extraterritorial income exclusion, were designed to offset the perverse effects of U.S. high tax rates and system of world-wide taxation. This system handicaps U.S. firms competing against foreign counterparts whose governments tax only their home income.
Even though the Europeans themselves rebate value-added taxes on their exports, they decried the U.S. tax breaks as unfair and won their case at the WTO.
That decision was disturbing on several levels, not least because it is part and parcel of a wider European effort to stifle tax competition..
That Windows Media 9, video, audio, and the avi and asf container formats, are an open standard now.
Windows Media is no longer a proprietary format. It's an open, but not free, standard just like MPEG-4. Anyone that pays a fee is free to implement it in any form they like (just like MPEG-4).
r ea te/licensing.aspx
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/c
so because they do it , we should to ?
regardless we broke the WTO's agreement (like every other treaty/international law we are determined to break) and are being punished for it,rightly so.
next up airlines and textiles
and the parent was offering insight into the USA's current position, not arguing about "they do it" which just smacks of kindergarten attitude, then again in terms of a building a country we are still shitting in our dypers(TM) compared to some
Ehm, no. This was because Bush gave the stale industry in the USA an ADVANTAGE.
I would agree with you about Mozilla, except for a few issues I have. 1) Sometimes the helper application work, sometimes they dont. For example, clicking on a .torrent will sometimes do the appropriate thing, sometimes it will just open the raw data in mozilla. Not sure if this is problem related to mozilla though.
2) Ctrl+C (copying text), Sometimes when I highlight text to copy, it selects like an invisible box around the text region. Only way to fix this is to reload the page and try highlighting the text again.
"Software is like sex: it's better when it's free."
This is just how European countries practice protectionism without technically violating world trade rulings. How come they've never done anything about the diamond cartel even though people are actually dying over that?? At a time when Linux is doing just fine on its own I can't see why we need this over the top MS conspiracy nonsense.
The advisory committee is expected to approve a remedy requiring the U.S. firm to share more of its protocols with rivals, charging a reasonable royalty. It will be left to Microsoft to work out the precise solution, with close oversight by the Commission, the sources said.
If Microsoft is still allowed to demand royalties for sharing API's and protocols (no matter how 'reasonable'), the sanctions will still be useless to Open Source and Free Software developers. What good is this to the SAMBA team? And you can forget about Red Hat finally adding NTFS-compatibility to its distributions! >:(
"Oooh, does that mean we get to kick some puffy white mad zionist butt?"
If MS can leverage their strong market position in the desktop OS area to drive competing commercial producers of media players out of business, that is a freedom issue.
5 gigabytes? No, that is a normal install of Red Hat or Mandrake. The average install of WindowsXP is less than 1 gigabyte.
When the EU has become the dominant trade force (outside of possibly China), as it almost certainly will, will you be condemning the EU for throwing its weight around? Will you be taking to the streets to protest future european corporate giants' behavior overseas? You might personally do this, but I think you will be part of a very small crowd.
Every day in the US, there are citizens trying to oppose unfair trade practices overseas by domestic corporations. Most citizens? No. Most citizens are just trying to get through the work week, feed their families, and pay off their bills. But according to you they are all "troublemakers." It makes it much easier to contemplate fucking them over when you lump them all together that way, isn't it?
Well, here is a little reality check for you. People are the same no matter where you go. We need to stop buying into this whole "region pitted against region" concept we inherited from our anceastors. The only purpose it serves is to allow those in power get more more power.
The only hope for _real_ free trade in the world, would have been a larger economic Union made up of the free democratic nations, everywhere.
But, then people like you would not feel a growing hatred for "outsiders," and a growing sense of power and unity in your specific geographical region. That was the real purpose, afterall.
MPlayer plays back more video types than Windows Media Player, and also is more fault-tolerant, uses less resources, is easier to use, and is more stable. ... and is more illegal, as it uses pirated software that they don't have permission to redistribute to do so.
Coming soon - pyrogyra
Even though the Europeans themselves rebate value-added taxes on their exports
It's simple, unless you are a very small company. If you sell stuff in the EC you charge your customer VAT. If you buy stuff in the EC you pay VAT. If you sell stuff outside of the EC you do not charge VAT and if you buy stuff from outside of the EC you do not pay VAT.
So if the US sells stuff to the EC the EC doesn't have to pay VAT and if the EC sells stuff to the US the EC doesn't have charge VAT. It is not a tax break nor a rebate.
What exactly is the purpose of a fine for a monopoly such as Microsoft? Does the EU think that the money is going to come out of the pay of top MS executives?
Of course not. Any financial penalties will just be passed along to the customer, as usual, who in this case does not have a choice due to the monopoly situation.
More interesting is what the EU will plan to do with the penalty money? Invest it in open source, require open file formats and standards?
One more duality in the Linux vs. Microsoft war.
Hard-core Linux advocates won't waste a second telling you how Linux is superior to Microsoft in EVERY way. They say Linux will beat Microsoft in the end because of its superiority.
Then you have some (probably the same people) influencing litigation against Microsoft, trying to tear them down.
So which is it? Is Linux going to win by superiority of product or superiority of political/legal influence?
It is detrimental to the Linux world if the focus is on Microsoft. The focus should be on Linux! Why would we want those choosing Linux doing so because they dislike Microsoft.
