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South Korea Fines Microsoft $32 Million
laffer1 writes "South Korea has fined Microsoft $32 million and ordered two new versions of Windows be made. The first version will be stripped of Windows Media Player and MSN IM software and the second must include links to competitors."
Here's $40 million. Keep the change.
Is it because their IM was tied to windows (tied in what way ,
networking protocol, hidden lockouts for non windows systems or
only ran on windows?) , or because they bundled this and media
player with windows?
Either way I can't help wondering if this is a good thing since
if Suse or Ubunto or some other linux dist suddenly becomes popular
overnight, will they get nailed for bundling 100s of apps with it?
Will a judge know (or care) of the difference between open source
and MS when it comes to bundling freeware in a distribution?
I wonder if Microsoft will be able to pay this...
If you say "here goes my karma" I will bite you!!!
Only old people sue Microsoft
"The other version must come with links to Web pages that allow consumers to download competing versions of such software,"
Microsoft will never go for this.
I don't know if there would be this level of complaining and problems with M$ if they innovated, did right by their customers, and honestly tried to put out a good product. M$ has become the GM of the software world. Sure they are big and have moeny for now but there are a lot of unhappy people with their product just waiting for a true viable alternative at the desktop to come along. So, when the Toyota of the desktop computing world finially is ready to step it up they will slowly be able to nick away at M$ and for similar management thinking as GM.
Evolution or ID?
...the Koreans are getting a happy ending for a change.
Jeeze, can't someone do something about this in a more serious manner? I mean come on, how many times are they sued and 'sanctioned' for not complying to anti-competitive laws etc. Its quite obvious suing isnt doing anything (come on, how much do they earn?) Someone do something that'll harm them! And jeeze, someone give the koreans an ubuntu disc or something *rolls eyes
ilovegeorgebush
2 Steps to profit and less complaining from the gallery...
1. Come up with completely open standards that are not controlled or licensed by you. Come up with these standards along with your peers in the industry, working together.
2. Build software apps and services to smoke the competition in these areas using these standards.
You have the money. And I would stop complaining cause I would ahve one dope system.
Evolution or ID?
It's a shame they didn't take a look at Europe and see just what a complete waste of time it all was. It's just dumb and retarded. These are programs that people want to use. If they're bothered enough about using something else, it's not difficult to do so. Pointless, just fucking pointless.
This just sounds like a rehash of the rather pointless European rulings. Can't MS just ship Windows XP N out there and be done with it?
Anyway, it's not like one can't stick alternative bits of software on top of what's already there. Having Windows Media Player installed doesn't stop you from using Winamp any more than having MSN Messenger stops you from using AIM.
Anyone want to join me in a lawsuit? I own an island off the coast of Tasmania and I am really tired of having to look at Windows Messenger and Media Player every time I turn on my PC. I think I will iniate a lawsuit and win. Just look at it as payment for all the innovation and competition that Microsoft has stifled in the programming world.
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
Whoever it is, forcing links to be placed to "sites that allow one to download competiting versions of such software" is ridiculous. This is basically forcing a business to advertise for its competitors - it makes no logical sense!
I wonder what these courts would do if Microsoft was to actually produce a version of Windows that contained absolutely no 'bundled' software that had a competitor in the market. Imagine a version of Windows with no notepad, wordpad, IE, Windows Explorer, Windows Media Player, screensaver, network browser, task manager, disk defragmenter, TCP stack, Instant Messenger, backup tool, cd player, email client, remote desktop, scripting tool, command prompt or shell.
Imagine an OEM having to supply alternatives to all of these things. Buying the replacements from third parties, or including crippled versions of full products, or using opensource alternatives where they exist. Imagine every OEM doing this, and choosing different products. Imagine sitting down infront of a computer and no longer having a guaranteed set of tools to work with - different browser, email client, file explorer etc.
Im not actually sure I like this but where does bundling end? Consumers expect a certain minimum level of capability in a computer these days, but what is acceptable and what isn't?
I'm more along the lines of not selling Windows in Korea. First, crazy pirated CDs. Then, enough gamers clamouring that they actually do need good Linux support. Then, game companies actually providing that support. Then I could finally say goodbye to XP forever and not look back.
Of course, the whole process could stop right after the pirated CDs, but I can dream.
make MS include optional software, perhaps on a second disk, with more important things like Firefox being the default browser on an out of the box install. CD 2 could have things like OpenOffice, or Free instant messengers.
i wish i was but oh well
This is more bad news. I dread the day when there will be 50 different versions of Windows out there. Some will have MP, some will have IM, some will have IE ... what's a developer to do? We will be forced to bundle all of these service-level applications with our installer. The poor user will end up with 5 different browsers, instant messengers, media players, constantly answering the "Firefox is not your default browser" questions. This type of decision, in my opinion, is very bad for the industry, and especially bad for the end users.
The more you regulate a company, the worse its products become.
The problem was once that these things came bundled with windows. That's not a problem anymore. The problem now is that the average person sees these apps as the primary app for that task. When they think email they don't think Eudora..they think Outlook. That's not going to change even if they unbundle things now and include links to competitors. The customer will simply say "Yeah...that's a link to realplayer, but where's windows media player?"
That battle has been lost. Instead of concentrating on unbundling, these governments should focus on breaking the perception that email means outlook, that web browsing means IE, etc. Bundling was a way to thrust these apps to the forefront and choke the competition. That's been done. Unbundling now will just make the customer go through extra steps to get the same software back again.
...But without a Korean translator.
Purple, because ice cream has no bones.
Let's think of competitor links that Microsoft should include..
:)
I'll start off..
http://www-306.ibm.com/software/os/warp/
Beware.. sales stop at December 23, 2005. So hurry!
The issue is not about the availability of the software so much as the awareness of alternatives and the opening of protocols.
Anyone who wants to open a WMV will just buy the bundled version, and people who take a political view against WMV will simply choose not to download the WMV.
If they'd bundled Starcraft instead of Messenger/Media Player there wouldn't be any problem.
http://twitter.com/onion2k
No, it doesn't say links to open source options...it says links to competitors.
If I'm Microsoft, I'm linking to crappy, expensive, third-party apps that look like crap. I'll satisfy the demands of the court and make people think that staying with my (media player/instant messenger/web browser) is by far the way to go.
Concerning RealPlayer, when it was suggested that Microsoft should add it to Windows, Microsoft said that people could easily download it, so bundling it with Windows was unnecessary and out of the question.
Now that WMP and Messenger are to be removed, suddenly downloading a media player is such a terrible handicap!
When it was suggested that Sun's JRE should be bundled with Windows, Microsoft asked why Sun should get a free ride on Windows, and was against adding third-party software to Windows.
The 'free ride' of bundling obviously does make a big difference. Just because Microsoft owns the operating system, this doesn't mean that it should be allowed to bundle whatever it likes.
What company is going to suffer as Microsoft has to bundle another product with Windows to entice people to upgrade? Maybe a PhotoShop clone is to be bundled with Vista's successor?
Linux/Open Source/Anti Microsoft News
I have trouble keeping up with all the various versions of Windows. We don't want more Windows, we want fewer!
Seriously, this Windows XP N edition is a complete waste of time, money (truism?!) and energy. If the organisations which have imposed these rulings on Microsoft want to have any real bite, then they must simply ban Microsoft products.
The key here is (I believe) that they don't want their legislation to have any "bite". They do this to satisfy pressure to be seen to be encouraging open markets and free trade while at the same time bowing to pressure from Microsoft.
And, $40M, what a joke. I bet MS never even has to pay it. They'll simply do a deal to ignore all those illegal copies of Windows + Office in South-Koreas government offices! Expect an announcement of a new multi-million Microsoft purchasing deal in the very near future.
return 0; }
Oh I don't think it's completely pointless. After all, the South Korean government just got $32 million US. Nothing to sneeze at.
The reason this isn't having any effect is because there's no real alternative to Windows. You've got Mac OS, which comes bundled with expensive hardware. And you have Linux, which hasn't reached a worthy position in the desktop market to take on anyone. No matter how many times someone reports that the current year is the year of Linux, there's no indication that it will be the year of Linux. And there's no indication that Linux will gain a strong position in the desktop marketplace anytime soon.
So no matter how many lawsuits are brought against Microsoft, there's no real alternative for your average Joe.
I've been told by someone at Microsoft that "640K should be enough for anyone"
(yeah, yeah...I know...urban legend)
Karma: Excellent. 15 moderator points expire sometime.
