Slashdot Mirror
Real And Microsoft Close to Settlement
pdirty writes "Real networks may be close to winning a $750 million settlement agreement with Microsoft following Real's antitrust lawsuit against Microsoft. The deal would include Microsoft paying cash as well as advertising for Real services, and products through channels such as MSN. Real is holding a conference call after the closing bell today to announce the details." From the article: "The deal follows on the heels of the European Commission appointing a watchdog last week to monitor Microsoft's compliance with its antitrust ruling. The pact is the latest in a string of payments by Microsoft to settle charges, including $750 million in 2003 to Time Warner to end charges about Microsoft acting to suppress Netscape, and $1.95 billion to Sun Microsystems to settle a suit by Sun over Microsoft's use of incompatible Java technology."
You will now have to enter a valid email address before logging into your desktop. Also several new unexplained executables will be added to every user's startup folder to enhance the browsing experience.
"The deal would include Microsoft paying cash as well as advertising for Real services, and products through channels such as MSN. "
This means that ads in MSN messenger are going to say
"Buffering... 33%"
And Microsoft should really consider advertising for Mozilla too.
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
The press release with details of the deal is here.
But until the close of trading, the RNWK conference call says onlBuffering... buffering... buffering...
1) Use monopoly power to crush and stifle any competition
2) PROFIT!!
3) Pay off government to drop anti-trust charges
4) Pay off former competitors to drop anti-trust charges
5) EVEN MORE PROFIT!!
Nothing quite like the "free market"..
Their little eyes grow wide, their little palms grow sweaty, and their mouth dries up. "Yes, Mr. Ballmer. That will be fine."
They reach for the suitcase, but Ballmer snatches it away. "First you'll have to sign this," he says, pushing a settlement agreement their way. A pen lies on top, and as they pick up the pen, it extends a small needle and pricks their finger, sucking their blood into the inkwell.
They sign.
As they take the suitcase and walk out of Ballmer's office, they hear an evil laugh behind them... muahaha. They turn to see that Ballmer has grown to twice his size, sprouting ram horns from his forehead. "You signed it in blood," he bellows. "Your soul is mine!!!!"
But hey, $750 million can buy a heck of a good time while you're still alive.
- Greg
Start a happiness pandemic
Microsoft finally learns the same hard truth we've all learned: once you've touched RealPlayer, THEY NEVER GO AWAY.
I know nothing
I stopped using RealPlayer after the "G2" version came out (1998, I think?). Even then, it was becoming bloated crapware. Just what I want is for Microsoft, how ever evil they may be, to be FORCED to include that crapware with Windows. OS X includes iTunes, and nobody complains about that. Most Linux distros include XMMS, and nobody cries.
RealNetworks has done more damage to themselves than anyone else could, through the overpromotion of unstable software, with annoying ads, and 192352398235 different taskbar crapplets that nobody wants. After most streaming sources went to either streaming MP3 or WMA, Real pretty much died. They lost a market they created due to poor management and bad software. Nobody cares about them anymore, and frankly, I wish they'd just get bought or disappear alltogether.
Note to mods: please only select the "-1 Flamebait" box if you REALLY think I'm flaming. Personally, I don't think I am, but it's up to you.
I don't know who to hate most Real or MS. Why can't we lobby for a new law that allows for both parties to lose.
I used to have a better sig but it broke.
If I speed down the road, but not too bad I get a fine.
If I speed down the road going too fast, I have to go to court, potential of jail time, fines, etc.
If I continue to do these things over and over again, I'm labeled as a habitual offender and have other court fun to go through.
Microsoft on the other hand just has to keep doing what they are doing and paying fines and now doing "community service" by putting advertisements for a competitor on their websites (which I think is wrong).
Personally, I would prefer just to be in the fine department for my behavior. Where do I get these privileges?
http://jogin.com/weblog/archives/2004/02/29/real_o bnoxious
"Unfortunately, playing video streams is only a very small aspect of what Real Player does; Real Player, most prominently, is a small bastard with inferiority complex and delusions of grandeur, not too different from Napoleon. Although Real Player's task is simple and limited to a certain timeframe, Real Player defaults to running at all times, whether its limited functionality is needed or not, and claims a seat for itself in the throne commonly called the systray.
When you install Real Player, you can either choose an express install, or custom install. If you pick express install, Real Player simply installs itself with every option and feature turned on. If you choose the custom install, the process is a blend between an installer and a Pokemon-like game of gotta-uncheck-all-checkboxes."
couldn't have said it better
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
incompatible java technology? how the fuck did they manage that?
...by shipping a Microsoft created JVM that intentionally broke the java standard.
OS X comes with iTunes yet there is no foul play there...
All sorts of people go to school playgrounds and it isn't illegal for them, so convicted child molesters out on parole shouldn't have any trouble going there either.
Luckily, the laws say otherwise. Monopolies can't use their monopoly to create a new one. Apple sells computers and bundles an OS and a mouse and iTunes. They don't have a monopoly on any of those things. MS does have a monopoly on desktop OS's, thus they can't bundle new products with it. If they want to sell the media player as a separate product with financing segregated from Windows that is fine.
