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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.
Media player being bundled costs the consumer money even if they don't want it. It also allows Microsoft to further leverage its market position once WMP is ubiqitous!
As for the 'orders' on API documentation? Woohoo.
Microsoft is the perfect example of how capitalism needs a tight rein for it to work to the benefit of people, not big corporations!
-- *~()____) This message will self-destruct in 5 seconds...
poor SCO lawyers might have to take a pay cut now. :(
How can the punishment serve a deterent, if the fine does not hurt??
Hey, that's my password you are typing
Right. Of course they didn't know. They just set up shop in a different country and assumed that US law would prevail. What's wrong with that ? (Hint: lots!)
Another quote:
Well, no wonder they're going to appeal, that removes 90% of their business practice!
Simon.
Physicists get Hadrons!
$613m is a lot of money, but will Microsoft try to use cupons, or "donate" software to schools, thus locking in more Microsoft users from a young age?
If the EU is smart it will force Microsoft to donate to CASH to open source, or educational groups, thus allowing people to break the Monoply by their own choice.
Does anyone else consider it a bit weird that they're using Windows Media Player as bait ? That's a division where there's at least some competition from Quicktime and Realplayer. The browser war was a far more dirty one IMO, and microsoft is STILL making it practically impossible for competitors to integrate their browser properly over IE.
And what about the java fuckups ? The Samba debacle ? The OEM backmailing ?
I don't get it....
When will I end this grieving ? When will my future begin ?
Before you all start moaning that EU is anti-American, note that the complaint was made by Sun & Real (both american companies) which resulted in this ruling.
Microsoft will appeal, and the EU courts estimate it will take 5 years until a decision is made.
Within 120 days Microsoft is required "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." This is at least in theory a pretty absolute requirement; Microsoft has to publish whatever it takes in order for rival vendors' servers "to achieve full interoperability with Windows PCs and servers, and it must provide updates where necessary.
Microsoft currently licence this and it is this which they use to sell server OSes and apps using the ease of interoperability as a main reason. Server OSes and stuff such as MS Exchange earn them alot more than desktop OEM versions of XP. Ease of interoperability is what is getting companies to sign up to the ripoff Licencing 6 scheme. The requirement to open up the server interoperability means that Linux will go storming in big style.
Conor "You're not married,you haven't got a girlfriend and you've never seen Star Trek? Good Lord!" - Patrick Stewart
Aren't the time lines for these things rediculous? From the time an investigation starts, trail is held, conviction is appealed and re-tried, it takes about a decade to exact "justice" on an international corporation.
In the meantime, the victims such as smaller competing firms and consumers have long since picked up the pieces and moved on. The companies at the amepx of it all aren't even relevant anylonger (Netscape?).
Until the law can put some spring in their step, a $600 Million fine 10 years after putting awa your competition is paultry.
Break up Microsoft - THAT is the solution!
I only came here to do two things; kick some ass, and drink some beer...looks like we're almost out of beer.
This sounds like the most important part to me. What does this mean? The CNN article is incredibly vague. Is MS allowed to place restrictions on the licensing of this "program code"-- i.e. forcing anyone who looks at code to sign an NDA saying, say, they won't use the information in a GPLed product? What do they define by "in the server market"? Is this just saying MS has to make its WMA code available, or is this Windows in general?
If the latter, that's absolutely fantastic. That means we could start seeing 100% compatible versions of Wine, freed from the difficulty and endless trial=and-error of duplicating an API where so much is undocumented and "bug compatibility" is so crucial.
If the former, that this means MS has to divulge the necessary information for third parties to be fully compatible with WMP serving, that's not quite so interesting.
Incidentally, I want to nominate this as the most bullshit argument MS apologists have ever put forth, ever.
Analysts say by forcing Microsoft to offer a version of Windows XP without Media Player, consumers could pay higher costs.
"If it were to be obliged to offer versions both with and without Media Player, then that would mean we would probably have double the number of consumer PC configuration in our shops. Of course this is product that is built before it is sold," says Brian Gammage from computer consultancy Gartner.
Wow. So Microsoft using Windows revenues to subsidize a hugely complex and unnecessary movie player and set of movie codecs doesn't increase costs to consumers, but Microsoft having to print up two differing sets of cheap cardboard to sell in stores does. Amazing.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
Read the EU press release from their own site (in your own language): http://europa.eu.int/rapid/start/cgi/guesten.ksh?p _action.gettxt=gt&doc=IP/04/382|0|RAPID&lg=EN&disp lay=
Where does the money go after Microsoft pays? To charity? To the gov't?
