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EU Deadline Approaching for Microsoft
doga writes "As reported by various publications, Microsoft is facing its deadline tonight at midnight central European time. The commissioner has then to decide whether it implemented correctly the measures (windows without media player and interop documentation) or if it should be fined up to 5% of its daily sales." From the article: "European antitrust regulators, who have been at odds with Microsoft over its efforts to comply with its order, hope to make a decision by July 20 as to whether Microsoft has submitted an acceptable proposal for compliance, said Jonathan Todd, a spokesman for the European Union. That date is the last meeting of the European Commission before its summer recess."
sweet
As I type, it is approx. 14:35 PST. Add 9 hours and one gets to 23:35.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
This again? I feel like this is a new years count down, where's dick clark?
Bill Gates: "Ooh, the Germans are mad at me? I'm so scared! Oooh, the Germans!"
(ok, shamelessly stolen from The Simpsons)
The owls are not what they seem
Looking forward to it!!!!
Yes, there have been other Slashdot stories about this. Please do not rain in a bunch of "Dupe!" posts. The difference ostensibly is that the deadline is tonight.
And no, Microsoft can't just pay the fine indefinitely because shareholders would revolt. Please none of that either. Save yourself the calculations.
Expect France to vote "Yes" on this one !
The deadline expires tonight.
Then, it will take a few weeks to decide on a punishment (if any).
Then a few more weeks to decide if the decision is the right one.
Then another month to decide if the decision of the decision was a good one.
Then submit it for a committee vote.
Wait - who had the decision?
I thought you had it? Where did it go?
What were we deciding upon?
I don't know. Let's hold a meeting and see if we can decide on it.
What's for lunch?
I don't know you - you decide.
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
How about free market extremists with no idea of the economic terms "deadweight loss", "externality", or "market failure" and why they are bad things to have going on in your economy. Can I hate them instead?
I still have more fans than freaks. WTF is wrong with you people?
Because in Europe, there are laws again anti-competitive measures (like bundling WMP or IE) used by companies having a monopoly or a REALLY good hold of the market?
I have a really elegant proof for Fermat's last theorem. If this sig was only a bit longer...
Owned animation goes here.
obey or obey not , there is a large fine
The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
Saw this image earlier and got a good laugh.
"What do you despise? By this are you truly known." --Princess Irulan, Manual of Muad'Dib
/)
Why don't collectivists accept the notion that individuals have a right to what they produce? A right to ownership? Maybe because they know they cannot produce.
What if the EU declared that you have to donate your second pair of Pradas to some homeless person?
Or declare that you have to give up half your dentures to someone who's lost theirs?
Or force (read: VIOLENCE) you to give up an organ?
Or force you to give up something that you have produced?
This is blatently unfair to Microsoft; an obvious exploitation of a wealthy corporation by governments. This is made obvious by the EU's 5% daily sales fine.
Last I check Microsoft was not pointing a gun at your head, and telling you to buy their crap.
These things are about Microsoft's market position and business practices. No, they aren't pointing guns, because they aren't armored criminals, but they are using certain business practices some organizations don't like.
Let the free-market decide.
The problem is that the market is less free to choose when one company is by far dominating the software market, and in addition to this trying to ensure others have a hard time competing (what this case is about).
You've got Apple as well, go buy a Mac; or install Linux.
Yes, this is a good tip if you wish to easier see the problem.
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
Here we go again, the free-market zealots who don't care that the assumptions of a free market are secured. Yawn, indeed. Stephan
http://stephan.sugarmotor.org
Is that 5% of the gross or 5% of the net?
Coder's Stone: The programming language quick ref for iPad
Unfortunately, by the time you've got a gun to your head, its a little late to do much about it.
I'm guessing you don't believe that a company that is sufficiently large can ask the government to hold the gun? See oil companies/clothing companies in many countries.
> Last I check Microsoft was not pointing a gun at your head, and telling you to buy their crap.
No, but they are pointing market dominance at PC manufacturers' heads, thus limiting my freedom to select my hardware supplier and OS supplier seperately.
If the invisible hand really worked that well, it'd probably be making sure monopolies didn't exist, not giving uneducated folks like you handjobs in return for drooling praise.
"Old man yells at systemd"
Every distro I've tried had tones of stuff bundled with it. How should this be considered? Same as IE/WMP in Windows? Hopefully not... here are my two reasons:
1. Any other OS does not have a monopoly - different rules apply (or, to be precise - antimonopolistic rules don't apply).
2. All that extra stuff in Linux is not integrated with OS (for example AFAIR you can't uninstall IE).
What do you think? Has this problem been mentioned/discussed somewhere?
I've heard the whole spiel on the EU thing from Microsoft's point of view, as can only be gotten off the record by a personal friend (he works on Longhorn). To put it simply, Microsoft will comply with the EU's demands as they have to, and they will adapt as necessary - but there are some things on which they simply will not budge, and most of those relate to how they engineer their software.
Microsoft's internal opinion of the EU is that it is acting entirely for economical reasons, that is, selfish ones. Fining Microsoft millions means lots of needed cash for some of the EU members whose economies aren't doing too hot. It also means the apprecation of Microsoft's competitors in the region (Real, Apple, etc.) who would, to use my friend's phrase, "line their (the EU's) coffers with cash."
