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Seven States Extend Microsoft Antitrust Judgment
Technical Writing Geek writes "A number of states have moved to extend antitrust judgments against Microsoft until the year 2012. California, Connecticut, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and the District of Columbia are all contributing to the decision, and have released a report on the factors that lead to the extension. 'The report laments the state of OEM web browser bundling, saying that no major OEM currently distributes a browser other than Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE). This is important due to the rise of new middleware platforms (such as Adobe's AIR and Microsoft's own Silverlight) that can create rich, OS-independent, web-based applications.' The report is slightly self-contradictory, but raises some valid points."
A number of states have moved to extend antitrust judgments against Microsoft
Ah yes, the old "embrace and extend" has come full circle.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
For the record, between IE, Firefox, and Everything Else, just because OEM's ship the default browser doesn't mean that there isn't anything else available - it means more often that people are far too lazy to look.
Physics is nothing like religion. If it was, we'd have an easier time trying to raise money!
DC = !a state
Part of the hardcore faithful who believed in Apple long before it was cool again to do so
Behold my 1337 fp skillz!
Hmm, it's amazing what they'll make a state these days.
Those who believe the Internet is private,
find their privates are on the Internet.
Despite the delusions of Mayor Adrian Fenty and Pretend-Representative Eleanor Holmes Norton, Washington D.C. is a city, not a state.
That's why it doesn't have congressional delegates or a Governor.
The rest of the article is similarly well researched and written.
So the totally ineffectual measures that've been taken to punish Microsoft for misusing its illegal monopoly to eliminate or marginalize its competition are going to be ineffectual for a longer period of time? That'll show 'em.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again. You cannot punish a corporation the same way you punish an individual, because they don't care about the same things. There's only one thing a corporation values, so there's only one thing you can take away from one: market share. Pass a measure forcing Microsoft and its subsidiaries to halve their advertising budget for, say, five years.
I've always thought it was strange that the focus of a lot of the anti-trust case was the "bundling" of Internet Explorer.
Who gives a shit? The only other browsers worth using, Firefox and Opera, are both FREE. How is bundling IE with Windows hurting them? They don't make any money from their browsers anyway!
Plus, the REAL problem with the MS/Windows monopoly (and I don't think it is a monopoly, really, but that's a different argument) is that they don't document the Windows API completely.
Good thing the government can decide for me what software I should receive packaged in my OS or else I just wouldn't know what to do with myself. It not like I can just choose for myself whether or not I will use the prepackaged version or download my own.
Creative Demolition
The states' report seems to imply that Microsoft will try to find a way to tie Silverlight to IE in the future, and leverage the 80 percent market share of IE on the desktop to try and edge out competitors like Adobe AIR. In our view, it's more likely that Microsoft has learned to accept the reality of a web application future and simply wants to make sure that it is the driving force behind its development.
+1 Insightful
Microsoft is hedging their bets. If their cash cows are really threatened in the near future they need a backup plan. I think they're not sure how they would profit, be it software-as-a-service or infrastructure or development tools. But they know they need to cover as many angles as possible to survive long term.
Developers: We can use your help.
Why does that sound like something a communist state would call themselves?
Why is it that everything that comes out of Massachusetts is crazy? It started with Stallman, moved on to the inability to read dictionaries, then blinking lights, and now they're a communist collective?
What with this and the releases of Gutsy Gibbon and Leopard, this is turning out to be a bad month for furniture.
I'm waiting for a "-1 somepeoplejustshouldn'tgetmodprivileges" meta-moderation.
The issue, as I understand it, is not that there aren't other browsers available but that the consumer must go out of their way to get the other browser and avoid the bundled IE in their OEM systems.
Is being slightly self-contradictory like being slightly pregnant?
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
The issue is MS making the OS DEPEND on IE and ignore anything the user wants. If I remember rightly, during the anti-trust case, Gates & Co. lied to the court that IE was needed to run Windows (it wasn't at the time). The next patch/hotfix/release it was, as they quickly embedded it.
That's funny I didn't know they made Internet Explorer for OpenBSD. Perhaps I am less of a geek than I thought.
Creative Demolition
IE killed off netscape by forcing OEMs to bundle IE. They used their monopoly to strong arm OEMs and charged higher fees to OEMs who didn't do EXACTLY what they wanted them to. Those who bundled AOL and netscape were punished. That's illegal in anti-trust law, and Microsoft is a convicted monopolist. That's where the bundling thing came from.
Bundling isn't right now hurting opera or Firefox, it's hurting the OEMs. The OEMs can't complete by providing, say Firefox and advertising that their bundle is more secure than their competitors. Dell could chose firefox and HP could chose opera or whatever. They can't because MS is still stronarming them.
And you are either highly misinformed or completely deluded if you think MS isn't a monopoly. 90% of the desktop OS market IS a monopoly under every developed nation's laws, and to anyone with any common sense, period.
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
OEMs don't want to waste time installing three different programs that do the same thing. So if IE is forced to be removed, browsers now will have to pay OEMs to be placed on as the browser.
