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EU Fines Microsoft $613 Million, Officially
Decaffeinated Jedi writes "As reported by CNN.com, the European Union has hit Microsoft with a record US$613 million fine after a five-year investigation, finding the company guilty of abusing the 'near-monopoly' of the Windows operating system. Microsoft has been given 90 days to make a European version of Windows available without a media player and 120 days to give programming codes to rivals in the server market to allow 'full interoperability' with desktops running Windows. Microsoft plans to appeal the decision." Other readers point to coverage at
the BBC, ZDNet, Reuters (here carried by Yahoo!), and abc.au.net.
what war was that?
Saying Apple is better than MS is like saying Botulism is better than rabies.
If Europe wants to see a real abuse of monopoly power, wait until MS just decides to stop offering their products on the European market.
It isn't the government's place to tell a company what they can or cannot sell.
A: It's 1700 GMT. That means all the Brits have finally given up pretending to work and gone home for the day. According to statistics, post quality soars over 30% on average.
Well, if you asserting that Apple's formats are all open and DRM-free, then that's fine. Otherwise, this is a somewhat fatuous argument, and is the equivalent of saying that just because Henry Ford invented the production line it's fine if Ford now sells heroin to babies. If you're unaware of what the letters M-P-E-G stand for (hint: not 'a-p-p-l-e') then maybe you should look it up.
Read Pynchon.
You know America acts more like old Europe (by that i meen medieval and napoleonic europe) than the supposedly old europe. It sadens me that the leader of my Country the UK was dumb enough to coned into war by bush and has taken a step back to the past and not the future. but there will be elections soon and no more blair.
Saying Apple is better than MS is like saying Botulism is better than rabies.
The EU has no legal authority over how an American company packages and/or bundles their products. The most they could do in retaliation is ban MS software from being imported to their member states. As good as Linux and OS X are, and as spiffy as the various Office clones are, I don't see that happening any time soon. Even if the EU imposed such a ban, several countries would probably choose not to participate. Are the folks in The Hague prepared to tell 300 Million Europeans that they have to learn Linux because MS won't pay their extor... er... penalties?
(Of course, some would argue that a total loss of MS products would be a "best-case" outcome of all this. It's not as if people actually like their software.)
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
Give him time.
Bill Gates is still a teenager in the global market. He is smart, and powerful, and wealthy. And he has a ton of lawyers. He will learn. It will be no time at all before he has a few key EU politicians in his back pocket, with enough votes to swing things in his favor.
Will he have to pay the fine? Let's see what happens after the lengthy appeal. I'm betting it will either be (a) reduced, or (b) several nations will be getting a lot of free (Microsoft) software (duhhhh....) or (c) both.
It's all a game, and Bill will learn to play it well.
All Hail Emperor Bill!!!
(Exiting tongue-in-cheek mode before I get into foot-up-butt mode).
P.S. If this is ever archived, I hope that in the future when the MicroSoft Secret Police find it they are unable to connect my Account name to my real name. I'll surely be in trouble then!
P.P.S. Please don't help them.
Of course from May you have to buy 25 EU member presidents
Which will be extremely difficult since there is nowhere near 25 presidents to buy (Denmark, Great Britain, the Netherlands, Sweden and several others does not have presidents).
Oh, and what on earth do you want to buy the german president for, he doesn't have any power anyway.