Incidentally, Microsoft is perfectly capable of pulling its business completely out of EU nations, though that is of course an absolute last option. Note that such a move would be disastrous for consumers there (and don't think for a second that it wouldn't be), but Microsoft would continue as ever.
The coolest voice ever.
00:00! Time's up!
Or more simply, because we can...
How... unilateral of you.
Please, do that.
Didn't the US rely on sovereign authority when it invaded part of the middle east, despite claims by its European rivals that it had no such authority? Sovereign authority is not lost on the US and it won't be federated away to Chirac anytime soon, friend.
Lurking at the bottom of the gravity well, getting old
... but the realy question is, when will we know what or if MS submitted a new proposal?
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
People brushing these things off always seem to ignore or forget the fact that trustbuilding is illegal. You don't think the government should be limiting abuse of markets, or taking steps to halt anticompetitive behavior, or busting trusts? Fine. The proper thing to do then would be complain to the lawmakers, and try to get the law changed. The proper thing to do would not be to whine about the poor abused multibillion dollar monopolies when people decide, hey, we're going to start actually considering enforcing the laws on the books now.
Microsoft was been unfairly treated? How so? How were they "treated" at all? In the Netscape case the government found them guilty and then walked away without doing one damn thing to them. How often does that happen? Looks to me like they got the treatment of royalty.
Though I prefer Netscape/Mozilla to IE, I thought the arguments about a browser monopoly were quite foolish.
And the fact that the browser with 90%ish market share has been able to effectively halt work on and adoption spread of open standards such as CSS2 or SVG is just a coincidence? As is the way that the messy derailing of Java as an application platform immediately followed that same browser/os company all but by their own hand preventing the widespread adoption of versions past the very primitive 1.1 or so?
This is blatently unfair to Microsoft; an obvious exploitation of a wealthy corporation by governments. This is made obvious by the EU's 5% daily sales fine.
If that was what the EU was after, they'd have implemented the fine at violation, rather than as an absolute absolute last resort after over a year of deliberation, delay, pussyfooting, and giving Microsoft chance after chance to comply with the law.
Considering Microsoft tried to destroy the Web.
IE would have stopped talking to Apache and slowly broke the web. This was their strategy.
IE talking to IIS servers on WinOS only, think of the insane liscensing costs of even a small server farm.
The Web is worth nillions, 5% of M$ daily sales is chump change considering the loss to Commerce Worldwide.
Now of course Governments shouldn't stick their noses in, but the courts should and did when a monopoly behaves illegally just like for any other crime - it is a legal matter and was pursued as such.
This is why Netscape went Open Source, because Microsoft was buying the web and Netscape realised its server business, where the money was, would be over when IE had blanket coverage and Netscape couldn't afford the developers to fight back.
Microsoft commited a crime, they broke the law and they still are, they should be punished and the punishment should fit the crime - it is pretty small ion fact, as evidenced by Microsoft completely ignoring it.
If only America had the balls to follow suit they might be brought to heel, if not break 'em up, just like Ma Bell.
Massive monopolies do not a healthy market economy make.
if the 5% would be destinated for the 3rd world or for cancer research, or...
but apparently it's just another case of business warfare
Regardless, you have a choice whether or not you want to use Microsoft products. Don't like it? Use Apple products or Linux. If you're not part of the solution you're part of the problem. The end. --- See that little dot? It's a PERIOD.
What would all you microsoft-bashers say if it was linux instead of Windows? Let's not bash the company, let's bash their business practices.
Microsoft's business model depends entirely on the idea of denying its potential competitors funding in order to prevent their future viability. If the EU became a "No MS zone" by Microsoft's own choice, that would be more than enough funding to support a viable competitor, hell, to support any number of viable competitors. Those viable competitors would then inevitably wind up selling in the U.S., and unable to deny them a market-- because it would no longer be able to impact the market in which they are rooted, in the EU, in any way-- Microsoft would have to compete on the merits of their own product, something they can't and don't do.
Microsoft wouldn't pull out of the EU. The money they'd lose by pulling out of the EU would of course be effectively irrelivant; Microsoft has money to burn. But the control they'd lose by pulling out of the EU would be, to Microsoft, unacceptable.
I do not apologize for the amount of space in this letter I intend to devote to telling you about Microsoft. In the text that follows, when I quote from Microsoft, I will use the word "excrement" in place of another word which is now apparently permitted in general circulation publications, and which I have edited out. It saddens me that I have to laugh when Microsoft says that it is its moral imperative to create division in the name of diversity. Where in the world did it get that idea? Not only does that idea contain absolutely no substance whatsoever, but if it wants to operate on a criminal -- as opposed to a civil disobedience -- basis, let it wear the opprobrium of that decision. It is important to differentiate between unregenerate, untrustworthy ruffians and filthy dorks who, in a variety of ways, have been lured by Microsoft's bleeding-heart teachings, or who have ended up wittingly or unwittingly in coalitions with Microsoft's bootlickers, or who maintain contact with Microsoft as part of serious and legitimate research.
Microsoft insists that all it takes to solve our social woes are shotgun marriages, heavy-handed divorce laws, and a return to some mythical 1950s Shangri-la. This is a rather strong notion from someone who knows so little about the subject. If I am correct that Microsoft throws the word "proconstitutionalism" around as if it had the same meaning to everyone, then its insults are an icon for the deterioration of the city, for its slow slide into crime, malaise, and filth.