-Colin
"Steve Balmer commented, that the fine imposed by the EU is completely unreasonble, considering that you can buy a president in the US with much less.".
"There is a terrorist behind every bush"
I think there is a lot more hope that EU will stick to it's guns than the US (and I say that as a US citizen). There is much less financial/economic risk to the EU to do this vs. the US, being that MS is a US company. So it will be easier for them to actually keep to their judgement.
It is not a matter of choice.
It is a matter that microsoft has a near monopoly. As such it comes other restriction. The main one(at least in the US and similar in the EU) is that you cannot use your monopoly in one area to get a monopoly in another.
And this was modded Interesting???
0 ,1 129,603206,00.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/medicalscience/story/
In 2001 the same comission fined Hoffman-La Roche (Swiss) for 462m, and BASF (German) to the extent of 296m, for vitamin price fixing.
You may go back to your freedom fries now.
PS: One can only hope that an appeal will not be granted. It does not have to be, you know.
It isn't the government's place to tell a company what they can or cannot sell.
it is when the company has killed off competition via illegal means.
So you wouldn't mind if my company sold your kids drugs? And there'd be no problem with me selling nuclear weapons to Islamic fundamentalists?
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Is there any information on how they have to release that code? I recall them being forced to release documentation of APIs in the US for a reasonable license, which they set at around a hundred grand, fifty if you decided to not use it after a look.
Will the EU allow that crap too, or will it realize that Microsoft's largest competitors are likely to be OSS developers and a hundred-grand license would be about the same as not actually releasing it to their competitors?
A friend of mine (in the UK) got a speeding fine. He found an old local by-law that said he could pay the fine in live chickens, to the equivalent value.
Hilarity ensued, of course.
You can easily buy a PC without Windows on it... and if you don't like Microsoft you can use one of the many alternatives. If you are a business owner and want to stream media content, you can choose from one of the many alternatives.
Nonsense. I may be able to buy some sort of PC without Windows on it, but suppose, like most businesses, I have standardised on one supplier (like Dell). I go to their website. I pick my PC. Where is the Linux Desktop option? As for alternative media content. Downloading alternative players and installing them takes time and effort. This may not be much for an individual but for a company with 10,000 seats its time and money.
Until I can go to most major PC suppliers and get the option of alternative OSes and features pre-installed and configured for hardware there is no true competition.
I share the hope that the EU manages what the US Dept of Justice flunked.
However, as a citizen of the EU, I'd advise against getting your hopes too high. Our legal systems have considerable ability to delay and obstruct, for companies with enough money and determination.
The US DoJ looked set to implement a proper solution just a few years ago, but the election of President Bush put an end to that.
Changes of government in European states are not infrequent and can change the direction of the whole loose alliance that is the EU. Don't overlook the possibility that if the EU's governments move to the right, this case may be damaged.
In fairness though, Europe's courts are less subject to policital interference, so here's to hoping!
I have been a user for about 10 years. This ends Feb 2014. The site's been ruined. I'm off. Dice, FU
...that in a time when incredible shortcomings of Microsoft's OS are found, some of you actually talk about 'American/European (skewed) relationships' and how 'unfair this is to an American company'.
For once look at the big picture, and forget that Microsoft is an American company, and the EU filed a European verdict:
Microsoft is a major global player in an international market ruled mainly by European and American companies together.
In this playing field it is only fair that a referree - no matter if US or EU - rules when a player crosses the legal line.
It is to the benefit of both the Europeans as the Americans in the long term, and we will pick the fruits of this decision in time.
Slashdot: stuff for news, nerds that matter, matter for news, stuff that nerd
...but the only reason this is a "record" fine is because our own government CAVED IN and let them off the hook after a decade-long trial. After spending a *huge* amount of money in court, the US government sternly told MS they had to promise to release a service pack.
If our government had stuck to its guns from the first time of many that MS was taken to court, the tech landscape here would be vastly different, I think. Hey, BeOS might even be alive, and Linux and Macs would CERTAINLY have more momentum than they do!
Even if MS pays this in cash rather than software, it's still pocket change, currently sitting happily in the MS account and earning them interest. So they won't earn as much interest this year. Big deal. This won't change anything. At best it's less money for MS to pay SCO with.
I'm not normally an irrational zealous dickhead, but I figure "When in Rome..."