I imagine the main reason they're opposed to the bundling of Messenger is that Windows Messenger can't actually be uninstalled in Windows (without command line or .bat work, anyway) and it launches itself automatically under various conditions.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
It wasn't even that much! (I'm easily confused!).
Jeez!
return 0; }
I wonder what these courts would do if Microsoft was to actually produce a version of Windows that contained absolutely no 'bundled' software that had a competitor in the market. Imagine a version of Windows with no notepad, wordpad, IE, Windows Explorer, Windows Media Player, screensaver, network browser, task manager, disk defragmenter, TCP stack, Instant Messenger, backup tool, cd player, email client, remote desktop, scripting tool, command prompt or shell.
This is not a problem of Microsoft bundling tools that anyone would consider basic fonctions a computer should have out of store.
This is a problem of:
- Many of Microsoft bundled tools can not be replaced/removed.
or
- Microsoft bundled tools are unable to properly operate with other alternate vendors tools by design.
Léa Gris
The fact is governments bitch, users don't. The wording of the article makes it sound like Microsoft can only offer the two new versions but if they were allowed to offer the old standard product (like the whole "Windows N" thing in Europe) users would still choose the base product over a stripped-down version, like they did in Europe. Governments might have some pie-in-the-sky ideals but users want bang for their buck. I might not use Media Player and/or MSN Messenger but like hell if I'm buying a crippled copy of Windows!
-everphilski-
"must include links to competitors"
It's cool if it means that Micro$oft will include links to Mplayer and Psi accordingly!
igor
What's next? Apple has to stop including iChat and Quicktime Player? Should Apple have to replace Safari with Firefox? As much as I hate Microsoft and their practices, they're not doing anything wrong by bundling these softwares. In Korea, only stupid people are for this.
I am going to sue GM and get them to make a car that doesn't come with their own branded CD playe, but does inlude product literature for Ford, Toyota, and Vauxhall cars in the glove compartment.
Any fool can talk, but it takes a wise man to listen.
Since Windows XP N is selling so well :\
Assuming open-source became the de facto and furthermore Ubuntu for some crazy reason became the monopoly, I don't how that could ever be seen as abuse of monopoly. In the case of Ubuntu or any other GNU/Linux distribution, most if not all code is licensed under the GPL. Not only that, but every distro I've ever used offered you the choice of multiple programs which fill the same niche.
Working in a DevOps shop is like playing in a band made up entirely of keytarists.
This ruling is meaningless in Korea, except to fulfil what others have said in this forum: free advertising for Redmond. In reality, Korea is rife with software piracy -- and I'm not talking about people downloading warez, as one can buy (for a fraction of the retail cost) just about anything on the street (and in "reputable" businesses). This problem costs Microsoft much more than the fine.
Another thing that has always bothered me with these settlements is that they seem to almost always arbitrarily favor the next 'x' largest companies. So they decided that this company is using it's monopoly powers in an evil way, so they...spread the evil around so that the 'almost monopoly' companies (Sometimes MORE evil IMHO) can get in on the action. i.e. Is the government willing to force Microsoft to put a link to download my new media player product on every Windows desktop?
" ... and the second must include links to competitors."
... after a while 'links to competitors' just pop up on your screen.
Isn't that a given if you use IExplorer? I mean
Tie two birds together: although they have four wings, they cannot fly. (The blind man)
Microsoft did a lot of things besides bundling that were anticompetitive, like demanding a Windows license fee for every PC sold, regardless of the OS, specifically targetting competitors to put them out of business, charging PC makers more if they dared to sell PC's with another OS, etc. It's this kind of crap that has gotten them (and us) into this fix we're in. We're all suffering because of their bad behavior.
The stupid government decision makers want to be careful how they phrase the judgement here. If I were Microsoft, purely out of spite for such stupid 'punishments' I'd be looking at a way to get away with doing the following:
p layer-v0.5alpha_downloado omessenger-v0.1beta_download
5 levels deep in the control panel have a "alternate applications list" menu item. This then opens a page with the following:
Download rubbish software made by people who have relations with goats here!!!
http://www.microsoft.com/thecompetition/real/real
http://www.microsoft.com/thecompetition/yahoo/yah
etc....
Well it does what it says - lets them download competing products from the opposition, and if MS did this they'd have my support. Punish an alleged abuse of the open market by further distorting the open market by forcing a company to actively promote their competitiors. Morons.
Seems like a cool thing to do. Maybe I should also send a letter to Microsoft, stating that I just fined them $40 million, and would they please transfer it to my bank account. Or rather, leave it in cash, small unmarked bills, in the third toilet booth of the restroom facilities of Sleazy Sam's.
A lot of people complain about the fact that politicians punish Microsoft for bundling software, and of course this is crazy - doesn't Microsoft have the right (and obligation) to give the end user a complete package so they can do all basic tasks with their computer right out of the box (In fact they already included software like Macromedia Flash with IE).
But what most people forget is that this is YOUR OWN FAULT. All computer geeks (that's you Slashdot crowd) have been complaining about unfair Microsoft for years now and this is where it will get you. Politicians never understand the heart of any case, they just hear a complaint, and when enough people complain they will take *some* action to save face, they do not care about the consequences of such an action... When there is compaining about unfair competition of Microsoft they will just make sure Microsoft can't bundle their usefull software with Windows. Finally the end user will pay the price, or worse - Microsoft/{insert any company here} will use the precedence of a case like this to get other companies to include their products.
Long story short: Well done, you got what's coming to you. Complaining to everyone (especially politicians) will NEVER get what you want nor expect.
I demand a new version of windows without the Start button. The word Start is monopilistic and I won't be forced to use it. They should be required to make an alternate version with a Go button.
If you don't want Windows buy a Mac or install Solaris/Lunix and get over it. Stop the stupid fines and lawsuits. I use quicktime on my Windows box and Media Player doesn't cause me any problems. I use trillian and MSN messenger doesn't cause me any problems. If you don't like the built in products fine install something else.
-Xen
I'm sure GM would have no problem with a ruling forcing them to include literature for Vauxhall cars in the glove compartment, considering they already do it!
http://vauxhall.co.uk/
Take a look at the bottom right corner:
Copyright © General Motors Corporation
Vauxhall is a division of GM, sold in Europe.
"City hall" in German is "Rathaus" Kinda explains a few things......
Simply put, the Apple market share is small, so there is less incentive for competitors to develop alternative products to Apple's own OS, media player, etc. Unlike Microsoft, Apple does not need to do anything to stymie or eliminate competition. Apple users are 'mostly' happy with what Apple themselves provide, so Apple putting the de facto software with the box is more of a convenience for the user than an attempt to pre-empt a competing product.
"Stop whining!" - Arnold, as Mr. Kimble
LMAO, nice analogy.
1.) Steal the underpants
2.) ???
3.) Profit
</southpark>
ilovegeorgebush
What would be really nice is for the EU/South Korea etc. to force Microsoft to remove IE out of the core of the OS and to produce an installer that gave you full control over which additional programs you wish to install. That way I could install Windows without having to install all the crap I don't use such as IE, Media Player, Outlook (not to mention the myriad crappy services etc. etc.)
Personally I have to use Windows on one machine as I use it to run Logic Audio and Sound Forge and it bugs the hell out of me that every time I have to reinstall the bloody OS, or use Windows update, it wants to install all these crappy Microsoft programs/services that I simply don't want.
Now that would be a useful court decision.
Sky subscribers are morons. They pay to be advertised at !
The issue is that Microsoft is using its monopoly on personal computer operating systems to attempt to monopolize the market on applications running on that same operating system.
Besides, the idea of going after, say, Ubuntu seems pretty silly. First, Ubuntu doesn't have monopoly status that it can abuse to take control of the applications market. Secondly, those application's don't really belong to Ubuntu in any meaningful sense other than that they can run on Ubuntu and they are included with the distribution.
So many of you seem to think that Microsoft having to advertise for another firm is a terrible thing, but this is exactly what happened with Real (a real pain in the a$$ if you ask me). Microsoft must pay for $301 Million dollars worth of advertising for Real... Either way, MSFT is out millions of dollars which although you may not think it's significant certainly adds up every year. MSFT having to pay hundreds of millions in the US, millions in the UK, and now millions in Asia, and rewriting code to be "compliant" will begin to have a real impact.
>>>Last I looked, Microsoft didn't stop other media players from running on Windows.
Maybe it is less about the player and more about the encrypted wmv format that is intentionally incompatible with FOSS.
The government which is strong enough to protect you from everything is strong enough to take everything from you.