Thanks to the BBC using Real Player for it's streaming media I have Real Player installed, but also thanks to the license fee for the BBC I get Real Player sans everything else for free, so no ads, no other crappy software, just real player. Still not great, and I'd prefer something else, but it's better than download Real Player from real.com as the basic edition
Oh, GREAT. If there was one piece of software that I wanted to see starved off by Microsoft's monopoly, it was RealPlayer. I don't like how Windows Media Player 8/9/10 promotes DRM, installs a DRM service in every Windows XP computer (mspmspsv.exe), and may potentially install more DRMware at the driver or kernel level, but Real is no better. Their software is harder to install, and more bloated and cumbersome than Windows Media Player 9. Their software uses an even worse "web portal" interface than WMP, and performs worse in erratic stream playback than WMP. And their RealOne player is one of the most invasive pieces of software when installed. It's basically spyware and malware.
From what I've seen, support for streaming media is heading away from Real and toward Windows Media merely because all the computers with Windows XP preinstalled can play WM files already, as opposed to having to download and run the Real installer. The fact that many media sites already have to deal with enterprise MS software licensing may have something else to do with it. Despite being an ISO standard and natively streamable, MPEG 4 has been plagued by the codec mess (mostly Microsoft's fault) four years ago. There is no single "MPEG 4" codec; instead, there's Microsoft's MPEG 4, DivX, XviD, QuickTime, blah, blah, blah. Users are turned away due to the sheer number of codecs they have to download just to view one video. The newest "universal" MPEG format is still MPEG 2, and it doesn't get the compression that many people need to make video sizes or bandwidths palatable to the customers.
And so now, in the next version of Windows, we'll all have RealONE bundled in, but hopefully with less access violations and bluescreens than the program delivers now. And, hopefully, with a more consumer-friendly and less surreptitious frontend. I'd rather watch Microsoft choke Real to death with WMP; despite the DRM and Microsoft-coded bizarreness, Real's software is worse.
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
Real released a crappy product with a shady web site. I think it's a shame to capitalism that the better product will be funding the lessor product in this case.
Then perhaps MS should have competed on the quality of their product, instead of illegally bypassing competition and bundling their product with their monopoly. Your opinion is that WMP is better than Realplayer, but it is not up to you or MS to decide what product deserves to be purchased. It should be left to market forces to decide, based upon honest competition between the two products. Those market forces cannot act when a monopoly is used to "force" all users to pay for one option whether they want it or not.
However, I really think the EU made itself ridiculous by ordering Microsoft to ship an alternative version of Windows without the Media Player. Microsoft created that "Windows Reduced Media Edition" (a name that doesn't quite suggest you should buy it) and sold it at the same price (!) as Windows with the Media Player. Obviously they didn't do anything to generate demand for that particular version. So what's the point in all of that? It just became a matter of principle for some bEUrocrats.
Moreover, the EU Commission lacks a consistent strategy for the software market. On the one hand, they start those anti-trust proceedings and believe they make the market more competitive (which the "Windows Reduced Media Edition" obviously didn't). On the other hand, the EU Commission was a driving force behind that EU software patent directive. And now the EU Commission even wants to retry and legalize software patents in Europe as a side effect of a so-called "community patent regulation":
ZDNet UK: EC slipping software patents "through backdoor"
TheInquirer.net: EU attempts to intro software patents by the back door
That makes no sense to me. A bundling of Windows with the Media Player isn't even 1% as bad as patents on multimedia data formats. The bundling may affect market share over time and it may make consumers less likely to choose another software for playing digital media, but patents constitute monopolies from day one and potentially eliminate all choice.
"but it is not up to you or MS to decide what product deserves to be purchased."
Never has been. I have never purchased WMP, Winamp, or Real MP. No one's sales have been hurt by Microsoft's actions (by my actions at least).
RMP sales have been hurt for two reasons, 1) it is an inferior product, and 2) it has a very poor image.
Using your logic, the makers of TextPad should be able to sue Microsoft for including NotePad in their OS. But they don't. They produce a supirior product and compete with microsoft. Real had that same oppertunity. Produce a supirior, or hell, even similarly performing application, and they could have competed with Microsoft. Even if their product was as annoying as WMP 9 it still would have been popular just because so many people look for non-MS solutions. Instead they create a bloated resource whoring program that was grocely inferior to not just WMP, but pretty much every other streaming content viewer.
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
Well see MS was not declared a monopoly until court pronounced it as such. So what are companies supposed to do until then?
When you are at 69% market share something is legal and at 70% it is not? Even the courts or the laws cannot agree is what exactly a monopoly is. The entire concept of having a monopoly and abusing it is f'ed up. This is esp. true when competitors can do the same. The way I look at it, if Apple bundles iTunes with their OS, and MS competes with them, they should be allowed to do the same.
Of course the problem is how to protect companies like Real wants to compete with Apple and MS, on particular part of their OS. There are no good answers that treats everyone fairly.