Microsoft has been doing "in-depth research" (whatever it thinks that means) to prove that the best way to reduce cognitive dissonance and restore homeostasis to one's psyche is to bombard us with an endless array of hate literature. I should mention that I've been doing some research of my own. So far, I've "discovered" that it would be nugatory to discuss Microsoft's opinions without first mentioning that Microsoft's newsgroup postings are colored by a sycophantic adoration of nepotism. But there's the rub; if you think that this is humorous or exaggerated, you're wrong. Microsoft's reports emphasize the formation of small units of xenophobic cronies that can avoid detection by authorities, strike quickly and disperse, and, to some extent, subordinate principles of fairness to less admirable criteria. We can therefore extrapolate that if Microsoft wanted to, it could parlay personal and political conspiracy theories into a multimillion-dollar financial empire. It could exert more and more control over other individuals. And it could advocate measures that others criticize for being excessively batty. We must not allow Microsoft to do any of these. I feel no more personal hatred for Microsoft than I might feel for a herd of wild animals or a cluster of poisonous reptiles. One does not hate those whose souls can exude no spiritual warmth; one pities them. What's more, if everyone does his own, small part, together we can resolve a number of lingering problems.
It would be wrong to imply that Microsoft is involved in some kind of conspiracy to call for ritualistic invocations of needlessly formal rules. It would be wrong because its plans for the future are far beyond the conspiracy stage. Not only that, but several things it has said have brought me to the boiling point. The statement of its that made the strongest impression on me, however, was something to the effect of how distasteful paper-pushers and the worst classes of backwards bourgeoisie I've ever seen should rule this country. There are two related questions in this matter. The first is to what extent Microsoft has tried to brand me as featherbrained. The other is whether or not the parasitism "debate" is not a debate. It is a harangue, a politically motivated, brilliantly publicized, disorganized attack on progressive ideas. Quite frankly, when I'm through with Microsoft, it'll think twice before attempting to supplant national heroes with what I call brain-damaged-to-the-core, deplorable proponents of phallocentrism.
Judging by the
Microsoft's business model depends entirely on the idea of denying its potential competitors funding in order to prevent their future viability.
If you seriously believe that this is all that Microsoft's business model consists of, you are a fool.
Why can microsoft not go 'Oh yes, you may have ruled against us as an EU court, but your laws do not apply where we are located. Ask GW.'
B.
Every experiment which ends in a big bang is a good experiment.
OK so MS are a monopolist. This position would have caused them to become lazy, complacent, expensive and they would have driven customers away. The government forcing them to change their ways will simply prolong the time they hold the monopoly for.
Commies don't matter BTW, don't you understand your own liberal free market argument?
Deleted
If you live in the USA, then your state's authority was federated away a couple of centuries ago.
All the while Linux and Mac users enjoy all the bundled software that comes for free with their OSs.
All I have to do on an OS.X boxen to get rid of Safari is to move the app to the trash can. Internet Exporer for Windows is wired into the OS in such a way as to make it very hard to remove. The same apparently applies to Media Player 10. Some of the bundled software on a Mac is provided by other companies than Apple. You do have a point in that Apple provides programs like iDVD, iMovie and iPhoto but at least none of them is hard wired into the OS.
Pretty unilateral, yes, I was a bit angry at the PP. Anyway the point I was to trying to get across is that all of this has got nothing to do with fairness, as the OP seems to imply with his "oh it's so unfair" claims. All revolves around economical interests here and, being quite a powerful economical entity, the EU has decided to flex her (yes, female :) muscles in a fight.
In the end, sovereign authority is about just that - the will to enter a pissing contest about who will outlast whom: in a real war, in an power struggle for dominance in a market, etc. So in a way you can argue that the US do understand what sov. auth. means :) perhaps better than anyone else, come to think of it. Ah, sophisms...
And of course the remark about banning products was sarcastic. I guess you know that, so why answer with such a "go on, see if we care" attitude? what good would it do to you (or us, of course) if MS products happened to be really banned from the EU? Kind of... interesting scenario though...
Finally, I really don't get your point about the recent vote. What's that got do to with anything we're discussing here?
Global warming is a cube.
Linux and Apple do not hold monopolies on their markets, so even if they wanted to, they can't break the relevant laws. The findings in the US and Europe were that M$ has broken those laws, and even a casual familiarity with their business practices would hardly leave anyone in doubt!
If M$ won't respect the law, they should be penalised. Of course, I'd rather see them penalised by a total market boycott, but that probably assumes an unrealistic level of common sense from their customers and potential customers...
you had me at #!
Finally, I really don't get your point about the recent vote. What's that got do to with anything we're discussing here?
By "recent vote" you mean the EU constitution? I make no point about that. That's an internal EU matter; the US has no say, no relevance, as it should not. I refer to cases where France ("Chirac") Germany and other rivals claim UN authority trumps US sovereignty.
Lurking at the bottom of the gravity well, getting old
WTF is this, elementary school?? Why can't my job have a summer recess?? Milk and cookies before nap time would be great too. Oh, and I'd like to meet the cutie from accounting out on the shipping and receiving dock after hours so we can share cooties.
This *is* funny!
Yankees do never get euro-jokes...
Okay, I'll just roll on out to the local store and buy my Linux-based laptop. Then I'll use my laptop to write up my resume and save it in the industry standard document format. I'll then apply for a position at all the companies whose websites are accessible with a standards compliant browser. Then I'll celebrate this personal victory by playing one of the many games that it can run.