The EU's anti-trust settlement with MS included having MS offer a Windows version without the media player bundled. MS complied. The problem, from the EU's point of view, is that no one is buying the unbundled version. Users want the media player and they want it bundled.
This mirrors a lot what we have found out within the company I work for. When given the choice, 90% of our users simply do not want to get rid of Windows, Office, or the media player.
This could all be fixed if they used Linux,. plus they'd save a crapload of money.
People don't want stripped out versions, especially for something like a media player and IMing app. If people want to use other products, they're more than free to do so.
Also, most people get their computers pre-built, which almost always already include alternate products (like AOL [yikes!]). Those that build systems and install Windows on their own presumably would already know about the other products and know how to install them.
I suppose that leaves systems put together by small shops, though I'd assume the number of those would be quite small.
If Korea really wanted to rid the country of a software "Monopoly" (I don't hold the view that MS is a mononopoly, not when there are free alternatives), they'd force companies like Dell to sell computers with Linux built pre-installed.
-Just my 2c
Download free e-books, lectures, and tutorials at bookgoldmine.com
The reason isn't having any effect has nothing to do with there being an alternative to Windows. It's because all they're doing is forcing Microsoft to release a product that there is no demand for. Of course nobody is going to buy a product that is just like the regular one but with features that were already optional removed. And a version with links to competitors? That sounds more like a joke than anything else, but whatever..
Feel free to mod me "-1 - Angry Jerk".
The anology would be be less totally wrong if GM was required to include the names and addresses for other CD player manufacturers in the glove compartment rather than literature for other car makers. GM would also still be able to give away "free" CD players, they just couldn't come factory installed. The issue that hasn't been covered is whether GM would be allowed to provide an "incentive" to dealers that required them to install the "free" GM CD players in all cars sold by the dealer.
Nothing forces them to put links to open source options, as far as I understand it, that is. They could get away with just putting links to winamp and real player as competing media players, and yahoo messenger and ICQ for IM programs.
It looks like a joke, because one cant think of punishing someone just for bundling free s/w with the main product. But.... Those who know how difficult it is to remove MP and MSN messenger will agree with the judge. Last time when I tried to remove MP from a freshly installed win2k server ( as it was being used in a super secure app), the mplayer.exe file kept on regenerating, as if by magic. The messenger is also difficult to get rid of, especially for those who dont know regedit or cmd (covers 90% of win users). Order to create links for other products looks even funnier, but I think its just to humiliate MS or to teach them a lesson. Clearly the judge treated MS as a naughty kid.
God created man in his own image, but somehow he evolved into a hairless monkey.
If Christmas sales move iPods even closer to giving them a monopoly, then the shoe will be on the other foot...
It seems to me that Microsoft is trying to create an "All in one" operating system. A bundle of software that is "all you need" when setting up a new PC. Most PC manufacturers include other options. Musicmatch, AOL IM, Quicktime, etc. These things come pre-installed on many systems. That is how it should be. A PC manufacturer installs the customer's chosen OS. The manufacturer then adds-in software bundles such as AOL, Musicmatch, Apple's iTunes and Quicktime, and the consumer now has alternatives on their system. If the PC manufacturer had not chosen to add the additional bundles, the consumer would have to locate additional software for himself. Where is it Microsoft's duty to supply alternatives? Doesn't the burden lay squarely on the consumer? If Microsoft blocked mention of competing products, or went out of their way to make sure they did not work on a Microsoft OS, then I could see a real problem, but as it is, they are getting fined for bundling free software with their OS? I don't like the idea of having to strip a product to its core to sell it. I like having additional "selling points" bundled in. As a consumer, I choose not to use WM9 as my default video player. That was the choice I made and it took only minutes after initial setup to download and install my preferred player. The install was not hindered in any way by Microsoft, nor did I feel pressured to use WM9 at any point. It is up to the consumer to find their own alternatives. Forcing that product's competitor to do so is beyond reasonable.
I'd love to, but I run Linux.
Linux/Open Source/Anti Microsoft News
I can understand the lawsuits against MS for anti-competative acts such as forcing a computer producer to only use MS products...or to not allow a company access to the necessary data so they can make a competative product for windows. (i.e. a competative browser).
Maybe China should fine MS for bundeling "ipconfig" with windows. Better yet, they should fine MS for bundeling "notepad" with windows. This sueing for bundling crap is retarded. All that will happen is companies selling stripped down software, for the same price as non-stripped software and then the customer has to buy the add-ons. So now if I want notepad with my windows (which I do), I have to pay an additional $49.99
These guys need to stop being stupid. The competitors need to just make a product that is better then the bundeled software.
And 32 million? is the emperor of china trying to get a bigger bonus this year? At how much MS makes in two weeks (last i heard it was 250 million every two weeks) - this is not much of a slap in the face. Can MS fine China for all the hacking that goes on in there?
I mod down so you can mod up. Your welcome.
>Users want the media player and they want it bundled.
....
I'm pretty sure that they would like photoshop bundled as well, what's your point? If they cost the same, naturally anyone will choose the most for his money.
The problem is not the software, the problem is monopoly: Since microsoft has 95% of the desktop market, bundling media player with windows is, apparently, illegal. There are laws about such things, it's not a decision based on user surveys
Washington bullets will simply be known as the "Bulle
This isn't like NASCAR where everyone is supposed to have the same strictly-laid-out set of guidelines.
Proprietary software products can give an edge that can generate earnings to make customers and shareholders happy. That's the purpose of a corporation.
This Korean ruling is like telling Ford Motor Company that their Shelby line of cars MUST have little rubber magnets with pictures of alternative sports cars affixed to their dashboards.
Cogito Ergo Sum
Microsoft being punished? Getting free publicity? Yes, that's pretty severe all right.
So what if Windows Messenger comes bundled? You don't have to use it! You can open your favorite web-browser (or IE, since that too comes bundled with Windows!) and download AIM or Yahoo! IM or IRC or whatever your favorite program is, and run that instead. Microsoft has not made it impossible for you to make other choices; they simply hand you their messaging software and say "here it is if you want it." The don't block links to the others, they don't make it so Windows will not install them, and they certainly don't launch DDoS against their competitors when you try to download them.
This is just the same argument that fanatical groups against violence on TV and pornography use. They seem to think there's someone with a gun to my head making me do things that are bad for me. They're not! I have a choice. And if I don't want to watch something, I can turn the TV off. Same principle applies here.
GetOuttaMySpace - The Anti-Social Network
"Does GM get sued because it puts a GM-developed air conditioner in its cars, not giving you the *choice* of other competitors?"
Depends: does GM insist that every one of their cars be sold with a GM-branded a/c whether the customer wants one or not? Does GM insist that the a/c is an integral part of the car and the car simply will not run without an a/c? Is the a/c left running even in the dead of winter? Does GM threaten to stop dealing with dealerships that allow customers to remove the GM a/c and/or put in an a/c from a different manufacturer? Will GM threaten to take your car away if you open the hood and try to figure out how to disable the a/c?
"Poor MS, getting immolated yet again for being successful."
Yeah, I know. Mussolini got the trains running on time and look what they did to him!
Nobody here questions that Microsoft is successful. The question is exactly what Microsoft is successful at. The government punishes lots of "successful" people: successful murderers, successful bank robbers, etc.
People are looking at this in the wrong way.
Microsoft is not offering its apps for no profit when it exclusively bundles them with Windows.
Bundling has more of a purpose than giving nice free things to end users, and making it easier for them.
Microsoft adds new middleware for various reasons:
1) To encourage end-users to upgrade.
2) To make its applications become standard on Windows Desktops.
3) To enforce Microsoft's proprietary file formats/protocols.
4) To gain dominance (i.e. Netscape)
Note: with Netscape Microsoft could have sold IE at a profit, but ignored this lucrative market in favor of dominance and full control of what is supported. Microsoft added its own JRE instead of Suns, and Microsoft polluted this to cripple platform-dependance.
Linux/Open Source/Anti Microsoft News
... lawsuit to keep MS from bundling Notepad.exe. People need a choice, MS is forcing the world to use Notepad.exe!
And so it begins. Others will follow in the suit. I do feel somewhat sorry, though, because it is MS software and they can do what they please. Company's need to contribute more to the OS market.