This way of thinking could get us in trouble in the current election campaign here in the U.S., where people hate Bush so they embrace Kerry. Why would someone want to endorse a product on the basis of a negative relationship with some other product? This way of thinking just doesn't make sense. Actually, I would say this isn't thinking at all, but pure emotional reaction. If this is the case with Linux, then those responsible need to reevaluate their direction.
"Never tell me the odds"
MS Windows XP without WMP..Euro 159.99
erm, Linux please...
Hey, just noticed something. For a site that likes to be open, why can I NOT use the Great British pound sign OR the EURO sign (both are in there now, but don't show on the comment), only the DOLLAR? Is this a consipiracy? Whether text, HTML or Extrans...What's wrong with that?
You can say Micro$oft but not Microoft or Microoft for examples...see, the pound AND Euro don't come out...?
When all is said and done, nothing changes...
Because by dragging it out in court, if they can get the injunction allowing them to continue their current practices until a final verdict is reached, they still win.
Allow me to elaborate: in cases such as this, it's usually (and anyone in Europe, please correct me if I'm wrong) fairly easy to get an injunction from the appeals court allowing the penalties to be put aside until the appeals court issues its ruling. So, during the 3-4 years in which the case is under consideration in the higher courts, Microsoft is free to continue its current practices. Thus, more people get used to (and come to expect) the WMP software. Therefore, even if the eventual verdict is wholly against them, they still have users who are most familiar with their software, and are thus more likely to use it even when presented with alternatives. As a result, they win, in spite of having lost in court.
This is basically the same thing that happened in the US antitrust case. By the time the settlement was actually reached, most users were more familiar with IE, and were more inclined to use it than any of the alternative browsers.
-Z
Option 1: Windows XP with Media Player, 99 Euros.
Option 2: Windows XP without Media Player, 99 Euros.
Retail purchasers and OEM licensees will be completely free to choose either version.
No, this is not a joke. If the EUC think this is too obvious to mention and prohibit, they are in for a rude awakening.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
I would call this new news. Your post is informative? Please.
If only more people actually did this! If even 10% of the people who complained about M$ actually did something about it, the software world would be a very different place. It's amazing the number of people who feel that they are a special case, that they have a particular special reason for not switching to something else. (Yes, in some cases those reasons are genuine, but I suspect laziness plays a large part in many.)
I try to act on principle. I've only ever owned two pieces of M$ software, for example: one was the Psion Series 3 version of AutoRoute (which doesn't really count as it was written by a separate company that got bought out shortly before release; M$ dropped it soon after), and the Mac OS X version of IE (pre-installed; I keep it as a last-resort browser and use it every few months). It's not hard, really -- it's a pain when people keep sending me Word documents, but there are various workarounds even if people won't take the hint -- and I don't feel I'm making any great sacrifices. I just don't put following the crowd as my top priority.
So, to all you people who use M$ software and complain about it: don't complain, STOP USING IT!
Ceterum censeo subscriptionem esse delendam.
If monetary penalties were imposed on security bugs (or any other bugs for that matter), it would wreak havoc on the software industry.
It seems DocSnyder is not suggesting imposing fines on security or other bugs, but since Microsoft is a convicted monopolist, and has steadfastly refeused to unbundle these bug-infested products, they must pay the price. If they really believe that integrated media/internet/mail is part of the OS of the future, then they should ensure that said OS is secure. Linux/OSX etc won't pay a dime because a) they are not manufactured by a monopolist b) they can unbundle their software.
Make sure everyone's vote counts: Verified Voting
How about requring MicroSoft to install third-party players as well as its own media player? That would provide more choices to users and the users will be able to choose whatever they like. In my opinion, this is way better than completely removing useful software from the system.
Let the end users decide what they want. Personally, I think that Windows Media Player is a lot better than Winamp or other alternatives; however, I would not mind if everybody had a chance to compare and decide.
Unless of course you count instances of bugs, in which case the multiplication times the number of copies of Windows sold (directly or OEM) would tip the scale rather heavily against them.
i for one would love to get my hands on a copy of windows with no ie no media play and so on i've been trying to dig them out of my system for ages i would much rather use winamp fire fox thunderbird and so on there faster more stable and genearly more convenient to use people will still be able to buy windows with ie and media player and such but people who didn't want them could use there own programs instead and probibly end up paying less for a copy of windows what could posibly be wrong with the eu makeing microsoft give people more choice i know that would put a smile on my face im suprised it doens't put one on everyones here :)
Hey Mod, just in case you see this.
What exact reasoning did you use to kick this down to 0 Flamebait? I answered an obvious troll in a reasonable tone, with restraint. If you think my views are incorrect why not just shave a point off? Or better yet, why don't you refute my points?
> Microsoft is a convicted monopolist
How about apache? It dominates the web server market. BIND for the DNS market? Or even BSD code in the MS Windows distribution? Of course, they are not monopolists, but AFAIK being a monopolist doesn't mean one has to make sure everything works perfect, while smaller entities could get away with distributing inferior products. So it's not really about being a monopolist rather than marketshare. If you're talking about marketshare, a lot of free software dominates niche markets (like in the above examples), should they be fined too?