You mean: MS Proposal service pack 1 ?
It's not Microsoft's fault that Linux is a piece of shit.
if you don't like Microsoft, then use something else
That's just it; consumer options are limited. Why? Because it's virtually impossible to compete against a monopoly that deliberately tries to put you out of business. That's why there are laws restricting what monopolies can do.
If anything the Government should not have any, and I mean ANY say in any of it, either way. They should not be allowed to give Microsoft anything special, nor should they hold them for being a crappy business. Let the free-market decide.
So where would Microsoft be if the government hadn't granted them artificial monopolies in the form of copyrights?
No, you really don't get it. Microsoft has managed to wedge themselves into the PC market, mainly through vendor lock-in strategies like proprietary file formats for things people depend on. It's damned difficult for PC vendors to not deliver PCs installed with microsoft, because understandably some percentage of a PC vendor's customers will want microsoft installed, but unless the vendor agrees to ship _ALL_ PCs with microsoft installed, microsoft threatens to pull the vendors license to ship microsoft. If the vendor gets their license pulled, they lose a lot of business. What would be fair is if microsoft just let the vendor decide which OS they want to ship for which proportion of their PCs. Microsoft is pointing a gun at the PC vendors heads and telling them what to sell.
There are plenty of people and companies today who really want to switch away from microsoft for very legitimate and understandable reasons, like the constant barrage of security holes, increasingly agressive licensing policies, etc., but they can't because they are locked in by the formats on the documents which they have invested so much time and effort into.
Microsoft is a bully to everyone it deals with, and it's time that the bully is dealt with by those who have the power to do it.
--
podz
Is this the deadline for compliance or for submitting a proposal that would hopefully eventually result in compliance?
For me, it comes down to deceptive practices.
I'm a big advocate of the free market. I really don't care if a company is a monopoly, or forms trusts, or price-fixes, or anything else like that. They can charge what they want for whatever they want. People can make all the deals they want with each other as long as it's honest and out in the open.
But microsoft doesn't play that way. They're behavior can be manipulative and dishonest and for me, that means it's open-season on them.
Consider what happened with DR-DOS. Microsoft basically deceived people into believing the DR-DOS was fundamentally incompatible with Windows 3.1.
Now it would have been different if they had been honest and said that they simply refuse to let Windows run on DR-DOS. But they weren't.
Here is what was in an email concerning how they would handle competing DOSes:
Microsoft's David Cole emailed Phil Barrett on September 30 1991: "It's pretty clear we need to make sure Windows 3.1 only runs on top of MS DOS or an OEM version of it," and "The approach we will take is to detect DR DOS 6 and refuse to load. The error message should be something like 'Invalid device driver interface."
That's deception.
And what about "upgrades" to Media Player that refused to handle the Real Player format after earlier versions supported it? How is that an upgrade? And why doesn't an "upgrade" that stops supporting Real Player format not restore file associations so that people can at least continue to use the format with Real's own player?
All of a sudden, after an "upgrade" people can't play the format anymore and most don't know how to restore the file associations.
How is that an "upgrade"? It's not. It's more deception.
And what about their handling of Java? Again, they lied. When you say you implement Java, then you had better implement it, damn it. You don't claim to support some special Microsoft only version of it.
There are so many other examples.
So, yes, the free market is great and it's the best system in the world, but it only works when you come down hard on fraud and deception.
Which, in this case means coming down hard on Microsoft.
So in short, to sum up the consequences of your post:
1) Microsoft had nothing to do with pressuring laptop manufacturers to only install Windows
2) Microsoft hasn't attempted to make their document formats noncompliant with any standard (and furthermore, as difficult to reverse-engineer as they can)
3) Microsoft hasn't attempted to pollute web standards and encourage invalid code that breaks other browsers
4) The status of Linux gaming hasn't suffered as a consequence of Microsoft's tactics garnering it a near monopoly
Interesting concepts, there.
Aeris Died For Your Sins.
Sorry but your friend working on Longhorn is hardly unbiased isn't he? So there are things that MS won't budge on heh? Well they are about to get the lesson in sovereign nations. I doubt very much that MS will take their ball and go home and right off a market of 400 million people.
Additionally, it is within the scope for them, should MSFT refuse to comply, to take those fines and use them to replace all software and OS on all computers in schools, universities, and government with open source competitors.
After all, what's fair for the gander is fair for the fois gras.
[caveat - I own shares of MSFT, Nokia, and RHAT and thus can't make up my mind if this is good or bad]
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Didn't the US rely on sovereign authority
Could you please explain exactly when it was decided that it was the right of every sovereign state to take away another state's sovereignty?
Or, were you talking about the UN (for which that Goldsmith himself admitted that he had trouble trying to come up with a way that the UN granted war authority to invade Iraq, in private correspondance that went public this year). If even the Attorney General of one of the architects of the war had trouble making up excuses for it, that makes the concept of the unilateral war having UN authority pretty laughable.
People should just boycott any company that annoys them. But they aren't very effective as individuals.
Hey, maybe the people should get together as a group, and if they all start putting on the pressure at one time, then the company would have to change its ways. They can elect a few of their number to define the rules, so everyone wouldn't have to be experts in finance and to force stragglers to comply. But what should we call this... collection of representatives...
How about... hmm... a government. That's the ticket.
try posting again....
Or are you just mentally challenged and we should send you a brownie?