[%] Cingular Ringtones
One of the problems with bundling 3rd party apps is support. Right now, if someone buys a copy of XP and has a problem with windows media player, they can call MS, and might get it fixed (MS support has been quite helpful for me in the past, but who knows). With 3rd party apps people are going to call MS, MS is going to tell them it is a problem with real player (and to call them), real player is going to tell them it is a problem with windows and to call MS, and users hate this shit. Companies always want to load off their problems onto another company. People are also going to see these 3rd party apps as "windows software" regardless if they are 3rd party, and you never know what the support for these companies is going to be down the road. If these 3rd parties end up with shit support, it is just going to make MS look bad. The issue is control, and with bundling of 3rd party apps, MS loses control over support. Heck, I used to consider realplayer spyware, and I'd hate to have it bundled if I pay for an OS. As a user, I expect my OS to come with a media player. I may not use WMP (I prefer j.river), but it should come with that functionality. The only issue I see is they should make it easier to remove (permanently) messenger and media player. (Are distributers like DELL and HP not allowed to [or foreced by MS not to] bundle 3rd party apps? I remember last time I bought a compaq it came with a bunch of useless crap bundled, like musticmatch demos). Linux doesn't have this problem because the free distros don't have mainstream support. Sure, they have forums and IRC, but for the non-tech this can be intimidating. Grandma can't just call up Ubuntu (actually, she can, for a nominal fee of $100, but few people are going to pay this for tech support that may or may not help).
Whoops, sorry about that. Correct formatting below:
One of the problems with bundling 3rd party apps is support. Right now, if someone buys a copy of XP and has a problem with windows media player, they can call MS, and might get it fixed (MS support has been quite helpful for me in the past, but who knows).
With 3rd party apps people are going to call MS, MS is going to tell them it is a problem with real player (and to call them), real player is going to tell them it is a problem with windows and to call MS, and users hate this shit. Companies always want to load off their problems onto another company.
People are also going to see these 3rd party apps as "windows software" regardless if they are 3rd party, and you never know what the support for these companies is going to be down the road. If these 3rd parties end up with shit support, it is just going to make MS look bad. The issue is control, and with bundling of 3rd party apps, MS loses control over support. Heck, I used to consider realplayer spyware, and I'd hate to have it bundled if I pay for an OS.
As a user, I expect my OS to come with a media player. I may not use WMP (I prefer j.river), but it should come with that functionality.
The only issue I see is they should make it easier to remove (permanently) messenger and media player. (Are distributers like DELL and HP not allowed to [or foreced by MS not to] bundle 3rd party apps? I remember last time I bought a compaq it came with a bunch of useless crap bundled, like musticmatch demos).
Linux doesn't have this problem because the free distros don't have mainstream support. Sure, they have forums and IRC, but for the non-tech this can be intimidating. Grandma can't just call up Ubuntu (actually, she can, for a nominal fee of $100, but few people are going to pay this for tech support that may or may not help).
he Apple market share is small, so there is less incentive for competitors to develop alternative products to Apple's own OS, media player, etc. Unlike Microsoft, Apple does not need to do anything to stymie or eliminate competition.
What about the Konfabulator/Dashboard story?
I fine Microsoft $10.000... no lets make it $13.320!
Why don't sheep shrink when it rains?
Remember that MS is being punished by monopoly abuse. When a single distro gets 90+% of the OS market, you can start asking that question. And, by then, the answer will be: Yes, that distro shoud get nailed and oblied to bundle extra software any time that is hurts someone.
But wait... You can bundle extra software with any distro you want! I forgot, I am comparing apples with oranges here...
Rethinking email
I mean, this is rediculous, governments forcing companies to amend their products.
I am getting tired of the constand MS bashing. They are trying to create a product that is easy to use, and has all the features users need in today's OS. Security, media playback, and email/messaging are all features most users want in an OS. Most of MS's competitors don't offer as easy to use or feature rich products as MS has in the box, but even then, there are countless free and retail products that compete against MS OS features, all people have to do is look for them. This whole idea that customers are being tied down and forced to use MS products is rediculous and unfounded. MS has always supported competition, it IS and OS where you can install whatever software you like.
I am also tired of the double standard against MS. Apple installs iChat, iTunes, iPhoto, iMac, iDVD, Safari, Front Row, and a slew of other built-in features. Why isn't Apple being targeted by the EU and South Korea as well for anti-competitive behaviour. In the OSX market, few users are generally looking for solutions outside the many Apple offers pre-installed on every Mac computer, Apple at least has the benefit of creating OS add-ins that people want. Look at Linux and the fact countless gigabytes of GNU shareware is installed automatically by most distributions. It is actually confusing and difficult NOT to install a slew of utilities through most Linux installs.
I don't understand why MS simply doesn't tell the EU and South Korea to F*ck off. I mean, MS should at least make them aware that other competitor products like OSX and Linux don't have the same restrictions, and that if they insist on suing MS, then ALL OS'es sold in South Korea or the EU should have NO built-in functionality other then a file system.
In any regard, make a product that excels past what MS build into their OS, and people will get it and install it, government forcing consumers to buy a product devoid of features imposes on the rights of consumers to make their own choice about the products they can and can't buy.
Governments should keep their noses out of it.
I haven't thought of anything clever to put here, but then again most of you haven't either.
... when they're being committed by non-Korean companies, that is.
If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.
But can someone **concisely** summarize for me why WMP and MSN's IM client coming preinstalled is different from Apple pre-loading all their stuff (Quicktime, iLife, iTunes, etc).
Apple is not a monopoly, MS is.
Bundling is not illegal. Bundling a product with a monopolized product is illegal. If I sell cars, nothing makes it illegal for me to include a free lifetime supply of cheese with every car. My customers are free to choose between my car and cheese bundle and my competitor's car or cheese or car and cheese bundle. If, however, I have a monopoly on car sales, then everyone who wants to drive is forced to buy a car from me. Then, it is illegal for me to bundle cheese with them, because it is unfair to the companies that sell cheese and to consumers. Since they are forced to buy cars only from me, they are also forced to buy cheese from me. Cheese sellers go out of business and soon I have a second monopoly. Worse yet, the cheese industry suffers, since I don't have to compete on quality or innovation, since my customers have no choice. Soon the quality of cheese in general is worse and customers have to pay more and I can move on to establish yet a third monopoly by bundling something else, except this time anyone who wants either a car or cheese is forced to buy some other product.
Apple bundles not only an OS and applications, but also hardware and services. It does not matter, because they don't have a monopoly on any of those things. MS does have a monopoly on consumer OS's, thus they are banned from bundling. They know it as well as anyone else and their business model is built upon the belief that the punishments for breaking the law will not be greater than the profit they make doing so. So far they have been correct due to the very slow nature of the courts, their huge legal team, and the influence they have in governments due to excessive lobbying.
I'd simply stick two fingers up at the South Korean government and dare them to pull Windows from the shelves. While most /. readers would feel this is a good thing, could you imagine the uproar from business and government when they discover that they can no longer install MS software on their machines?
Reality is, it's not going to hurt MS at all.
PocketGamer.org - For the gamer on the go!
... on installation of Windows XP: Korean edition I'd pop up a message that said "The functionality of the operating system you just purchased has been crippled on the orders of the Korean legal system. You are still allowed to freely upgrade to a non-crippled version of the operating system by clicking the link placed on your desktop entitled 'Completing Installation' and following the onscreen instructions, or by clicking on the web link entitled 'How To Replicate the Full Functionality of A Western Windows Installation Using Third Party Software To Fill Holes Mandated By the Legal System'. We apologize for the inconvinence."
Help poke pirates in the eyepatch, arr.
The reason this isn't having any effect is because there's no real alternative to Windows.
None of the courts, thus far, have made any punishments even designed to break up MS's OS monopoly. If the courts wanted to fix the problem of an abusive OS monopoly, they could certainly do so. It is easy, split the company in five parts (just like they did with AT&T). MS service, MS OS 1, MS OS 2, MS Applications 1, MS Applications 2. Both OS companies have equal rights to all the source code developed to date as well as half the dev team. They are forbidden from colluding with any other MS company and watched by an oversight group. Both applications companies have equal rights to the source to the applications yada yada. Poof! Instant competition.
All the rulings so far have been weak attempts at keeping MS from extending their monopoly into other areas such as media distribution, instant messaging, internet services, etc. That is all well and good, but just not enough when dealing with a company whose business model is built upon breaking the law and assuming the fines and settlements will be smaller than the profits.
No matter how many times someone reports that the current year is the year of Linux, there's no indication that it will be the year of Linux. And there's no indication that Linux will gain a strong position in the desktop marketplace anytime soon.