Suppose one day Linux achieves world domination, are free software developers obligated to ensure their software is 100% bug-free?
> and has steadfastly refeused to unbundle these bug-infested products
If people use them, they use them. Unbundling it doesn't really make the situation better. Of course, those who do not use the bundled software will be less likely to be hit by these bugs, but for essential software like web browsers, media players, people will install them anyway. Of course, they might install products from other companies, but in general, it doesn't guarantee a more secure system.
> If they really believe that integrated media/internet/mail is part of the OS of the future, then they should ensure that said OS is secure
Nothing is 100% secure. Even OpenBSD has had a few holes in the past (*Only* one remote hole in the default install, in more than 7 years!). How should one draw a line between "acceptable" and "unacceptable" risks of a security exploit?
All in all, it all boils down to how to draw a line between "bad" Microsoft that needs to be fined, and "good" Open source software that is exempt from these charges.
Besides, once a ruling is made that software companies are liable for bugs, then more will follow.
Don't quote me on this.
The .torrent problem is a server misconfiguration. The server is sending the data with a MIME type of text/plain, and Mozilla is obeying. The best way to fix this is to email the webmaster--if that's not an option, I hear you can save the data when it finishes loading and everything works, or you can right-click the original link and choose save as. I never use them, because I hardly ever have that problem, but I've recommended it to lots of people before and never had anyone tell me it doesn't work.
I've never seen or heard of your problem with highlighting before (and I spend lots of time on the netscape.public.mozilla.* newsgroups). It could be a profile issue, but I doubt it... maybe a reflow issue? If you find a way to reproduce it on demand, report it to bugzilla (http://bugzilla.mozilla.org).
Happy surfing! :-)
There are 11 types of people in the world: those who can count in binary, and those who can't.
Can Quicktime be removed from Mac OS X?
Make it illegal for a company that sells it's own sotfware, from including clauses in the vein of "we aren't responsible if it breaks, and costs you money"
A commercial product should come with some warranty no? If it's THEIR fault, it should be THEIR RESPONSIBILITY if I use it correctly and it still melts my face!
If they want to bundle other applications, they should charge for those apps, and include the invoice of all the apps that the consumer is paying for. All this with the option of NOT buying certain apps for the consumer. This, I think would force MS to drop the price Windows. Figure, the total bundles price is, oh say $100, with all the bundled stuff included. Start peling off the bits you don't want, what's the price then?
I can imagine some base install and then a web activation (yeah I know, we all love those) where a customer picks all the apps he wants to install, have the installer say something to the effect of "all those extra apps are gonna cost $xxx enter credit card info here:"
Of course, some people will find a way to rip them off, but, that's happening alread right?
For the case of F/OSS, tack on a clause that apps where the client can obtain source, and fix it himself (or audit it before using), is not requred to be warrantied by the author.
Of Course IANAL, It's not perfect, but it's my 2cents.
Suppose one day Linux achieves world domination, are free software developers obligated to ensure their software is 100% bug-free?
Key word I used: convicted. If Apache group were convicted of a) having a monopoly and b) using that monopoly coercively and c) refused to un-bundle extenstions... then YES, I'd say the same logic should apply (bonus points: is this even possible given their liscence?). Gee, is it that hard to grok? It's not about dominance. It's about paying the price for illegal activities. Besides, I'd say Google is a much more apt example since they are a profit-driven company, instead of an free-software organization.
Make sure everyone's vote counts: Verified Voting
They'd have to release the formats/protocols at least six months or so before releasing the software, to prevent other developers playing continual catch-up. (Without changing them in the interim, of course.) And they'd have to be prevented somehow from hiding details that might allow subtle incompatibilities, later lock-in, or other preferential treatment. Ideally, they'd be made to release an open-source reference implementation, too.
And they'd have to show that implementing the protocol or using the format didn't infringe any patents -- not just that a patent-free method was available, but that M$ couldn't use a better, patent-encumbered method unavailable to their competitors. And that they couldn't file such patents in the future.
And so on. Time and time again, companies have learned that you can't play M$ on their own terms and break even, let alone win. They've learned a whole battery of techniques to steal an unfair advantage. And blocking them all is no easy task.
Ceterum censeo subscriptionem esse delendam.
I'm a typical geek who builds custom computers for people preinstalled and preconfigured with their choice of software, and most of my clients opt for Media Player Classic rather than WMP as their default video playback thing, as far as video goes. I'm not an OEM by any means (I've only built about a dozen computers), but I'd love if customisable installs would filter down to the end users.
For those of you who don't know, Media Player Classic is an open source clone of Media Player 6.4 (the default media player shipped with Win2k), and (with the right codec libs installed) will play DVD's, avi's, wmv's, ogm's, Real and QT streams. Very nice clean and easy to use interface, and hooks into standard DirectShow codecs, none of the irritations of WMP/Real/QT, and completely free (thanks Gabest!), although donations are always welcom I imagine.
Being able to completely replace WMP with MPC would be a dream come true for me, and my clients. The only thing that worried me is that MS would take their ball home, and if made to remove Media Player they would probably cripple DirectShow to such an extent that I'd have to install WMP in order to get my codec libraries to work.
Moderation Total: -1 Troll, +3 Goat
Get used to disappointment.