"What would be fair is if microsoft just let the vendor decide which OS they want to ship for which proportion of their PCs. Microsoft is pointing a gun at the PC vendors heads and telling them what to sell."
No, Microsoft is offereing them terms in a free market. It has nothing to do with physical coercion. Either party is free to walk away from the table.
"Microsoft is a bully to everyone it deals with, and it's time that the bully is dealt with by those who have the power to do it."
Now these people you speak of have real guns, and are using them to deprive MS executives of real liberties. Who is the real bully?
Vote for Pedro
A STATE monopoly on socially sensible matters (healthcare, public transport in some areas, etc) can be good, especially to keep costs down, since a state owned company only has to try to break even.
(it's also normally highly inefficent, though)
A PRIVATE monopoly is just wrong, especially if you consider yourself a capitalist (what do they teach in economics courses in high school in your parts??)
and btw: which one has a medical/healthcare assistance average status only slightly better than developing counties? Non-monopolistic USA or EU countries? Dont't be silly...
Ciao, Renato
Where is this '5% of its daily sales' fine figure coming from? Every previous article I've seen on this topic, including the one pointed to by this story, says a flat $5 million a day fine.
And $5 million a day is chump change for Microsoft. Anyone who thinks otherwise needs to start looking at Microsoft's financial statements.
I bet they spend more than that on toilet paper for company restrooms.
I want a new quote. One that won't spill. One that don't cost too much. Or come in a pill.
I acknowledge your input and reiterate that Microsoft is clearly an enemy to the computing world. But how does requiring a "Reduced Media Edition" help with the above-stated problem? It just scales back what they offer with the OS, when as far as I can tell, most of the trust/monopoly complaints are about the operating system itself (integration of IE with the OS, breaking competitors software).
In order to level the playing field for software development, the Windows OS must be standardized somehow (that is, Microsoft cannot intentionally make changes for the purpose of squashing to competition). How does the action of the EU actually reduce Microsoft's monolithic stature?
Furthermore, is such a steep monetary fine justified for the damage that Microsoft actually causes to its competitors? Notice that many of the apps which challenge MS products (Mozilla, Opera, Winamp, VLC) are available free of charge. Furthermore, the implicit goal of many of these (especially the Open Source projects - think Firefox) is to destroy Microsoft's market share in each respective category. So Microsoft's damage to the computing community cannot be measured so easily in pounds and pence. So why is the EU charging them so much money? Use your imagination.
Yes, Microsoft is involved in "unfair" business practices. But nailing them for IE and Windows Media Player is sort of like nailing Al Capone for tax evasion.
4) The status of Linux gaming hasn't suffered as a consequence of Microsoft's tactics garnering it a near monopoly
Linux gaming? You might have a valid point with the other ideas but this one is like saying nintendo is making mac gaming impossible... It's not that fact that MS is trying to monopolize desktop gaming, it's the fact that linux isn't really much of a gaming OS and doesn't have much of a desktop presence. It's market share and not MS that keeps Linux from having many games.
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
Good plan. While I'm at it, I'm going to go back in to the end of the 19th century/early 20th century and establish a steel company, an oil company, and a railroad company. After all, monopolies don't *really* use their dominating position to force rivals out of the market through cheap tactics. Carnegie, Rockafeller, and Pullman just simply got lucky because nobody wanted to buy the products/services that their competitors tried to sell for half the price, eh?
Aeris Died For Your Sins.
doesn't have much of a desktop presence
Which is what I said, although I could have worded it better (by continuing on with "...on the desktop market).
Aeris Died For Your Sins.
I love the way you "summed up" my post by making it longer. Way to go, sparky!
Then I'll use my laptop to write up my resume and save it in the industry standard document format. I'll then apply for a position at all the companies whose websites are accessible with a standards compliant browser.
Send your resume to Amazon, where we use linux based crap all over. Then celebrate your personal victory by getting out of the damn house and enjoying the wonderful greenery that results from all the rain we get.
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
What changes reducing the use of Microsoft products would make in them is another question altogether, and there are better reasons for controlling MS' behaviour than to gain the income from fines.
Disclaimer: I'm typing this from Firefox on Windows 2K (I have a few apps specific to work that won't run under WINE, and I don't have the skill to get them running...yet), while VNCing into my linux (Gentoo..yay) development server and SSHing into my MacOS X server, all just trying to do my job as best I can. So I'm running an MS product, but I'm running Win2K because I find XP ridiculous.
I hate MS as much as the next guy. I'm also a US citizen (just FYI). Quite frankly, I don't see any good coming from this. MS can easily afford the fine. 5% of daily sales may as well be a Euro to MS. And if there's one thing I've learned, its that corporations don't pay these fines. Their customers do. MS won't blink at increasing their costs to cover the fine and maintain profit margins. They can do this because they are a MONOPOLY! For the fine to be meaningful, I think it has to be on the order of 90%. I'm sure they'd find a way to unbundle real quickly then. Look at tobacco companies in the US. They didn't even consider changing their practices until the lawsuits started costing them billions per fiscal quarter.
I could be wrong. But I truly believe those rat bastards will find a way to pass the costs onto the consumer.
Give a man a fish and he'll eat for a day. Teach him to fish and he'll wipe out the species.
How about people that will never realize that *noone* is coercing anyone to buy the product.
That is what you will *never* get beyond. A person always has the decision of whether or not to use it. Always.
