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Microsoft Settles Antitrust Suit with Vouchers
TedCheshireAcad writes "Microsoft has apparently settled its antitrust case with the state of Arizona by offering $104 million in product vouchers. Arizona consumers in the state from 1996 to 2002 will get $15 for their past operating system purchases and $9 for past application purchases. Public schools in Arizona will get 50% of unclaimed vouchers and 50% of vouchers that have been claimed but not redeemed for software products. I remember when lawsuits were settled with money, not monopoly propogation."
Can the vouchers be used for other things like with several other settlements? Or does it have to just be refunded for more M$ crap?
I touch computers in naughty places
Except they're not even giving you anything of value on its own! Its like being given a fucking gift certificate to HMV after one of their CD racks fell on you and crushed your legs. That'd go over like a lead baloon, yet Microsoft can practically get away with murder? I don't get it. Something is seriously fucked with the system if this is what passes for "modern justice".
I'd like you to point out one such case against a monopolist that you remember where money (and nothing else) was paid in restitution.
There is a very famous case, which supports the voucher "punishment," whereby for its rampant and flagrant price fixing Nintendo was ordered to send out $5 vouchers to its customers. The irony was that Nintendo at the time was making more than $5 per cartridge sold thanks to its flagrant price fixing, so even when being "punished" it was making a profit due to the activity it was being punished for.
The ______ Agenda