As in the US antitrust case, these sanctions are remedies based on a false set of assumptions so the end result will not make anti-MS zealots happy.
In both cases, the legal efforts were driven by competitors who wanted to rub something, anything in Bill's face. They were hoping that they'd be able to break MS up, but failing that, they were left with remedies that don't mean much.
In the US case, for example, were Sun or Oracle really held up in their competition against MS because of secret API's? Have they added any new functionality to their products based on the new information?
In the EU case, forcing MS to provide a Media-Player-free version of Windows is unlikely to have a substantial impact on MS's market share in Europe. Just as the claim that IE was going to allow MS to take over the Internet turned out to be specious, so will similar claims for Media Player.
Note however that the information will be available only to those who pay for a licence; and who accept MS's terms and conditions.
"The draft decision says the US firm must share more of its protocols with rivals, charging a reasonable royalty. It will be left to Microsoft to work out the precise solution, with close oversight by the commission". -- Guardian
The number of IP licences taken out actually fell after they were mandated by the US judgment.
A better solution would be for to require the protocols be openly published, with their value for non-monopolistic use netted off against the fines the EU wants to impose.
The penalty for misusing protocol specifications to reinforce a monopoly should be the loss of control of those specifications.
Neither are tied to a distribution by force. If you want to run GNU/Linux without a DNS or web server (or with alternative software), maybe on a notebook or a PDA, nobody and nothing prevents you from doing so.
On many Windows machines (especially servers), Media Player, Internet Explorer and Outlook Express are unnecessary and don't contribute any needed features, only security risks. So if Microsoft still believes that bundling these software products to each Windows installation would be necessary, they should pay for the damage - per incident multiplied with affected Windows systems including sold but never used OEM licenes (aka M$ tax). A worldwide severe M$IE hole which gets exploited by worms would result in fines which are high enough to hurt even Microsoft.
"IE killed Netscape".
How many failed businesses do you know where the owner walked away with millions of dollars in his pocket?
If you're familiar with the movie "Brewster's Millions", I'd say Marc Andreessen invoked the "wimp clause".
seriously what is the real issue here? Closed, proprietary formats. None of the unbundling will change the fact that people with Windows will have a system hostile to interoperability.
ship mplayer with windows instead of windows media player.. since both program binaries are mplayer.. no one will know the diff, except that someone else's mplayer will be better than SOMEONE else's mplayer ;P
I wonder what would happen if they included porn in windows by default, would the porn industry go up in arms? that would be fun to watch... nor would anyone care.
Yow. I've never seen so many obvious MS posts on any story here before. They must have been rousing people from bed in Redmond today to get the word out.
How are these obvious trolls and flamebait getting modded up? Every single MS monopoly story has some bonehead saying "how come Apple doesn't get in trouble for bundling iTunes..." This has been definitively answered dozens of times, but here it is again, and modded up too. Likewise, every story has someone saying "what's wrong with bundling things people find useful..."(apart from anti-trust law, nothing) or "who gets hurt by forcing MS to stop breaking the law? Joe Sixpack, that's who..." (I agree, let's ignore laws that restrain Microsft's freedom to innovate) Both are here as well, and modded up.
What's going on? The low number of comments on the story seem to have revealed a distinct pattern that would normally go unnoticed.
If you remember the lawsuit, the MS monopoly was defined for a very peculiar market - operating systems for IBM PC-compatible computers. The reason for that was simple: including all OS into the market will make the case much weaker, moving 95%-type dominance to much muddier 70-80%.
Note that if the same rules are applied to Apple, it has a much worse 100%-range dominance on the Mac-compatible computers.
Make it illegal for a company that sells it's own sotfware, from including clauses in the vein of "we aren't responsible if it breaks, and costs you money"
That immediately puts every commercial software "company", from microsoft down to the lowliest shareware author, out of business. Is that a good thing?
If they want to bundle other applications, they should charge for those apps, and include the invoice of all the apps that the consumer is paying for. All this with the option of NOT buying certain apps for the consumer. This, I think would force MS to drop the price Windows. Figure, the total bundles price is, oh say $100, with all the bundled stuff included. Start peling off the bits you don't want, what's the price then?
Your goal here is not fairness to the consumer. Don't pretend it is. You want microsoft to be forced to create a product that is so much of a pain in the ass people don't want to install it or one that won't have enough of a feature set for people to give a damn about. Honestly, if microsoft had "played nice" and stuck to selling just the base operating system I'd be typing this on a Mac and the icon next to the story would be Steve Jobs photoshopped to look like a borg. And if not them, then who? No one? Well in that world we're all using Linux and all the downtrodden microfucked software companies who you pretend to champion are STILL out of business because instead of WMP bundled, it's MPlayer or whatever the decent FREE player for Linux happens to be this week. Net gain to said companies who are getting this protection? None. They are still irrevelent.
I can imagine some base install and then a web activation (yeah I know, we all love those) where a customer picks all the apps he wants to install, have the installer say something to the effect of "all those extra apps are gonna cost $xxx enter credit card info here:"
More crap solely aimed at pissing off customers. If Microsoft did not want business they would have adopted the "RealNetworks" model of customer irritation long ago. They do, so they didn't. Sorry it pisses you off. Sorry commercial vendors do not port to your OS. But hey, even if you do manage to put MS out of business they are still not going to write for your OS. They're going to go out of business right next to MS because the fact of the matter is that you people don't like to pay for software and have proven that you'll do nearly anything to avoid doing so.