Jealousy and envy are the real causes of this litigation. And the fact that the EU needs money badly, and since socialism doenst work they need to loot it from someone else.
..start firing EU workers and moving jobs elsewhere until the EU relents.
True, but if it weren't for Microsoft, Linux would have a much larger market share, thus more games. And no, it is not like Nintendo-Mac at all, Nintendo and Mac are made for doing entirely things, the same is not true for Windows and some distros of Linux.
Yeah.... right.
The EU supports a dozen PRIVATE EU monopolies. They ONLY have a problem with the ONE American monopoly they have to deal with.
The EU are CLEARLY xenophobic about this.
Except that they are. Coercion doesn't require them to put a gun to your head to be coercion.
I still have more fans than freaks. WTF is wrong with you people?
" A STATE monopoly on socially sensible matters (healthcare, public transport in some areas, etc) can be good, especially to keep costs down, since a state owned company only has to try to break even."
It can be good, unless your a doctor. Then your stuck with whatever the govt. decides your worth paying.
"and btw: which one has a medical/healthcare assistance average status only slightly better than developing counties? Non-monopolistic USA or EU countries? Dont't be silly..."
Making doctors govt slaves isn't my idea of a good solution to the problem, comrade.
Vote for Pedro
I have to eat your poo
... Commies, go hate them.
Keep up, dude, we're supposed to be hating terrorists this week.
Engsoc has always been at war with terrorists.
A private monopoly is wrong, of course. But I don't buy that a state monopoly is not a private monopoly. Yes, yes, I understand that "we all own the state", but this is just pretty rhetoric. I don't have any more power over the officials of state monopolies than I do private monopolies. One vote out of tens or hundreds of millions every X years for a leader, who will appoint a cabinent memeber/minister, who will appoint a head of a state run industry is so abstracted as to be meaningless. And because state monopolies tend to be over "socially critical" matters, the mistakes they make are just that much more harmful.
As for socialized medicine, the U.S. government spends more per capita on health care than a lot of EU countries, so it is a bit unfair to say that the U.S. isn't socialized medicine. However, having lived with the U.S. 60%-70% quasi-socialized system, and living now with Canadas 100% socialized system, that health care in the U.S. is orders of magnitude better. Even the poorest people without insurance where I lived in the U.S. got better health care than where I live in Canada. And Canada's system is considered comparable with most EU countries, so I don't see why it would be any different there. One thing to remember is that the U.S. government desperatly wants to control everything in the world, including health care, and EU countries need to justify their massive government monopolies, so both the E.U. and the U.S. find it convienient to spread the same propoganda.
Microsoft Shall Die!!! (We wish)
Go to the w3.org and put Slashdot.org through the validator.
A browser monopoly is not foolish at all. It means that if Microsoft has the top browser, they also control the internet. I don't want MS to control the internet... it is commercialized enough already. Look at how many bad/annoying/non-comforming web sites came about because of using IE-only quirky programming. Might be unfair to MS, if you look at it that way. I say it's completely fair to the end user, and in my book, that's all that counts.
Meh.
Europe has no right to levy a fine of that magnitude on an American company.
Don't pay any fines.
Dump the software on Europe for free as in beer to continue to lock the market in.
Europe is hell bent on starting a trade war. The Bush administration should intervene on Microsoft's behalf and place sanctions all European technology companies in retaliation.
Ban SAP and Business Objects in the United States.
This is my sig.
"it's the fact that linux isn't really much of a gaming OS"
What makes an OS a gaming OS? What needs to be changed in GNU/Linux to make it a gaming OS? I can't think of anything specific about the OS that would prevent it from succeeding as a gaming OS. (of course I'm one of those old fogies that doesn't consider web browsers and media players to be a part of the OS, so YMMV)
"It's market share and not MS that keeps Linux from having many games"
Market share doesn't keep the WWW inaccessible in a world of IE. Market share doesn't prevent me from filling my Audi at the same gas station you fill your Excursion. Market share doesn't keep me from running gcc on any system I choose.
What keeps games from Linux is DirectX.
Microsoft sabotaged OpenGL (they were part of the initial standardization group) to push its Direct3d and other associated proprietary libraries.
If game developers weren't locked in DirectX and standard libraries for low-level hardware interaction were nurtured instead of aborted, most games would be multiplatform. As it is, progress on this has been set back 10 years.
Business practices is what defines a company.
Bash the company.
Bash it's partners
Bash Dell, HP, and Gateway that support Microsoft's monopoly.
"If anything the Government should not have any, and I mean ANY say in any of it, either way. They should not be allowed to give Microsoft anything special, nor should they hold them for being a crappy business. Let the free-market decide."
Well, considering that it was the government having a say in it in the first place that got them the copyrights to their code, your theory falls flat right from the start.
Now, if you really mean that the government should have no say in it, then you are calling for the end of copyrights. Is that indeed what you are doing?
In any event, the government will at least have a say in any event in that they are a customer or potential customer.
all the best,
drew
FreeMusicPush If you want to see more Free Music made, listen to Free
Did that. Interviewed. Didn't get the job.
Still wouldn't mind working there though, in the right group.
It can be good, unless your a doctor. Then your stuck with whatever the govt. decides your worth paying.
Doctors can go on strike here, you know. It happens, but it's rare because their salary demands are usually accepted. So it's not bad at all.