The most incredible thing (and kind of funny in a shocking way) is that Microsoft is trying to use that very reason as some kind of excuse as to why it shouldn't be fined in Europe. The argument runs something along the lines of "... but we can do this in America! You can't fine us if we can do it in America!"
Hey, news flash for you Billy boy! In Europe, you comply with European law, and it's a lot harder to buy a few politicians to exert political pressure on the justice system.
-- james
We will soon see a new set of installation dependancies for .NET framework, MSXML, etc.:
"Requires Microsoft Media Player 9.0, greater to run".
Well, it worked the last time!
If releasing the full Windows APIs is part of the deal, it should be possible to provide a Mozilla based DLL to replace the IE one. Ditto Opera and others. If enough functionality is released to allow WindowsUpdate to work, any browser war will be formally over.
Forget thrust, drag, lift and weight. Airplanes fly because of money.
I don't think I agree with this suit. Media Player isn't near a monopoly in media players. Almost everyone has Quicktime installed, Real comes preinstalled on Dells, DivX is out there. There are things Microsoft has done that I don't think were right, but bundling software with the OS isn't one of them. Anymore I expect some type of media player, a browser, and e-mail client, whatever to come with my OS, be it OS X, Windows, or Linux.
Things like the BeOS lockout are what I'd think should be the focus of antitrust type suits against MS, not value add to Windows.
"Windows Me offers tremendous reliability and stability improvements..." -- Paul Thurott
Riiiight...
But if you are the only provider of X (a legal monopoly) and you leverage that monopoly to drive out providers of Y and gain a second monopoly, then it becomes the government's place to tell you what you can and can't do.
Twat.
Justin.
You're only jealous cos the little penguins are talking to me.
No, no, no, you don't get it.
They are a monopoly on desktop OSs. There is no problem with that in itself. What they have been convicted of is of leveraging that monopoly to gain an unfair advantage in other markets. Namely, the media player market.
--
This sig is inoffensive.
Consistency is a property that is often overrated by geeks. In the real world, logical consistency often leads to such stupidity as monopoly, anarchism, facism, the religion of "free markets", and Libertarianism. There are two reasons for this:
First, logic is a process by which models are built, not a reality. As a modeling methodology, it is very sensitive to the axioms chosen from which to start the process and many "true believers" in logic are very non-selective in their axiom selection. In addition, the models produced by this method, like all models, distort some aspects of reality, and these models need to be probed for limitations and inacuracies and validated against the real situation. Again, those who most often prattle on about "consistency" are often least likely to test their models for the only consistency that really matters - consistency with the real world.
The second problem with consistency is that the real world simply isn't. The real world is an incredibly messy system. Can you predict with logical certainty that a particular lion will attack a wildebeast at a given time? That a human will make a certain stock trade? Human beings have evolved a highly complex, but inconsistent processing unit (called a brain) that copes pretty well with the world as a whole. Compared to this processor's proven longevity, the creation of logic has been a relatively recent innovation and one that is (as of yet) evolutionarily unproven. Given this, it is highly specious to assume that this new (and unnatural) processing mode is superior to the messier and fuzzier processing that has insured our (and other creatures') survival over millions of years. It is also most probably false that a pure use of logic is superior to a synthesis of the Aristotlian model and a more fuzzy one.
In short, cowboy, people ain't machines - stop tryin' to turn folks into them. I know it would make them a heck of lot easier to model of they were and you think that people would be a lot easier to understand if they were mechanistic and that your natural ability to understand mechanisms would give you an upper hand if they were and you'd be a lot more comfortable with that, but all that just means I'm really glad that you're not in charge. I refuse to surrender my humanity to your logic.
That is all.
The problem comes in when a company like real or Netscape comes out with a product that is good and then Microsoft does two things.
r
They come out with a similar product, bundle it in the OS and then force/threaten their OEM's not to install the competitors. That is what is wrong.
Let's take your list. What if IBM/HP/DELL/Gateway decided to bundle:
OpenOffice
FileMaker
Winzip
RealPlaye
Mozilla (and change the default browser)
GIMP
Suns/IBM's JDK with Eclipes
Could they do this for almost no cost? Yep. Then Microsoft would suddenly raise the cost of EACH version of windows that IBM/HP or Dell buys (Like they did to IBM. Dell got Windows for ~$10 while IBM got it for ~$100.00, and they wouldn't sign any deal with IBM for MONTHS after the new OS was released, thus killing IBM desktop sales during that time)
So yes, I agree that I want a bunch of stuff bundled with my OS. (With the ability to not load it) But I hope that you would agree that most people want the best software bundled at the lowest price. We currenlty don't have that CHOICE. That is what is hurting consumers.