For the case of F/OSS, tack on a clause that apps where the client can obtain source, and fix it himself (or audit it before using), is not requred to be warrantied by the author.
Well it's good to see that there will still be paying jobs for software engineers. Pity they'll all be maintenance. Also a shame for joe business owner when he needs to have something fixed or added and finally realizes that even though he's been using 'free' software that the 40 hours of development work he's about to fund would have covered a years worth of closed source that most likely would have done what he wanted out of the box.
How about this as an alternative: Govenment stays the hell out of it. Seems to me that the windows monopoly is either a myth or the people who swear that unix already won the internet (bind? apache? inn? sendmail?) or the database market (oracle? db2?) are full of shit. Which is it? Does MS own the world or do they not? Methinks they don't. And with the goverment out of it if a company wants to sell a media player they had better make one worth paying the money for.
I would say the argument is a good one at heart but a bit off - If Office for the Mac were nothing more than a historic relic than I don't think it would be well looked after. But the Mac BU is an important one at Microsoft and gets a lot of good people and attention.
What I would note is that if Office were a seperate company, they would be far more prone to note that Linux is an obvious upcoming desktop with a decent program (OpenOffice) that provides a dangerous level of competiion to Office unchallenged (on that platform). As Office and Windows are part of the same company, instead of the rational choice of moving onto a rising platform they are purpously avoiding that platform, even at the cost of future Office sales, in order to try and halt the spread of that platform.
As a proof of concept look at how many platforms WordPerfect ran in its heyday - they supported the Atari ST and the Amiga in addition to the PC and the Mac.
If I were a Microsoft shareholder, especially a big one, I would be questioning this long term strategy since Office is the bread and butter of profit at MS.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
This is a matter of principle. MS is using its monopolic power to yet once again (surprise,surprise) force its own wares to dominate a segement of the IT business.
The did so with the Web browser to the point that the only viable alternative has to be done by voluteers giving the software away for free. They did so with fileystem compression on real time by stealing another company's implementation (Stac Electronics, RIP).
They also got rid of competing products by making them cras in puepose when running in one of their OSes.
They backstabbed IBM when they abandoned OS/2 to promote Windows.
ANd here we are, they are doing it all over again, and the champions of lazines over freedom like you, like the frog choir, are chanting that it is easy, thus it should be good.
No, it is not good. This company is killing the ionnovation in the IT industry and it enerves me to no end that people are prepared to submit themselves to company convicted of unlawful behaviour so willingly.
People like you would at least think twice if a convicted criminal in any other sphere of life would approach them for a business too good to be tru, but when it comes to MS, a convicted abuser of a monopolic position, then all critical thinking dissapears, and the offering too good to be true is accepted blissfully ignorant of the pas and of its future implications (DRM, lock in, forced upgrade, monoculture).
Enough ranting, there is no hope.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
And the free software community would be one of the first to burn from the full heat of it.
Balderdash!
With Closed Source, the vendor is the only party in a position to correct any problems.
With Open Source, the source itself operates in lieu of warranty. Regardless of how any contracts are worded, the facts of the situation are significantly different.
There has to be some relationship between the liability of the vendor and the purchase price. There should be some precedents in the cases of misprints in advertising and the liability of the party carrying the advertising.
"While this sounds like a good thing"
Since when do law prohibiting freedom to develop and sell software constitute a good thing?
Can we use this decision to have the EU force MS to debundle IE from windows so that OEMs can have the choice to bundle FireFox or Opera as the browser for Windows?
I take serious issue with the above market-speak spin bs. The use of DRM DISABLES, not enables those formats.
I said nothing about not buying software if it's what you need, but after doing so and having said software crash and cost me a fortune to recover, I'd like to know that the author of said software be responsible for providing a fix, rather than finding out that they aren't going to help and showing me some cleverly phrased clause in some EULA.
When I deliver a product to a client, I give them a period of free support, perhaps only a month or less, depending on the value of the contract. I'm human, I make mistakes, and my fixing them for free for a certain period sure must be appreciated.
And there in one sentence plus the "Insightful" score, ladies and gentlemen, is the reason that Linux will never be mainstream. I hate MS as much as the next guy, but at least they try to make it useable by Joe Sixpack. They might not always succeed, but they try.
Great - another useless "remedy". Good to see that the EU is just as useless as the US government is in trying to stop the future of the information age by being controlled by one company. Pathetic. "You have to make another version of windows with out your media player!" That's the best they could come up with? Idiots! Oh, and the default: "and you have to greeze some palms with a $xxx million dollar fine; just deposit that in this swiss bank account..."
Seems like the usual: The government is useless, the courts are useless, and the companies and money are against us. So it's up to us volunteers to save the world again.
Jeff
To what country did the "diamond cartel" recently move it's heacuarters ?
USA perhaps ?
Have not noticed any reparations from said country to that company, besides their hold on the diamond market is only 55% of the western market, microsoft has 90% plus.
Or where you talking about something more akin to a conspiracy theory ?