That is because the courts have never addressed MS's OS monopoly and done nothing about its anti-competative contracts that exclude competition on pre-installed OEM machines. Linux could compete just fine if it was purchasable, pre-installed on computers in the stores, and retailers would like to sell that way, but are forbidden from so doing because of MS's differential pricing that allows them to immediately crush any vendor that sells computers that way.
So no matter how many lawsuits are brought against Microsoft, there's no real alternative for your average Joe.
Well, it funnels some money away from MS to hopefully better causes and raises the price of Windows, which hopefully opens more of a market for low-end competition. Also, just because no government has implemented an effective solution against MS does not mean it can't be done. It certainly can be done. If MS OS company 1 and MS OS company 2 both have to renegotiate with Dell, do you think Dell will accept the same prices/features? Hell no, they will go with whichever company gives them the better price/feature set. This would drive both companies to have to try to sell cheaper and/or with more features the end user wants. It also ends MS's power over the OEM manufacturers. MS OS company 1 can't threaten to raise prices if Dell sells Linux since Dell can just buy a similar product from MS OS company 2, thus it opens the floor to competition from Linux and any other OS. Competition is good for consumers and the industry, if only the courts would actually enforce the bloody law, things could be better for the average Joe, as you put it.
Please note, I am not in any way complaining about this particular remedy. South Korea knows US politicians would make life difficult if they tried to actually fix the problem with such a large, influential US company. The first judge who ruled in the US ordered them split up, but a lot of bribes, err lobbying, changed that in a hurry. I blame the corrupt US government that no longer answers to the people.
Over the weekend I parked my car next to a shady-looking minivan at the supermarket. I thought I locked the door, but ever since it's been driving itself around constantly, flyering windshields across the neighborhood with V14GRA ads and DDOS-ing the handicapped spaces...
it's a blue bright blue Saturday hey hey
I think your analogy is off by one level. MS isn't the manufacturer, MS is a supplier
So they don't write Window is what you are saying?
Writing the system IS manufacturing. burning and packaging is just a later step in the manufacturing process.
we'd all be better off if MS just took their ball and went home. but then what would the minions use?
I doubt they'll ask for a specific app - they'll more likely ask - "how do I play my music files and do that contacting people instantly thingy?" at which point their helpful techie/support person will tell them how to download and install one (of a range) or how to install one of the bundled (but NOT installed) ones.
Ok.. this has nothing to do with pro/anti MS tactics but doesn't it feel like lots of companies/countries are just using MS as an easy money grab?
Nobody complains about this because everybody seems to agree that packing in stuff in Windows is bad... but shouldn't countries do something about it instead of just grabbing some easy money??? Put their money where their mouth is?
Oh shit, you mean to tell me that there was an alternative to Unix this whole time?!
:D
Omg omg, where do I go about getting this Windows thing of yours?
[/joke]
- shazow
Make Microsoft ship Windows with an option to install Linux.
They have about $40 billion in cash. $40bil @ $1mil per day = approx 40,000 days. Or 109 years.
And just for comparison, $40bil IN THE BANK - Cash - is a HUGE amount. Even when comparing with the likes of Exxon, Wal-Mart, etc. As far as I know, it has the largest coffers of any (publicly traded) company. By a lot.
There are some large private companies where we have no idea how much cash they have. Koch Industries comes to mind. Cargill too.
Notepad and the inbuilt calculator have no competitors that I know of. The lack of complaint isn't because they're "crummy" products (although they are pretty unimpressive in functionality), but because there's no perception that innovation that could've been provided by a competitor is being stifled.
My recollection is that the bundling of IE with Windows was viewed as a problem by many people from the very first moment it was announced. I don't know about WMP. I do know that people are very upset about the existence of MS' "open" XML format for Office 12 and its attempt to leverage the MS Office monopoly at the expense of ODF, regardless of any alleged superiority or inferiority of the MS XML format.
Bundling an app that's so inferior that there's no way that a person would prefer it over the competition, or so simple in functionality that there's no reason to seek a better replacement, isn't such a bad thing because it doesn't annihilate competitor products. Bundling one that's as good or almost as good is a bad thing because it does.
Microsoft should go ahead and sell the new version for $0.02 less than the full version. Nobody would buy it, and they would still be in compliance.
Pay the fine... Make the new versions of windows... Make sure said versions of windows can't launch starcraft or warcraft 3.... Said versions of windows never get installed once anywhere in Korea... As a side note.... did the Korean government not notice how well removing media player helped things in the EU?
"and the second must include links to competitors." How many competitors would they have to include then? all of them?
My biggest complaint is all the DRM'd porn. Whenever I try to DL some new autoerotic pleasure material, I end up with half of it redirecting me to license sites. If Windows Media Player weren't so popular, all of us single geeks wouldn't waste so much lube warming up just to see the 'acquiring license' message.
But no one complains as long as the product is crummy. When the product is a real competitor, then they complain.
You're mistaken. IE is crummy and people complain very vocally about it. You're also confusing consumer complaints with legal action. For legal action there needs to be demonstrable damage (losing market share). No one sued over the calculator program because there was no calculator program market (defined by dollars exchanged). There was a media player market, an browser market, and a chat market, most of which was ad supported.
Personally I complain more when MS bundles a crappy product than a good one because I want to use a good product and when MS steals a huge chunk of the market with a crappy one competitors (not really competitors since bundling nullifies competition) are forced to raise prices to stay profitable or they go away and I end up having to make due with an old version of a good product or a crappy alternative from MS.
Only for webapps. And even then it's not necessarily going to be cross-browser, depending on what you're doing with it.
Stick to standards compliant browsers. That gets you something that works on firefox and safari. You can even distribute a custom XUL app as a front end. That gets you around the browser issue neatly.
You don't write cross-platform applications by making a web site.
You better tell these folks.
And these
And then there are this lot
And then there's a little known crowd called Google. GMail and Google maps are both ajax based.
Oh, and you don't need a web site, just a locally running back end that uses http over the port of your choice. It's no worse than running a database where the DBMS runs in its own process or thead.
Java applications still suck, even on modern systems with scads of RAM.
"Appeal To Suckage". Isn't that a logical fallacy?
Functionality you get for free with native applications is either missing or doesn't behave properly.
I belive that's called "writing buggy software". Its not java's fault if you can't use it correctly. It's not my favourite language either, but I don't blame the language if my programs don't work.
As a developer, when my choice is between "Application for one platform that works beautifully on one platform" and "Application for all platforms that falls short on all of them," I know what my choice will be.
So? No one is going to force you to write cross platform apps. Just because it may increasingly yeild market advantage, that doesn't make it compulsory.
You DID have a better argument here than "I like what I like and everything else sucks" didn't you?
You probably mean C# here... "dotNet" is an incredibly nebulous term,
Um... no. dotNet (or more properly .NET) refers to MS answer to Java. More
specifically to the CIL and the .NET runtime. There are a dozen or so
langauges that can generate executables for the dotNet runtime. C#, granted,
but also C++, Java, VB.NET... even Perl.
If you want to see how elegant cross-platform can be and has been for years, open up Notepad, MSN Messenger, Word, and Internet Explorer. There's not a UI commonality between the lot of them. Notepad is still stuck in the 80s. But they're all supposedly part of the same system.
So you're saying that because MS can't keep a consistent look and feel across multiple apps on a single platform, it therefore follows that no-onecan keep a consistent look-and-feel for a single app across multiple platforms?
What were you saying about crack pipes?
Do you really want every application on your system to be that divergent in terms of UI? That's invariably what happens.
Counter examples: gmail, gaim, firefox.
Don't let THEM immanentize the Eschaton!
How many sites with streaming media now give you the choice of WMP, or nothing?
How many sites with streaming media can be played at all while commuting such as in a carpool, bus, or train? Apple's model leans more toward DRM purchases and podcasts, which work well on its portable music players.
...so, how do I remove it from my windows install?...
The real issue here is (and I haven't read any post that have said this) that you cannot fully remove MSN messenger from a Windows install (similar to how you cannot fully remove IE). The Messenger performs other tasks, which to me, seem only assigned to MSN Messenger so that it is vital to the windows package. Now, I've never tried to remove WMP (because, it's actually not a terrible app, though I still prefer VLC), but I assume that it is very difficult to remove it in full.
The difference in my eyes, is that when a Linux distro bundles in software, they don't treat it any differently than if you had installed it yourself. MSN Messenger and WMP are "Windows Components" (straight from the horse's mouth, see the "Add/Remove Programs" Dialog and click "Add/Remove Windows Components"). Also, MSN Mess [no joke here, just lazy], for example, cannot, to my knowledge, be removed in full. I see this as a massive difference than just "bundled software." This software is entrenched in the Windows Install.
while(++€euro){ --$dollar; }
I'm still trying to figure out what people mean by 'social skills' here.
