Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Hands Over Docs To EU
hankwang writes "Reuters reports that Microsoft has handed over technical documents to the EU in order to enable the competition to make interoperable software. So far, the EU has imposed fines of €497 M and €280 M onto Microsoft for abuse of its monopoly. The deadline for this documentation was today. According to Microsoft, the documentation is over 8500 pages."
And what license will it be under?
Red Leader Standing By!
the lack of software pattents in the EU
> And why should nation states and courts get involved in making other products work with
> Microsoft's?
Because Microsoft are leveraging the effective monopoly they have in the OS and office markets to make their protocols and file formats de-facto standards, then withholding documentation in order to stop competitors from being able to use these, now standard, protocols.
> Microsoft's not a monopoly: you're perfectly free to create your own standard (as the OO
> crowd is trying to do). Surely you'll admit that it's not Microsoft's fault that such
> standards aren't catching on?
Yes they are and yes it is. Courts in both the US and the EU have found Microsoft to be a monopoly. Furthermore courts in both the EU and the US have found Microsoft to be illegally using it's monopoly status to lock-out competitors by either polluting existing standards ('embrace and extend' as it's known)(HTML, Java etc) or create proprietary standards and then consistently attempt to make it difficult for other software to be compatible (.doc, SMB, WMV etc).
> Personally I don't use OO because I can't swap files with people with whom I co-author
> scientific articles. MS Office and Open Office equations STILL don't work right (and before
> you LaTeX fanatics step in, neither of us speak that language).
All the more reason to document the file format properly and allow the applications to compete on merit and price then don't you think?
> Since I get my MS Office for free, why should I even consider OO?
I didn't notice anyone say you should. But if I can't use OO because you use Office simply because Microsoft is deliberately obfuscating their file format is that fair either?
Heh, I had a compulsory business economics lecture this morning -- ooh lookey, a chance to show off my mad economikz skillz.
In a normal competitive or semi-competitive market, firms try to maximise their profit by following the supply and demand curve. The cost for a firm to enter or leave a market is negligible, and consumers will always go for the best product at the lowest price (i.e. the optimal price/quality point). This is the optimal sort of market from almost everyones' point of view the best product will always win, and it turns out that this is a really good thing for the economy.
Let's assume that to start off with, the market for audio player software is a perfect competitive market. All media files are stored in an easy to implement format (e.g. MP3 or WAV) and so one audio player can easily be replaced by another.
Now, Microsoft decides to enter the market. They realise that they can get a huge install base by bundling their audio software with their operating system (which is more or less a monopoly product). This is an attempt to gain a monopoly in one market by leveraging a monopoly in another, which is illegal in some places such as the USA and EU. They then decide to reduce the contestability of the market by making their audio software default to creating files which competing firms' software cannot read without a license from Microsoft.
There are many more examles of Microsoft doing (or attempting to do) this.
All involve deliberate breakage of interoperability and backwards compatibility by either undocumented protocols/file formats or perversion of existing standards for them.
Pirate Party UK
``But Microsoft will then argue that mandating the usage of formats and specifications other than those of their choice "limits innovation." Agree?''
Who will they be arguing to? The EU government? They have no reason to listen. A judge? They won't care if some organization doesn't want to buy another organization's product, whatever the reason. Other potential customers? That won't do anything to change the situation of the EU gov't. Themselves? They'd just be trying to convince themselves that the loss of sales is a Good Thing.
With the present case, where Microsoft is actually being fined, they have all kinds of legal recourse, and I do believe they've tried those options. They won't necessarily win: the government makes the rules, and everyone has to play by them; but Microsoft could at least try to convince a judge that the fines are unfair, the law is unjust, or that they need more time to comply.
If the EU decides to mandate open standards, Microsoft is not being singled out in any way. That gives them much less reason to complain. They can either cater to the customer's demands or decline to, but they're not being wronged in any way.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
I seriously and strenuously doubt that this 8500 pages constitutes the purported documentation. Far more likely it is a masterwork of corporate techno-drivel. I expect to hear from independent qualified judges that this material is not, in fact, necessary and sufficient information to enable an expert to create a system capable of reliably interacting with M$ machines on a network. Likewise with file formats, &etc. This present waste of paper is nothing more than yet another chess move by M$. The EU will have to burn months deciphering and testing the documents, more months filing reports on how extrmely bogus it actually is. The EU bureaucracy machine will piss away many more months spinning up. M$ will whine and wail to the press about how the oppressive socialist regime is never satisfied no matter how many earnest efforts poor little M$ makes to comply with the the horrible old EU's draconian and anti-competitive rules. Neelie Kroes will impose more very impressive sounding, but ultimately trivial fines on M$. The EU will decree that M$ can not distribute software in their constituent countries. M$ will instantly appeal. An automatic injunction will take effect, nullifying the decree. The decree was, after all, nothing but hollow posturing from the get go. M$ will pay the fines -- which have been for years factored into the cost of doing business in the EU. M$ accountants will treat the whole matter as a simple, standard, albeit largish, bribe. The wheels on the bus will go round and round. Macchielvelli's rotten, grinning corpse will cum in it's shorts again. Same Old Shit. Repeat after me: M$ will NEVER give up their wire protocols, APIS, ABIs, or file formats. Ever. Not until doing so presents itself as the most profitable course of action. At present, such a disclosure would be nothing short of financially catastrophic for them. Complying with the EU's demands is quite out of the question. So forget about it. Now. Do it.