Besides people never take the south Asian gemstone market into account, it's almost half as big (or possibly more, noone knows) than the western one, westen "diamond cartels" have almost no presence in that market and prices are cheaper, but the death toll is even higher
Why is every European monopoly decision a politiacal ploy, but every similar decision taken in the USA "for the protection of customers"
Everytime an article comes up talking about this issue, there are more people saying "why are they forcing them to exclude software they make, how come they don't force Linux or apple to do this, blah, blah blah." It really make me wonde about the intelligence of the slashdot crowd. How many times must you be told the M$ is a convicted monopoly. Next time I will say go write a media app that decodes wma9 format into avi or mpeg2 and then maybe your eyes will be opened. I would have thought that once you wrote a standards compliant web page and viewed it in all browsers, and wondered why IE displays it differently. no use
you know the rest
http://slashdot.org/faq/editorial.shtml#ed850
sEAN
... but what have you got against embedded punctuation? How the hell is anyone supposed to read your post?
Sean
What kernel functions do you think are kept secret? It is OPEN source.
My faith is expressed through Nihilism. Do you understand?
That would go further than the steps Microsoft had to take when it settled an antitrust case in the United States in late 2001.
I mean, basically the US govt said: 'Bad MS! Don't do it again!' And then MS came with WinXP.
-- Cheers!
Will auto manufacturers be required to put something in their cars that tell drivers that although their car is designed to be able to drive 120 MPH it is the driver's responsibility to obey the speed limit?
Will knife manufaturers be required to tell their customers that it is their responsibility to use this tool legally?
Come on now. Sheesh. P2P software is a TOOL like a hammer or a knife. What the user does with it makes it a crime not the tool.
I don't mean to sound like a gun advocate, but there is truth (and power) to the bumper sticker that says "Guns don't kill people. People do." P2P software doesn't commit copyright infringment. People do.
And the free software community would be one of the first to burn from the full heat of it.
Point taken.
How about monetary penalties that are a percentage of the amount paid, say 2% of the sales price, for what really amounts to a manufacturing defect?
That way, people that are getting paid to produce quality software will have an added incentive to produce higher quality software, while those who give software away for free are not penalized.
Of course, if there were some kind of genuinely competitive marketplace for software, something that free and open standards would enable, then there would be no need for such tricks to make software quality higher. Competition would produce the best quality at the lowest price.
"Provided by the management for your protection."
Thank you very much for the info.
As for the highlighting problem, i just reproduced it right now by highlighting your text a couple times. I get a grey box appear outside the entire text area and can no longer highlight text anywhere on the page (the grey box stays). only way to solve is to refresh . I took a screenshot of the bug hopefully this will help people understand the problem a little better.
btw, i am using Mozilla 1.6 on XP Pro
"Software is like sex: it's better when it's free."
I seemed to have figured out what the problem was on my own. When im selecting text to highlight, i hold down ctrl early (before i hit c) and these causes the the problem. Not even a bug, just selecting webpage items i think using just ctrl and clicking on something. Something that IE didnt have.
"Software is like sex: it's better when it's free."
It's funny how most of MS always claims they can't strip anything out of windows, can't provide a base system, too hard to make it stable, usable, etc.
Yet there is another part of MS that sells exactly this, an embedded version of windows, that OEMs can customize to their tastes, etc...minimal fuctionality, "rock solid base OS", etc.--the opposite claims are made.
It can't really be both ways, can it? Either you can strip things out and sell companies what they want, or you can't. They claim both things are true?
None of these product use exclusive OEM contracts that prevents competive products from entering the marketplace and competing against them on fair ground.
I noticed for the first time the other day that WinXP bundles CD-R burning functionality. I wonder how long until the makers of software like Nero start finding their market disappearing because the functionality that their software provides is now bundled into Windows already?
I wonder what other markets M$ is on its way to kill in the same way?
And another anonymous mod out of control. EU sanctions was the original topic. Remember that? What a useless pile of trash /. has become. It has become nothing but swarm of childish, selfish, spoiled children.
The fact that we used to be able to have reasoned discourse here makes it all the more sad.
OEMs, which is what this is all about, want the right to overlay other software in place of MS supplied s/w.
The average end user does not install s/w or care to. Example...OEMs in England might love to make a deal with say, the BBC, to install the "BBC Media player" (or whatever) on the PCs they sell...and get paid by some external entities to do that.
They can't do that right now. They want to.
Sorry if you like Real Player, but I just can't handle it. WinAmp, by the way, is a lot better than WMP, but I'm too lazy to download it; it's just easier to use WMP. I suppose that could be one point to offer, but anyone who really cares would take the two seconds to get WinAmp anyway, and anyone unsure of what to use would have WMP. I think the EU should be more concerned with Microsoft's total domination of the OS market than one of the few high points of the pre-packaged Windows XP.
I said nothing about not buying software if it's what you need, but after doing so and having said software crash and cost me a fortune to recover, I'd like to know that the author of said software be responsible for providing a fix, rather than finding out that they aren't going to help and showing me some cleverly phrased clause in some EULA.