*grins* Your second analogy is exactly what people what microsoft don't allow (or didn't before getting their predatory asses hauled through court) - OEMs having Real / Quicktime / etc media players installed instead of Media Player.
Bzzzt!! Wrong! HP bundles iTunes and QT as the default media players. Dell bundles the horrible "Dell Media Experience" app as the default CD and DVD player. And I know that another OEM bundles RealPlayer. It's true that Microsoft doesn't allow OEMs to remove WMP, but users don't want them to (witness the utter failure of XP sans WMP in Europe). As long as OEMs can bundle other players as the default players, what's the problem?
-- "I never gave these stories much credence." - HAL 9000
Computer systems are scary, complicated, cumbersome devices compared to devices of the past.
In fact I believe any company that grows to be a monopoly, in a capitalist system, will act this way. But we sit back and passively create these monopolies and ask for it to be 'put right' after the fact.
Now I can see the advantage in moving to one telco, or moving to one hardware standard, or moving to one operating system (all monopolies that had to be broken), but I don't see why the sheep are all out buying (specifically) iPods (rather than MP3 Players) this Christmas...
Of all the comments I've read on this thread, I see a great many complaining that MS is getting unfairly chided for bundling software. I've even seen a thread about Linux distros "doing the same thing". Has everyone lost the capacity for rational analysis?
MS is not being sued over "bundling" software; that is, they have not run afoul of the law for including applications with Windows. They are being sued because the applications they include are impossible to uninstall without damaging your system, and MS is losing because that technique is anticompetitive.
If a user cannot replace the included software (like WMP and IE, for example) with competitive software, then MS is being anti-competitive. Sure, you can install Firefox and RealPlayer if you want, but you can't safely and reasonably get rid of WMP and IE. Attempting to do so without great care and a reasonable level of technical knowledge is likely to damage the OS. That behavior is unacceptable, and MS is finally being taken to task for it.
Linux distros already allow you to easily replace software with competing software wihout causing damage, so that comparison is simply insane.
All that said, I would agree that a better ruling would have been "change Windows so that you can uninstall stuff that's not core to the OS without breaking things". However, I think "make a version of Windows that doesn't have these things" is a reasonable compromise, and is actually better for MS than it could have been.
We may not imagine how our lives could be more frustrating and complex—but Congress can. – Cullen Hightower
I'm curious, what Google software bundles VLC? Isn't VLS technically "illegal" since the devs don't pay for the various codec licenses. Those who hold the codec licenses (the various MPEG orgs, MSFT, Apple, Real, etc) haven't done anything against VLC (for practical reasons), but I'd be surprised if Google bundled software that could play MPEG2 (for example) without paying for the MPEG2 license. (Hell, Apple makes you pay $10 to get QuickTime player to play MPEG2, and MSFT makes you pay a third party for an MPEG2 codec for WMP).
Secondly, if Google becomes a monopoly in its field (which it definitely is striving for), would you support them bundling a particular media player, making it harder for others to compete?
-- "I never gave these stories much credence." - HAL 9000
That would balance the nonsense with copyright extensions. A bit.
Nice to see MS still doesn't own everyone
Don't you get it dear boy? Then I will shout. MICROSOFT IS AN ABUSIVE MONOPOLIST, wheras Apple is not (and make some nice computers too).
Apple abused its PPC OS monopoly to systematically destroy the Mac clone market in the late 90's; a more blatant example of monopoly abuse than anything Microsoft has ever done.
-- "I never gave these stories much credence." - HAL 9000
I don't see how the bundled software is anticompetitive. IE never stopped me from using Firefox. WMP never stopped me from using VLC. Windows Messenger never stopped me from using Trillian. Even if MS bundled Virtual PC with Windows I would still use VMWare. There is nothing in the OS preventing anyone from running a competitor's product, Furthermore, all this software can be uninstalled or replaced fairly easily. Finally, why should any company be forced to advertise for their competitors. This is completely silly.
I think the "all publicity is good publicity" only holds true for fairly obscure products. Everyone knows what Windows is, so I don't think MS has anything to benefit from bad publicity.
The whole "microsoft is a monopoly" argument is so absurd because we aren't even talking about a scarcity of resources. If I owned 95% of the world's oil reserves, then I would truly have a monopoly because there is only so much oil to be had. But software has no such resource limitations. Anyone with a computer and a web server CAN produce an unlimited number of competing operating systems and package them with whatever software they like...oh wait, hundreds of company's already do this. Microsoft's Windows does NOT have a monopoly. It is impossible to have a monopoly with software when there are free, viable and unlimited supplies of alternatives available.
With regard to the real definition, fist of all, Microsoft doesn't have exclusive control over the production of perating systems (there are hundreds of alternatives, many of which are free), and secondly, Microsoft does not control the means of production (as millions of people are capable of writing and distributing operating systems). It seems that the politicians and judges that went after Microsoft and labelled them a "monopoly" were more influenced by politics and lobbyists that the actual definition of a monopoly. You also have clearly become enamoured with the spurious use of the word as it suits your ideology to ignore facts.In addition to these facts, the operating system market is not a zero sum game. Because an OS is simply a piece of software, anyone is free to install multiple OS's on their hardrives to maximize their choices. Indeed, I have 3 Operating systems on the machine I'm typing on right now (Windows XP, Ubuntu Breezy, and FreeBSD). It is litterally impossible at this point in the game to assert that Microsoft eliminates choice when there are hundreds of alternatives available for FREE right now! Even if it had 100% marketshare, their product is certainly not exclusive and they certainly don't have a stranglehold on the means of production.
Rhetoric never wins under scrutiny. You lose.
I think, therefore I doh.
Not create programs that rely on a particular operating system, but instead create programs that can be run on any OS? Whether it be Windows XP, Windows N, Mac OSX or Mandrake Linux.
Which would require even non-commercial developers of applications to own a computer running Windows XP and Windows XP N, a computer running Mac OS X, and a computer running Mandriva Linux, in order to customize the application for each operating system. Is this feasible financially for hobbyists who routinely get turned down for even minimum wage jobs?
If you don't want Windows buy a Mac or install Solaris/Lunix and get over it.
Where can a fellow buy a home desktop PC with Linux compatible hardware, with a Linux operating system pre-installed, with a warranty as strong as that of a national brand, and without having to already own a computer and subscribe to Internet access to order it?
What is the problem with Microsoft supplying WMP and MSN Messenger bundled with XP? Apple jams QuickTime and iChat down your throat with OS X, but they aren't being sued. WTF is the problem? If you don't like it, then don't buy it.
The very business of many companies is to survive on capitals and show increasing profits while doing it.
They've invented this shit called "compound interest."
However, congratulations on your life being so charmed that you have yet to realize that employees are expendable.
KFG
"The 'free ride' of bundling obviously does make a big difference. Just because Microsoft owns the operating system, this doesn't mean that it should be allowed to bundle whatever it likes."
Apart form the fact that you hate MS irrationally of course, why not?
As others have said (and you've probably ignored their wisdom too) bundling an app doesn't force anyone to use it.
Your assertion is just that, an assertion, with no basis in reality.
How pathetic are you that you follow me from topic to topic and waste all your mod points at once modding me down?
I doubt even the Koreans care about the $32 Million. Microsoft sure as hell doesn't and has proven it by paying off everyone that even looks like they might have a case against them. This is a lesson to Microsoft, a lesson in control. What the Koreans are teaching them is the same lesson that the EU started. "You will comply with our laws and how we judge you or we will make you do things that you don't want to do in order to continue doing business here." I believe that South Korea won't be the last country to impose this sort of lesson on Microsoft if for no other reason than they can make themselves more important to a company that has ignored the intent (if not the letter) of their laws. The best that Microsoft can do to really make amends is to bend over and shout "Thank you Sir, May I have another?". Once the beating is over its back to the normal corruption and graft.
The lesser of two evils is still evil...
This is retarded. If they make the OS then they can put whatever the hell they want on it. If people don't want to use the media player or IM then just freakin don't use it. MS should follow through with their threat to pull out of South Korea entirely.
As others have said (and you've probably ignored their wisdom too) bundling an app doesn't force anyone to use it.
I'm happy to agree that nobody is forced to use a bundled app. I see no point in ignoring the obvious truth.