The more I learn about science, the more my faith in God increases.
Melius mori in libertate quam vivere in servitute.
They most certainly did bundle IE to "get us hooked", as came out in the original Judge Jackson DoJ anti-trust trial. IE was tightly integrated with the operating system to prevent Netscape from being able to create platform independent middleware, and it was the platform independent middleware they were most concerned about. By making using Netscape a "jarring experience" (Microsoft's words) and by encouraging the development of Microsoft-only webpages through technologies like ActiveX, Microsoft most certainly hoped to hook people on Microsoft-required content.
I'm also baffled as to why you think that it's the job of an operating system vendor to supply a bunch of tools that have nothing to do with the functionality of an operating system. We can have a competitive market, or we can put up with OS vendors including tools that are "just about good enough" to ensure that 90% of people do not switch, and hence the market for better alternatives isn't supportable. How is that a good thing?
Compare Firefox to IE, any number of email clients many of whom predate Outlook Express to Outlook Express, commercial virus checkers back when DOS included a Microsoft Virus Checker, etc, and ask yourself why people should be lumbered with Microsoft's third rate crap because Microsoft has killed, through the act of bundling, better alternatives?
Now, if Dell or HP, or frickin' Gateway wants to bundle this non-operating system related software with a computer, that's one thing (and, yes, that means Apple has a perfect right to), at least them doing so ensures a competitive market. But Microsoft doing it means that Dell, HP, and Gateway, etc, have to include whatever Microsoft includes. And that's not right, that doesn't create a competitive market, and it's Microsoft muscling into a market to the detriment of customers and for the sole reason of wanting to control who runs what, who is able to create what, who is able to see what, and what tools, as a result, they have to run everywhere else.
Right now what little choice we have is thanks to the Open Source movement, essentially a socialist enterprise (socialism in its original meaning of "a group of people working together to improve things for everyone" rather than the bizarre American "A government wanting to interfere in everything" definition), we're not seeing capitalism in its supposed "competition will improve everything" mode. It's time we did.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
It is much different to say:
"We are giving you product X with the purchase of product Y, whether you want it or not"
than to say:
"We are giving you product X with the purchase of product Y, and not only can you not remove product Y from your machine (as it is an integral part of the operating system), but we have taken special precautions to make sure that only product Y has access to features of product X that make it particularly useful; and by the way, your system provider signed a contract stating that they would not install product Z on this machine, so you're on your own if you want to install it. And don't complain to us if it is mysteriously disabled every now and then."
Linux distributions don't even compare. Yes, Mozilla is bundled, but if I want to get rid of it and use something else, it's nothing more than a dpkg --purge.
Bundling is not illegal. Product tying is legal too, except that it is a common technique by which a monopoly position is frequently abused, so it is something that frequently comes up in these cases when you are trying a company for abusing a monopoly position.
LRC, the best-read libertarian site on the web
What is often forgotten is that most competitors of MSFT are also US companies, so to limit MSFT's monopoly would harm one US company, but benefit a lot of others many of which are also US companies.
So, the economic balance does not explain the US failure to correct this economically damaging condition, there must have been another reason. Probably plain old bribes, or just stupidity from the part of the Bush government to see the economic benefit to have sound markets with sound competition.
So for the same business behavior, it is fair when you are small and it is unfair when you are big. I would say Microsoft is punished for being too successful, not for unfair practice.
If Windows was 30% of the market share, MS could add a media player and increase value, sure.
What they could *not* do is threaten to jack up prices on OEMs that include rival media players, because the OEMs would use one of the OSes that made up the other 70% of the market.
They didn't even get in trouble for just bundling. They got in trouble specifically for *illegally leveraging monopoly power.* This is something you cannot possibly do without a monopoly, so market share DOES matter.
Don't you wish your girlfriend was a geek like me?
There are, admittedly, some crazy people out there who think that all the wrongs in the world are the fault of Mr. Bush.
:)
The more rational elements of the left repudiate these people, and appologise for their claims. All the wrongs in the world are not, in fact, the fault of President Bush.
But the overwhelming majority are
Killfile(TGK)
No trees were killed in the creation of this post. However, many electrons were inconvenienced.