I don't see having three different programs as being a problem. All an OEM would need to do is create one disk image with all three then use it to clone it on each hdd installed on a PC, "do once, use anywhere". If OEMs aren't already doing this, minus the three different programs, then they need to work on improving their workflows.
FalconShould there be a Law?
Its not really a good idea to impose restrictions on a company for "what they MIGHT do".
Ie they "might be able to" leverage the next version of Windows to push people toward silverlight. Kinda dangerous ground.
Perhaps it's only a little ironic that some states keep fighting the Microsoft Monopoly yet force their own (state) employees to use Microsoft products. This is true of California (and probably most states). How much do they really care to bust the monopoly if they can't even wean themselves from the convicted monopolist?
Or, imprison the corporation itself. If I break the law, they lock me up, and I cannot do business with the rest of society. Do the same to the corporations. Send the sheriff out to lock the company doors, and prevent them from doing business for 6 months, a year, or whatever sentence they would give me.
Yes, it would be devistating to the corporation, just as devistating as it would be to me if I were locked up for a year.
Yes, those that work for the corporation would be hurt, just like the people who work for me. (if I were wealthy enough to hire people to do my bidding)
Yes, it would hurt the economy if all, or even a significant portion of corporations got shut down, just as it would hurt the economy if all, or even a significant portion of people were imprisioned.
You can bet that the corporations would get their act together right quick if the penalty for breaking the law was the same as for a real person.
I would say that one of the big problems we have is that corporations are considered to be 'people' when it is convenient, and not 'people' when that suits the needs of those in making money off of them.
I can think of at least one OEM that bundles a browser other than Internet Explorer.
if desired, we And 7inancial charnel house.
Since when does Ubuntu and OSX have IE installed? Dell and Apple are both OEM's and they both use alternative OS'es which has alternative browsers. Just because it's not running windows doesn't mean it's not competing with IE.
Regardless, There's a definite rising trend of market share in alternative browsers, especially FireFox. Most likely the OEM's are not including Firefox (as well as other free software, such as Openoffice) because the Mozilla Foundation isn't willing to pay the OEM's (unlike Google, AOL, ETC) to install it on pre configured PC's.
In Soviet Russia, Trojan exploits YOU!
That is simply incorrect. Corporations live off the recognition of the government. If the government revokes their charter, then they are dead. If the government recognizes them as a Corporation, then it lives on. Cutting off of it's revenue could simply make it destitute. The same as cutting off the ability of a real person to make money for six months could make them destitute. So, that is no excuse for the government to give one entity preferential treatment under the law over another. Hell, many companies run in the red for years. That is certainly not the same as cutting off a real persons food supply for years.
Better yet, prevent retailers from bundling operating systems with new computers
A BIG problem with this is that most people when they buy a new computer they just want to plug it in when they get home and have it work out of the box. Maybe it would help if a new computer came with different OSes came on disk. A Windows disk, maybe two or three different versions, and disks for different versions of Linux and BSD. However I seriously doubt most people ever want to install an OS unless they call tech support and the tech walks them through reinstalling Windows.
Hey, perhaps that's an idea that might work, OEMs shipping computers with these disks then allow the user to decide which one to use. When booted up the first tyme a screen asks which OS the user wants. The user selects one then it asks for the correct disk and installs the OS.
FalconShould there be a Law?
with Slashdot.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
The government isn't choosing your browser. They are preventing Microsoft from choosing your browser. They are leveling the playing field, and forcing people to actually make a choice, instead of going with the flow. You're not being told which web browser you can and cannot use. I see where you're coming from, but you should clutch your idealism with slightly less intensity -- this is a good thing, even if it doesn't meet the strict interpretation of capitalism.
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
for the hammering Microsoft takes on Slashdot, we all know what Microsoft's next quarterly financial report is going to look like. we all know why "Apple' is no longer "Apple Computer." Apple sells a half dozen or so configurations of the Mac that either meet your needs or they don't. that is a profitable strategy, but it is not a strategy that dramatically increases your market share.
IANAL, so WIAL (Who Is A Lawyer?) Does this extend the bit where someone should watch over Microsofts shoulder, or does it also extend the bit where I, living in Iowa, can get cash back for every Microsoft product I've had forced on me when I've bought computer products? (At least in Iowa, I could get cash back on any copy of DOS, Win3.1-XP, Office, and maybe a few others bought between like 1994 and 2006 or so, the date of the original agreement.) Is THAT extended to 2012 as well, so for instance my Dad could get cash back for the copy of Vista that he had me erase and replace with Ubuntu (within about 2 days of getting his notebook..)? That'd be super-sweet 8-).
Instead of the states taking ineffective legal action, how about this: "msft knock it off, or we won't buy your stuff. We'll use mac, or linux, or whatever. Then we'll insist on all documents in non-msft format: odf, pdf, whatever. Then we'll insist on firefox only as a browser. And all multi-media must also be in a non-msft format - no .wma or .wmv."
Could you imagine how msft would react? Lawsuits take ten years, cost $100 million, and get you nowhere.