What happens when you go to play an MP3 on Windows? Up pops Windows Media Player.
Are you forced to use it? No.
Are you given a choice to use something else? No.
What do you do? You use it.
Why not download RealPlayer or Winamp? Some people don't even know about these alternatives. Some can't be bothered downloading something else when the default is sufficient.
In fact, as long as the default is sufficient, nobody is likely to 'consider' downloading an alternative.
Furthermore, I would suggest reading my post here, concerning Microsoft's proprietary and patent-encumbered file formats, protocols and APIs.
So looking deeper into this, rather than skimming the surface, the issue of whether or not you're 'forced' to use Microsoft's bundled applications is irrelevant.
Linux/Open Source/Anti Microsoft News
Ok, before I get railed with comments; I do NOT know much about internation trade law, so feel free to enlighten me.
Let's look at IE as an example. IE has been part of Windows since Win95 whether we like it or not. I'm assuming that Windows made it to S. Korea by 1996ish, possibly 1997 at the latest. Obviously, these laws were created in Korea some time after 1996, but it takes them until 2005 to make a stand on it? US versus Microsoft started in 2000, which means that it was already being investigated in the late 1990s. Seems like a big gap IMHO
But here's the real kicker to me... Windows is a product made in the US. The 2000 antitrust case was one where a US company broke a US law. This situation is a US company being fined on a foreign law. How is that possible? Do they have jurisdiction to do such things? My feeling is that if the Korean Fair Trade Commission found a US product to be out of compliance with their rules *AFTER* they've already permitted the sale of it, they should just ban it, and inform Microsoft of why they've been banned. If Microsoft chooses then to create a Windows version that is compliant, then so be it. Otherwise; sorry Bill. Where do they inherit the jurisdiction to impose a fine?
To me, that's like the Korean government saying that they're going to impose a fine on GM for all Chevys that have seatbelts after the Korean Trade Commission cleard GM cars for sale in Korea. Regardless on how I feel about Microsuck Winblows, seems like a bad slippery slope to be travelling.
This message was posted using recycled electrons.
I think we should "ask" (or force?) OS maker (MS and other, but most Linux already doing what I am about to describe) to include an industry-standard package (presumably binary, but source can be available for techie whereever license allows) distribution tool. So when you install Windows, you have a choice of a list of software to install/uninstall/replace at will. These software includes both commericial/free. And Surely each software vendor can advertise the advantage (or even bash other equivalent software?) within the confine of this tool (so consumer only look at advertisement when they CHOOSE too). And software will be delivered over a the internet.
I suppose the bottom line is, I have no problem with MS if I have the choice of removing (not merely not using, even 1MB of software I don't desire is unacceptable in my computer) their software and replacing them with what I prefer. I used IE over netscape by choice because netscape was getting big and slow, and now I am using firefox by choice. My main IM client is MSN messenger partly because 70% of my friends are on it, and partly because I actually like it. I am testing out GAIM-WIN32 now, looking good so far...
The only possible interpretation of any research whatever in the 'social sciences' is: some do, some don't
and replace the 38th Parallel with Media Player.
The Admin and the Engineer
Windows Media Player 10 series is available for free download to all Windows users. MSN Messenger 7.5 is available for free download to all Windows users. Hmm, lets see, I can pay for Korean company A's crappy beta media player, or download a polished late version one for free? The point of this entire endevour, then? 32 million free dollars.
In South Korea, only old people throw chairs.
Apple OSX bundles Safari, iChat and Quicktime, but I don't see government forcing them to strip that software and post competing links. Safari, iChat and Quicktime are all free and made by Apple just like IE, MSN Messenger, and WMP is made by Microsoft. I don't see why you guys complain about Microsoft in this issue when all other operating systems do the same. It's not like Microsoft forbids other software to be installed or making it really hard.
Personally I think by providing these software gives the OS more worth, but many of you just tend to think it's anti-competition. Is it because Microsoft is easier to pick on? has more money to milk?
HD Trailers
"Furthermore, I would suggest reading my post here, concerning Microsoft's proprietary and patent-encumbered file formats, protocols and APIs." -- Me
The link is here.
I accidentally put in one that shows SCO's stock, as I was laughing at it at the time. Sorry.
Linux/Open Source/Anti Microsoft News
Where would companies like Real Networks, Sun, AOL etc be today if they couldn't suck at MS's antitrust teat. I'll bet there's a lot of companies out there that would love for MS to bundle a clone of their non-profitable product in Windows so they could get some of that unearned cash.
why will it be that Koreans and Europeans can buy the better version of Windows without Media Player but us poor Australians cannot? :(
Now I will probally get modded down for this but... I believe that it is a good thing that M$ gives these programs (IM & MPlayer) away for free (bundled) as long as they do not require OEMs to only use there apps. When I buy a PC with MS I expect it to natively support certain functions like web browsing and playing music and videos. I personally do not want to buy additional software to do these things. I look at it as more bang for my hard earned buck. If a competing product is far superior and has features that I want not found in MS version then I will buy/use it. If not why should I want to pay more money on top of what I already payed. As an example M$ has MS Search (pretty crappy) that is free, but I choose to use a far superior product namely Google.
...how South Korea gets to tell an American company what it has to do and what fines to pay. Does the US government get to order Hyundai (or SAP, or Virgin Atlantic, or...) to do this or that, and fine them and whatnot?
"A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy." --Theodore Roosevelt
IE was almost always bundled with Windows, IE didn't become a problem until it had most of the features that Netscape did.
So here's a question for you. If IE "became a problem" and took over a big chunk of the market when it had "most of" the features of Netscape, then you have just provided an example of an inferior product taking over a market from a superior one. The main "advantage" that IE had at the time was that it was bundled with Windows. Since MS has a monopoly with their Windows product they are legally prohibited from bundling other products with it. They have chosen to ignore the law in this case and pay off politicians and lawsuits.
Now do you really think dozens of judges in multiple countries have all ruled against MS, despite the fact that they have done nothing wrong?
If instead, people innovated and created products that address concerns that MS's products do not, and consistently did so, then they wouldn't have so much to whine and take legal action on.
Your proposal requires that other companies reach a higher standard that MS, in order to achieve the same results. That is called "unfair competition" and it is due to MS's monopoly position and bundling.
MS has provided a platform in which you can easily download a different browser, a different media player, etc. The fact that most people don't is simply telling the competition that the average user sees no advantage over running your software instead of the stuff that they have already without expending any effort.
A more eloquent person than I once said, "They need only create a product just 'good enough' that people don't trouble themselves to see if something better exists." That is what MS does. They make products that are inferior to those already on the market, but are just "good enough" that it is not worth the trouble and/or price to get a better solution. And that is what people use today. Web browsing without tabs, spell checking, translation, real pop-up blocking, ad blocking, secure defaults, support for the HTML, CSS, and XHTML standards written in the last five years, or dozens of other features available in other browsers. I don't know a single person with an understanding of Web technologies that would claim IE is superior to, say, Firefox; and yet IE holds 90% of the market. That is bad for consumers and bad for the industry and it applies to dozens of other fields as well. Do you really think it is a good thing that IE is the main browser despite its obvious shortcoming, just because it is the on MS forced Dell and other companies to bundle?
The increasing popularity of firefox is a testament to this statement.
The fact that IE retains 90% of the market despite being vastly inferior for half a decade belies your belief. Companies should not have to be better than MS, just to compete with them. If another product is just as good as one MS produces and at the same price than each should grab about 50% of the market. That is what is known a fair market.
Let's face it, generic soda is just as good as Coke or Pepsi, but people buy Coke and Pepsi in mass amounts compared to these products. Some of MS's advantage is its name recognition. People outside of the software community know who MS is, and for whatever reason, they trust it as a decent name in software.
You're overestimating their market influence. The truth is much of the popularity of IE is due to the fact that it is bundled. If that was not the case and most people bought computers that came pre-installed with Firefox, most would neither know or care that it was not an MS product. Most people making purchasing decisions decide to buy from Dell or HP because of the name recognition. They don't decide not to download Firefox, because they've never heard of Firefox. A good percentage don't even know what IE is and couldn't tell you if they are running Windows or something else. The fact that people have to take an extra step to get Firefox is the problem and it is the result of bundling.
My point is that nobody cares that MS bundles some things, but yet gets out of joint about others. As long as the MS product is so inferior it doesn't capture any percentage of the market, nobody notices or cares. Then as soon as the bundled application gets a bit better and takes off, everyone gets irritated.