So, when a private person or company gets to a certain arbitrary size in terms of assets, then the government is allowed to use force to take property from them? That sounds soooo enlightened.
Yup, pretty much.
If I were running Microsoft, I would stop all shipments of all products to Europe (which is within their rights), and vigorously prosecute all copyright infrigment. That'll teach the government to mess with private property.
Good idea. I'm sure Microsoft is really keen on losing on the biggest single market for its software! And everybody would have to use alternative operating systems and office productivity software, essentially killing the MS lock-in once and for all - why didn't they think of that brilliant plan! You should be running Microsoft.
Switch back to Slashdot's D1 system.
> If people don't like MS, just don't buy its software.
We can't, our external partners send us and expect to receive data in proprietary MS formats.
I understand that you live in your moms basement, and thus have no need to exchange data with other people, but some of us live in the real world and our only choices are 1) to use MS software, or 2) to use 100% compatible software.
Requiring MS to publish specifications is a way to ensure that #2 remain at least theoretically possible.
What EU is doing is what any government should do, to keep the market alive is the finest reason for governments.
And no, because you are unable to imagine any other reason than petty protectionism for an action does not mean it is irrational. There is another option. At least you choosed the proper subject for your message.
You know, it would be nice if all the "it's like some stupid kind of import tax" or "it's punishing US companies" people actually bothered to read the way it all went before posting crap.
First of all, MS was initially _not_ fined a single dime. They were ordered to release the docs for certain protocols needed for interoperability. (I.e., no, not to document all of Windows. Dunno what gave you _that_ idea.) It was even allowed to give a list of which independent experts are qualified to judge whether the docs are enough or not. And the commission picked one of them. Pay attention, because it's important: it was someone suggested by MS judging these docs all the time.
That's it. The original ruling had _no_ punitive aspect as such. It was aimed strictly at correcting the monopoly situation that made it possible to break the trade laws.
MS _only_ got finally fined when months after months went by, and it showed no intention to comply with the ruling. It engaged in anti-EU astroturfing wars, it tried lame threats, it did stuff that was at best mocking the court, etc. You try doing that as a private person and you'd probably get some time in jail for holding the court in contempt.
Even then the fine was (A) per day that they keep ignoring the court ruling (which is how it eventually got to be hundreds of millions), and (B) with various generous deadlines and in between, and the provision that if MS complies until the deadline, it doesn't pay a dime.
So how the heck does that support such assertions as "it's like some stupid kind of import tax"?
And if you want to talk about punishing US companies, have a look at the long list of EU-based companies which have been slapped with hundreds of millions in fines from day 1 for breaking the trade laws. If anything the EU is giving a US-based company an unfair advantage and preferential treatment there. Because, again, any EU-based company in a similar situation was _not_ given the kind of sweet deal that MS was given.
Unfortunately, MS has mis-interpreted this as weakness and tried to pretty much just defy the court. Well, it didn't quite work that way.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
Oh yes. By its shareholders. See, the EU is a market twice the size of the USA. Giving up on that market would send MS's shares into quite a bit of a dive.
But here's the funnier part: Not only it would make a lot of investors sell (thus speeding up the dive), but it would put quite a big dent into Bill Gates's personal fortune. See, his being such a rich guy isn't calculated just in money in the bank, but mostly in MS shares.
So between paying a couple hundred million of MS's money and losing a few _billion_ off your own worth, which would _you_ choose?
Plus, it's precisely that kind of thing that MS has worked hard to avoid. See a large part of the "secret sauce" in MS's monopoly of interlocking parts, is its products being ubiquitous. It's not just that you can't replace product X because product Y depends on it, it's also the mentality that product Y is the de-facto standard, everyone else has it, and you can't just give up on it without becoming the odd guy out of the loop.
MS has worked hard to maintain that illusion of ubiquity, world-wide. It has been known to offer massive price cuts and even prefer to overlook piracy than allow whole markets which are proof that you can jolly well live without both X and Y.
So forcing the whole of Europe standardize on something else than Windows and Office? Ooer. That would be the day when IBM', Sun' and the others' managers ejaculate in their pin-striped pants out of joy. It's not just the loss of the European market as such, but that would be the day when almost every single US corporation's executive starts hearing stuff like "sir, we can't send that document in Excel format, because they don't use Excel in Germany. No, sir, neither in France." It's the day when people start hearing that MS file formats aren't, in fact, the ubiquitous de-facto standard and can't be an ubiquitous de-facto standard.
So, heh, yeah, I'd _love_ to see MS do something _that_ stupid. Sadly it won't happen, because they're not stupid. But it would be comedy gold.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
According to Microsoft, the documentation is over 8500 pages."
And if I know Microsoft, it's all disorganized, incomplete, unusable crap... Anything to be able to claim that they have fulfilled the EU's request without making any real progress toward interoperability. Please Microsoft, prove me wrong!
The race isn't always to the swift... but that's the way to bet!
We are getting there slowly. BECTA in the UK has already mandated that all Office type software used in the education sector in the UK must be able to save in open formats. It will then be a fairly short step to mandating the use of formats which must already be available. So we will get there. BECTA has woken up to the fear of losing access to data. Once this fear bites, a solution will emerge, and it will be open. It is very funny to have little chats with vendors who are struck dumb with horror at the prospect of having to provide for csv exports. They tell you what a terrible format it is. You smile sweetly and say, yes, isn't it awful.
But you see, our trustees....