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Missed Opportunities in U.S. v. Microsoft

cyberlaw writes "The Supreme Court's deadline for filing a final appeal in the landmark U.S. v. Microsoft antitrust case expired yesterday with little notice. But it's a day Andrew Chin has been anticipating for six years. Today Chin, a former legal extern who assisted Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson during the drafting of the November 1999 Findings of Fact in that case, makes his first public comments on the merits of that case, in keeping with the D.C. Circuit's admonition that officers of the court should not comment on impending cases. He has written an op-ed article in today's Raleigh News and Observer.

Chin is currently an associate professor teaching antitrust and intellectual property law at the University of North Carolina. According to his faculty biography, Chin also earned a doctorate in computer science in 1991 as a Rhodes scholar at the University of Oxford. After a few years of teaching math and CS, he picked up a J.D. at Yale Law School, and eventually ended up working behind the scenes on the Microsoft case.

Chin's article raises some new points about the Microsoft case that don't seem to have been considered by any of the parties, courts or commentators during the trial, such as the fact that the Windows and Internet Explorer software products actually consist of legal rights and technological capabilities, not lines of code. A longer piece by Chin is being published in the Harvard Journal of Law and Technology."

4 of 424 comments (clear)

  1. Ash nazg durbatulûk, by StM.Rawder · · Score: 1, Offtopic

    Ash nazg durbatulûk,
    ash nazg gimbatul,
    ash nazg thrakatulûk agh burzum-ishi krimpatul.

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    My sig was stolen - the insurance company replaced it with this one.
  2. Re:This way they have more time to fight other stu by danheskett · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    The Bush Adm doesn't care about stopping terrorists in the United States, they only care about stoping them overseas. Proof of this is in our 'Open' Borders policy.

    Neither party has any political will to shut down illegal immigration. For the conservatives, it puts downward pressure on the job market which helps business interests and keeps inflation and monetary changes under control. For the liberals, it is both an issue of policy and practicality. Immigrants vote democrat 90% of the time. Registering to vote even as a non-citizen requires virtually no proof - a drivers license (which does not require legal status) or a phone bill (which requires an address and cash) will usually do.

  3. Re:Yet... by killjoe · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    " Sorry but your Beloved Democrats are no different or better in any way, shape or form."

    Sorry but my reading of recent history shows them to be much better. Not perfect, not 100% on the side of consumers or freedom but much much better then the republicans.

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    evil is as evil does
  4. Re:This way they have more time to fight other stu by phyruxus · · Score: 0, Offtopic
    >>Duh. Would you rather fight [terrorists] in Iraq and Afganistan or in Iowa and New York?

    Um.. I would prefer to fight them wherever they are. If they are in Iowa and New York, we need to fight them there also. What sense does it make to fight terrorism in Afganistan if you're going to let it fester elsewhere? Have we learned nothing from Vietnam? You don't give your enemy a place to hide and regroup. That's why we went into Afganistan.

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    "A witty saying proves nothing." ~Voltaire
    "d'Oh!" ~Homer