What makes an OS a gaming OS?
ease of use ; Driver support for various video cards, game pads, monitors, and other peripherals; and support from game studios.
What needs to be changed in GNU/Linux to make it a gaming OS?
Make installing a game requires less then 3 hours, ensure that the default configuration can run on most systems without reconfiguration. Include all nessacary libraries with every game. Improve driver support, win over game developers.
I can't think of anything specific about the OS that would prevent it from succeeding as a gaming OS.
The need to re-compile and configure for most installations is a huge problem. The lack of driver support from hardware vendors as well. The fact that linux is not uniform makes it even more of a pain in the ass to make a bug free game for. Not onyl do you have hardware variation, you now have to account for subtle software differences too.
(of course I'm one of those old fogies that doesn't consider web browsers and media players to be a part of the OS, so YMMV)
I didn'ts mention any of that. only his point about games.
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
"...if [Microsoft] should be fined up to 5% of its daily sales."
In other news, Microsoft's European software prices are expected to increase by 5-7% this week...
I can't speak for macs but at least on the linux side of things from what I have seen is that I have a choice of what apps I want to use.. I can uninstall things I don't like and use what ever I do.
Also there is that little bit about all that bundeled software actually being developed by others beside those putting out the GNU/linux distro. Bundeling Firefox or Openoffice does not interfere with say gnome office or opera as they are all seperate entities then the particular linux distributor.
In the end I have a choice with GNU/linux.. MSFT effectivly removes that choice from me with windows, as the browser is part of the OS and can not be removed etc, etc.. I won't rehash everything that is already out about the problems with windows and the misdeeds of MSFT.
gives a damn?
-- "I never gave these stories much credence." - HAL 9000
So AirBus is exempted from these laws?
full of toilet paper, that comes out to 17 Libraries of Congress of toilet paper per day.
The constitution vote went 'No' in France, and it will do the same in the Netherlands.
We can hope this now means the dried husk of 'EU' bureaucrats will blow away in the next high wind.
Look, either you have two willing parties that want to trade, or you dont. Supporters of this dumbass litigation always want to muddy up the waters with unessentials.
Are the two traders both willing parties to the trade or not? That is a yes or no question. And as long as MS didnt force anyone to say 'yes' when they wanted to say 'no' then there is NO basis for fines. That is, unless you belong to a theiving nation.
Microsoft could rise product prices by 5% -:).
I guess you know that, so why answer with such a "go on, see if we care" attitude?
:)
I believe the gentleman meant "I say... bring 'em on"
We like to do that sort of thing here in the United States now.
A.A
I don't think a monopoly has to be State run to be sensible, but I still agree with you in essense. An efficient monopoly is great, especially when it is dealing with a basic service, such as coal, oil production, maybe tap-water, energy production, just so long as it is a uniform, single procedure
What is really bad is when that monopoly starts bundling (i.e. for every tank of gas you fill, you get a 'free' 32oz bottle of water! from the same monopoly) soon, the old monopoly on a single service pushes all of their new 'free' service competitors out, and we all know that bottled water isn't actually 'free'.
Microsoft's bundling is bad in two ways, as I see it: 1)The bundled software obviously isn't 'free'; and 2)the bundled software uses up valuable resources (i.e. I.E., even when I'm running Firefox)
Tally-ho
Don't you mean.. BIZZARO!
> Making doctors govt slaves
HAH! You evidently aren't familiar with this whole "working for the government" lark.
It's more a case of job security, enjoying being in a govt. mandated monopoly (your market is always there, and you don't face growing competition), and the wages (depending on the country) range from reasonable to "as absurd as in a free market".
Here in Ireland of course, we have the worst situation, a hideous mish-mash of free-marketism of the overboard US type, and socialism of the "we didn't bother checking how other countries do it, lets make it up out of our heads, or pay some friends lots of money to think about it".
On the plus side, we get a ludicrous amount of foreign investment (thanks to the only 10-12.5% corporation tax), have pots of money and loads of jobs (not that you aren't screwed if you're in the marginalised 10% that's either in the 4% unemployed, or the minimum wage/high costs bracket).
-- *~()____) This message will self-destruct in 5 seconds...
"Last I check Microsoft was not pointing a gun at your head, and telling you to buy their crap."
Is that so. Can you kindly point me to a location in Belgium where I can buy a portable without Windows license (and Azerty be keyboard)? Where can I buy a branded PC without Windows on it, where can I buy a branded server without it?
Even the few brands that do offer PC's without OS pay one license to MS for that product and most of the time, the consumer does too.
You are mixing things up.
Some countries here in the EU have/had government monopolies on services that are crucial to the public.
This includes hospitals, train transport etc.
These monopolies are not to private companies. The institutes involved are required to perform a public service, they are not intended to make profits and the price of their products/services are deteremined by the government and could even be at a loss for certain categories of people.
In this case, MS has been trying to use its desktop monopoly to break into multimedia and kickstart a monopoly using the WMV and WMA formats by bundling vector (WMP) on Windows. MS was told to stop that illegal, anti-freemarket activity and ship a version of Windows not locked into WMV or WMA.
That version is called now XP Home Edition N (MS tried to call it Reduced Media Edition) and it is broken. Of course, Windows Media Player, the vector to spread WMA and WMV, is absent as required by the court. But MS has also removed the rest of the libraries needed for other media players to use Windows. That in itself is contempt.