Do the phrases NO CONSEQUENTIAL OR OTHER DAMAGES or YOU ARE NOT ENTITLED TO ANY DAMAGES, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES really sound like cleverly worded ploys to make it seem like you'll be compensated in the case use of said software costs you money? When it comes to current software you bought it how you saw it, and that's it. If a different software vendor (who sells into a mass market) has the stupididy to claim anything else you are certainly welcome to purchase that software, but you're going to find it hard to get them to live up the agreement when they're waving bankruptcy paperwork in your face and telling you to get to the back of the line.
So why should a company be FORCED to warrant the software to suit you? Why should the companines who think they can, not be allowed to warrant them in any way they see fit and then let the consumer decide exactly whose product is worth spending the money on based on this? It's not like the existing companies are tricking you into thinking they have when the bits about warranty are generally in bold/and or caps text stating that you are entitled to zero in the way of damages.
When I deliver a product to a client, I give them a period of free support, perhaps only a month or less, depending on the value of the contract. I'm human, I make mistakes, and my fixing them for free for a certain period sure must be appreciated.
I'm quite sure it is appreciated. I do business the same way, myself. And so do the big boys. Not because we're nice, but simply because if don't they'll look elsewhere for people who do. It's why I'll do a small fix, apply it to a customers software, and not charge. It's why mega corps spend a steamer trunk of money every year on fixpacks, service packs, or whatever you want to call it. But thats a TOTALLY different thing from saying "Hey if we eat your data we'll correct the problem, sky's the limit! Would you even do this for your customers knowing that all it takes is one bad night, one stupid bug, one fatal crash for the ball on the end of that chain of events to mean that you can kiss your business, retirement dough, and kids college fund bye bye because you're about to be hauled into court and raked over the coals.
Now assuming you charge a client an hourly rate and have already lifted a few bucks off of them you might well be able to afford to fix the problem outside of court to the customers satisfaction. But what if you're selling a 300 dollar shrink wrapped package that some company, with no backups, sense, or reason is running their entire enterprise on (think Excel)? Do you REALLY think it would be wise to open yourself up to what is an inevitability?
If so, I have about 2 hours worth of work for you, name the rate. Retain a good lawyer before handing over the deliverables, though.
Who modded this down?
Its just a statement of opinion. There is nothing trollish about it.
I don't agree with him, but if we are going to have a free and open discussion, we need to promote allowance of all points of views. Whoever modded this down should be ashamed of themselves.
if this is really about Microsoft, or whether we have another trade war brewing between the US and Europe?
There are many, many monopolies out there, but MS is a convicted harmful monopoly.
>How about apache?
How about it? It has a powerful market position. Now show me the abuse? Is it bundling and destroying a whole different product like MS did with Netscape?
All apache is doing is competeing with other websevers. Nothin' wrong with that.
Mozilla is slower than IE in all aspects. If you are using Mozilla, you are using a slow browser. That is all there is to it.
There are lots of comments that are saying: look, Windows Media Player is the best, why should Microsoft forced to unbundle it? Why is the European parliament worried about that?
Some time ago Microsoft did not care too much about the video media. Windows had a player that basically used Intel codecs. Then came along Real and Apple with much better video compression and rendering, and all sort of things sprung up on the web like movie trailers, etc, that people actually wanted to watch.
Now Microsoft became interested, developed their own codecs and now wants to own that market lock, stock and barrel. It can be easily argued that they have been using their monopoly on the desktop to ensure their dominance in this area, and that shortly Real will be history and probably Apple too, except on their own hardware.
This is not a very healthy situation. Microsoft is so huge and powerful that they can wait for smaller companies to come up with new, innovative business models and product, let them do the hard slog of being the prime mover in a new area, and then when it is proven to work and be profitable, either buy them outright or quickly write a competing product that they can force people to use just by bundling it `for free' with their O/S.
Quickly content developers start using the Microsoft format, whether it is better or worse than the competition does not matter because it is soon to become `the standard' by virtue of Microsoft saying so.
This is not healthy because it discourages innovation on the desktop, it does not reward the true innovators, only the same people over and over, and once the market domination has been put in place, end-users face a total absense of choice and competition, which can't be good.
Just remember the Netscape situation, and look at the state of Internet Explorer on Windows right now. Sure IE was better at some stage than Netscape was, but Netscape was completely wiped out by virtue of the bundling of IE, and now IE is not standard compliant, full of bugs, lacks a lot of features that other browsers have had for years (tabs, better popup controls, spam control, etc) but Microsoft has lost interest. It owns the market now, and can't be bothered maintaining IE, they have other fish to fry.
If nothing is done over the video codecs and players, this is exactly what will happen to users a few years down the track.
The idea of the injunction is not to forbid Microsoft from providing a Media Player, it is to forbid them from bundling it. Users can still download it for free or whatever, or they can get it on a CD, whatever. The idea is to level the playing field by forcing the users to make a choice based on quality and availability, not a Microsoft fiat.
So maybe there is a tiny bit of inconvenience to users right now, but the benefit is continued competition for years to come, based on quality, not the leverage of a monopoly.
Ultimately this is better for users.
- Windows XP with Windows Media Player, 109 Euros.