If a bank robber tries to rob a bank, but accidentally locks themselves in their own closet for six hours no one knows or cares either, because they have not successfully caused any damage. It is when MS bundles products which take over markets based not on their own merits, but upon that bundling that other software producers and consumers are damaged.
IE always came bundled with Windows, but Netscape came installed too. When IE surpassed Netscape (which I believe it did before the advent of spyware and the exposure of all of its security holes), Netscape no longer needed to be packaged.
Ahh, but it was not when IE surpassed Netscape, but when IE became good enough that customers did not complain about it.
Netscape was a purchase product and MSIE simply came with Windows.
Except Netscape was free. Do you deny that being bundled is an advantage? If not, then IE has an unfair advantage, thus the monopoly was abused. If so, can you honestly tell me that if Firefox was bundled with all computers and IE was not, you don't think the market shares would change drastically?
If users who don't know anything about computers manage to download and install all kinds of other garbage, you'd think that if they wanted to, they would be able to download competing products.
The problem is that they don't know that they can, need to, or that there is any advantage in so doing. Most people just assume that Dell either includes the best product, or to get a better one will cost money. Clueless users don't install specific things, just ones they happen upon.
Are you saying that on a standard MS windows install you should have no browser? That is hardly an alternative. No media player? MS applications to me at least allow a gateway with which I can get the alternatives.
Do you think any computer retailer is going to sell a computer these days without a browser or a media player? I don't. How can you still not be getting this. When you buy a computer from Dell it will come with a browser and a media player. The problem is Dell should be the one choosing which one of those is installed, not MS. By forcing Dell to include IE and WMP to get Windows is a blatant violation of the law. MS gains market share by bundling, which is illegal for them, because they are a monopoly. Nothing is stopping Dell from selling a computer with Windows, IE, and WMP on it, but the law should be stopping MS from forcing Dell to sell that if they want to sell Windows. Vendors should include a browser pre-installed and on installer disk with your computer, just like they used to.
And here's another point, if the user doesn't even know what program they are using then does it really matter to them which program it is anyway?
Yes, because they are given an inferior product with security holes, and lacking features. In a free market, without bundling they would be given whichever program the retailer wanted to include and then the free market would decide which one was right. As it is now, they are all given an inferior solution because MS has forced it upon them.
The target audience for software these days I believe should incorporate the average user but target the high end user. Because as people get more and more tech savvy it will no longer go on what program was packaged with their Gateway, but what program is the most useful.
The evidence from the field does not agree with you. IE has been significantly behind in functionality to other products for many, many years, and yet they still have most of the market. Most users just use what comes with their computer and most people never know anyone who uses something else. As a result, users don't buy a HP computer that comes with the better browser and doesn't get viruses, because all the vendors ship the same thing, so there is no real competition for them to use to make a choice.
Who cares if MS decides what software is the best for the end user or if Dell does?
The end user. If Dell and HP and Lenovo all decide you can bet some will make different choices, then the market can decide the best product. If MS decides they all have to use the same solution and the people are stuck using it. If Dell and HP and Lenovo are looking at a variety of choices, the producers of those choices will try to cater to their desires, which are to sell more computers, which is one step removed from the customer deciding. If MS decides there is no incentive to make better products or give the customers what they want.
Like Dell or Gateway or HP ever packaged superior products with their PCs, they haven't.
But if they are given the choice to do so, then consumers can vote with their dollars and buy from the company that gives them the best, or least annoying software. When MS decides, no one has a choice.
Besides, I bet people like Dell would prefer MS anyway, because then they can offer anti-spyware packages and upgrades when people only got spyware because their browser sucked to begin with. There is nothing more fun to a computer vendor than to sell a computer novice superfluous crap.
"Hey Bob, how's that new HP computer working out?" "Well, it's a lot better than that Dell which got viruses and I had to keep buying add ons for. I'm glad my cousin bought one and told me or I'd never have known."
Do you see how much better the aforementioned situation is than the one we are in now, where everyone is stuck with only one option?
People have the ability to decide for themselves what they want to use on the computer, the fact that they aren't aware of this ability just shows how disgustingly uneducated the populace is, and further illustrates that if you aren't going to educate yourself about technology then you probably deserve what you get.
When people buy any product, whether it is a car or a computer, a smart shopper looks at several options, then buys the one that seems like the best suited, for the best price. This works great in a free market and is how people are conditioned to shop. They don't expect a non-free market where they are only given the option of one substandard product. As a result, most of them assume, incorrectly, that there are no other option. After all if there were, wouldn't they be available in stores?
They should be available in stores and trying to shift the blame from the company that breaks the law to make sure they aren't to the deceived shopper is just blaming the victim.
I also don't understand why people, outside perhaps the tech support industry, get irritated by MS at all. Nowadays they have plenty of competition for the aware user. I use firefox almost exclusively and does it really matter how many other people use my same browser?
Yes, it does matter. First, because websites are crap compared to what they could be if the state of the art was not frozen, through this anti-competative behavior. Second, because their is no way to compete with a monopoly many companies don't bother to try, which further retards progress. Finally, there is plenty of other fallout from a massive user based trapped on a single, insecure product. The majority of automated worm traffic that clogs up the internet and slows everything down is the result of automatically propagating worms exploiting Windows, IE, and Outlook.
Firefox and other companies also stink at ad campaigns and making people aware of their superior product.
Firefox isn't a company. Companies can't compete against a monopoly so there are basically none left with significant market share. The Firefox team does a great job marketing considering they are just a bunch of guys working on donations. But no marketing campaign that does not cost many millions is going to have any affect compared to forcing everyone to have a copy of your program.
I think when we start to see Firefox co
As someone who designed webpages before, I know that the state of the art isn't in fact frozen. The truth is that you could design a website to easily scale back based on what the user is using... Web site designers are simply too lazy to implement this kind of thing.
They aren't lazy. It is not cost effective to implement a new solution (using many man hours) when that solution can only reach a small subset of the populace. You can urge people to download Firefox all you like, but the number who have the bandwidth and are willing to try some new random software is small for any given website.
The average consumer is therefore not presented with a viable alternative. Windows is a monopoly because you haven't introduced a proper product yet.
The average consumer can't go to the store and buy a computer without an OS. The average consumer can't go to a store and buy a computer without Windows. You claim this is because OEMs don't want to ship these products because the other OSs are not up to snuff. I think you're dead wrong. I've put my name on a purchase order for over a thousand desktops, each of which came with Windows. We specifically requested them without Windows, but the price was higher. None of these machines ended up running Windows. I know dozens of people who have done the same thing and I'm sure there are countless people in the same boat. Many large computer buyers have corporate licenses for Windows. They pay for two copies of Windows for each machine to make installation less painful. You don't think the number of companies with corporate licenses for Windows is a significant market? Why then can't you buy a PC without a copy of Windows you don't plan to use. Surely they can sell a computer cheaper without one, right?
The answer is all the major OEMs have contracts with MS that say they can't sell a computer without Windows (or actually a DOS based OS). The contracts are trade secrets, but this has been confirmed by numerous insiders and has been common knowledge for years. This is the same reason why you can't buy a computer with Linux as the main OS in a store. It would cost the normal price (including Windows) plus the cost of installing/packaging a Linux distro. It has nothing to do with Linux not being ready.
99% of home users run the OS that shipped with their computer, hence MS automatically has 99% of the market, regardless of how well competitors do.
Apple has okay mainstream OS's but you have to be an Apple style individual, Apple has basically packaged their OS with their hardware and their mentality. It takes a unique individual to buy into all three at the same time and most companies that don't have an explicit need to do so aren't going to, it's simply not viable.
Lots of people would love Apple to sell their OS for x86 by itself. They won't for the foreseeable future because it is too big of a risk to compete with a monopoly. Apple makes most of its money on hardware sales. They would sacrifice that market and need to make that money back on such a move. Given that no major OEM can pre-install OS X without paying for Windows at an arbitrary cost set by MS and given that no OEM can afford to abandon the Windows market, there is basically no chance that Apple could compete in that space, even with a better product. Several other companies you've never heard of have tried with superior products, including ones that ran Windows software. They were all killed and most of them have won big settlements from MS for that.
Basically since MS has illegally locked down the pre-install market the only way to compete with them is to (like Apple) sell your own pre-installs, which necessitates getting into the hardware market. Aside from that, Linux will take chunks of the market away when they are so much better than Windows that Windows is not a viable option by comparison. That day may come, but it is by no means a level playing field and it certainly is not subject to the advantages of a free market.