The 5% fine is too small. MS has dragged on this case for years, each day hurts competition and the free market. Now MS is dragging on the punishment. The strategy is if it is able to wait long enough the problem goes away on its own.Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
> Where is this '5% of its daily sales' fine figure coming from? Every previous article I've seen on this topic, including the one pointed to by this story, says a flat $5 million a day fine.
? reference=IP/04/382&format=HTML&aged=0&language=EN &guiLanguage=en
The ruling states "The Commission has the power to force changes in company behaviour and to impose financial penalties for antitrust violations of up to 10% of their annual turnover worldwide."
http://europa.eu.int/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do
This fine is the most ridiculus claim I have heard in a while. If "Windows" media player can no longer be given for FREE when you buy/install windows, then why should they stop there? Why not get rid of windows taskbar, because there are alternative task bars available. Then you'll need to get rid of your wallpaper and desktop so companies can compete in that sector.
The US economy and currency is dropping like a rock, the US is hated wordwide, and Microsoft software is poorly coded bloatware to start with.
Microsoft are criminals that have abused their monopoly for far too long, but a company that rich needs to charged money and maybe put some people of the high council in jail.
I dont see why they make a big deal out of WMP and IE. The real problem is fud campaigns, lieing/deciving, abuse of patents and copyright, property file formats, intentionally breaking standards, refusing open standards, etc and doing everything in their power to lockout possible competition. Holding companies that build and sell PC's by a iron fist, forcing them to either ship all computers with Windows or to get put out of bussiness.
It is organisated crime like a mafia disguised in a corporate business company/structure.
I would love to see the EU take out huge fines from Microsoft and banning their products from EU.
Sure would be difficult times at the begining but wouldnt take long for people to realize Linux has been sitting there waiting for them all the time.
It would evolve at rapid pace with all new users and contributers and it would spread like wild fire.
Wouldnt take long before Asia, Africa, etc see what is going on and jumps on the train.
At that point, Microsoft wouldnt even last in the US, since american developers would start developing more and more for the Linux platform while more and more starts migrating to Linux.
I remember that I downloaded versions of IE for myself just because I thought that it was the best browser in the market at the time that I could get for free.
Whether IE would have as big marketshare if it hadn't bundled it with windows is doubtful, but then again, Microsoft wouldn't have put their browser team into cryosleep or whatever it was if it hadn't kept it's marketshare as long as it did.
The same's true for MS' media players - They were free (as in beer), fast and reliable compared to the two main competitors at the time - Quicktime and RealPlayer.
Even now, I don't see much reason to use either non-MS software with Real alternative and quick alternative (or whatever their names were) codec packs. Unless of course, I want to pay a lot of money or watch a lot of happy ads.
Though currently I don't use either IE or WMP but that's because open source software got past them in quality.
I'd like to remind you that Microsoft actually was found guilty in the USA, too. But then what happened? The judge was removed, and Microsoft had a deal with USA government.
Another point: the company that sued Microsoft here in EU is American.
So please stop anti-EU flames.
It can be good, unless your a doctor. Then your stuck with whatever the govt. decides your worth paying.
No you're not. Here in Belgium for example, when I go to a doctor I get a certain fee back from the government. But I get to choose which doctor I go too, and that doctor gets to choose how much he asks for a visit. Some ask the fee that gets payed back, some ask more.
Pitchforks? Come on, Redmond is in the USA where you can get flamethrowers from vending machines! We'll just fly there and stock up on the way to Redmond.
Does anyone know whether any supermarket chain currently has subtactical nukes on sale?
USE HOT GRITS WITH STATUE OF NATALIE PORTMAN (NAKED AND PETRIFIED)
I refer to cases where France ("Chirac") Germany and other rivals claim UN authority trumps US sovereignty.
What? When did either of those countries ever claim that? Please give me some kind of reference. Wasn't the argument more about what trumps Iraq's sovereignty?
-chris
San Francisco values: compassion, tolerance, respect, intelligence
Except doctors are paid very well, and they can keep a share of private visits at whatever cost they choose. And people who can afford it often choose to pay more for private assistance because in general you are treated better (not on the medical side, actually, but in terms of accomodation and such ancillary services).
Doctors are not forced to work for the national health service, either, but they choose to, cause the pay is good and very safe.
Besides, enjoy your freedom to bleed to death while the E.R. doctors try to decide if your insurance will pay the costs...
Ciao, Renato
Stop off in Seattle and you can pick up a certified organic implosion-type bomb with Pu derived only from ecologically sound mining practices, and explosive lenses with low VOC content and no environmental oestrogens!
walmart
I am Spartacus
There are no international treaties forbidding the EU from enforcing its trade laws.
Me (Blog)
Doctors are paid adaquately in most European countries.
Me (Blog)
Frag, can't remember my pw and I'm not at home...
I know I'm extremely atypical in my home computer use... but seriously, the only reason I run windows (2000 since it was released, and now XP Pro, unfortunately) is to run games - and only one really at that. Only Eve Online's caught my interest in quite a while. (stackless python, yummy...)
The rest of the time that machine sits idle or is used as a distributed compiler under cygwin while I do my real biz/devel/hobby coding work or gaming in linux...
Personally I think windows is really only for games or things where time/money/effort doesn't matter - hundreds of millions of corporate installs to the contrary. That's just my opinion though, and one that's heartily disputable to be sure... not really trying to troll.
You know what they say about opinions and assholes though... They (We?) all have one. *shrugs*