- Windows XP without Windows Media Player, 99 Euros.
that would defeat Microsoft's current dumping tactic.Copyrights, Patents, Trademarks: temporary loans from the Public Domain, not real property ("intellectual" or otherwise)
a) having a monopoly and b) using that monopoly coercively and c) refused to un-bundle extenstions
Existing laws are supposed to handle this situation. According to your logic, once an entity is convicted of doing (a),(b) and (c), it is additionally punished for writing buggy software. So somehow this has an implication that people who write buggy software (or non-100%-bug-free software) are prone to additional charges. Which is what I'm against.
I'd like to draw an analogy:
Imagine a person convicted of theft. Originally he'd have a sentence of 2 years, but since he looks ugly he gets another 1 year and is fined $1000 for smelling like rotten meat.
Don't quote me on this.
I see your point.
But the question is where to draw the line.
Distributions like, for example, RedHat bundles even more software with their many installation CD's (apparently more than MS). To many, they are unncessary, and you can sure bet a large portion of the included softare have security holes. Of course, RedHat doesn't have a history of disregarding court orders to unbundle their software, but still, I'd bet that if one day software companies are charged for releasing buggy software, it wouldn't only be Microsoft (or the monopoly of the time).
The main implication is "Companies could be fined for software bugs!". Sure you could compile a list of conditions on which companies are liable and which not, but I'm sure the list would only shrink over time. And don't forget the horde of lawyers eyeing this new "market" once such a ruling is made.
Don't quote me on this.
From your argument, the only difference I see between closed source and open source is in price.
IANAL, and know next to nothing about contract law, but my intuition is that giving away source shouldn't allow one to disclaim more liability than otherwise.
The situation is sure different, but whether it is different enough for OSS to be exempted from same liability as for closed software, I am not sure.
I'd say its fine for them to include a viewer for anything. However since they have sorta a desktop monopoly, pushing their own proprietary formats is a real problem. Isn't access to information the real issue?
Surely there's a law against this?
Yes, MS would rather you never heard of them, but they do exist, have been developed by many of MS' competitors, but have been illegally crushed by MS' typical monopolistic practices.
you do realize they are providing fixes? what do you think all those fucking updates are about.
So commercial companies who provide a product for which source is freely available, let's use Redhat as an example, are exempt? Should we also extend that to Apple as well, if any fault is with their "base" system (Darwin, which is open source)?
Backup not found: (A)bort (R)etry (P)anic
>>>>truth; beauty; unix.<<<<
http://europa.eu.int/rapid/start/cgi/guesten.ksh?p _action.gettxt=gt&doc=IP/04/382|0|RAPID&lg=EN&disp lay=
IP/04/382
Brussels, 24 March 2004
Commission concludes on Microsoft investigation, imposes conduct remedies and a fine
The European Commission has concluded, after a five-year investigation, that Microsoft Corporation broke European Union competition law by leveraging its near monopoly in the market for PC operating systems (OS) onto the markets for work group server operating systems(1) and for media players(2). Because the illegal behaviour is still ongoing, the Commission has ordered Microsoft to disclose to competitors, within 120 days, the interfaces(3) required for their products to be able to 'talk' with the ubiquitous Windows OS. Microsoft is also required, within 90 days, to offer a version of its Windows OS without Windows Media Player to PC manufacturers (or when selling directly to end users). In addition, Microsoft is fined 497 million for abusing its market power in the EU.
"Dominant companies have a special responsibility to ensure that the way they do business doesn't prevent competition on the merits and does not harm consumers and innovation " said European Competition Commissioner Mario Monti. "Today's decision restores the conditions for fair competition in the markets concerned and establish clear principles for the future conduct of a company with such a strong dominant position," he added.
After an exhaustive and extensive investigation of more than five years and three statements of objections(4), the Commission has today taken a decision finding that US software company Microsoft Corporation has violated the EU Treaty's competition rules by abusing its near monopoly(5) (Article 82) in the PC operating system.
Microsoft abused its market power by deliberately restricting interoperability between Windows PCs and non-Microsoft work group servers, and by tying its Windows Media Player (WMP), a product where it faced competition, with its ubiquitous Windows operating system.
This illegal conduct has enabled Microsoft to acquire a dominant position in the market for work group server operating systems, which are at the heart of corporate IT networks, and risks eliminating competition altogether in that market. In addition, Microsoft's conduct has significantly weakened competition on the media player market.
The ongoing abuses act as a brake on innovation and harm the competitive process and consumers, who ultimately end up with less choice and facing higher prices.
For these very serious abuses, which have been ongoing for five and a half years, the Commission has imposed a fine of 497.2 million.
Remedies
In order to restore the conditions of fair competition, the Commission has imposed the following remedies:
As regards interoperability, Microsoft is required, within 120 days, to disclose complete and accurate interface documentation which would allow non-Microsoft work group servers to achieve full interoperability with Windows PCs and servers. This will enable rival vendors to develop products that can compete on a level playing field in the work group server operating system market. The disclosed information will have to be updated each time Microsoft brings to the market new versions of its relevant products.
To the extent that any of this interface information might be protected by intellectual property in the European Economic Area(6), Microsoft would be entitled to reasonable remuneration. The disclosure order concerns the interface documentation only, and not the Windows source code, as this is not necessary to achieve the development of interoperable products.
As regards tying, Microsoft is required, within 90 days, to offer to PC manufacturers a version of its Windows client PC operating system without WMP. The un-tying remedy does not mean that consumers will obtain PCs and operating systems without media players. M