Windows 7 To Be "Thoroughly" Tested For Antitrust Compliance

CWmike writes "Technical advisers to the antitrust regulators who monitor Microsoft's compliance with the 2002 antitrust settlement will test Windows 7 'more thoroughly' than earlier versions of the operating system were tested, according to a new status report filed with the federal judge watching over the company. Microsoft is also facing renewed scrutiny from the EU, which two weeks ago filed preliminary charges against the company over bundling IE with Windows, and said more recently that Microsoft 'shields' IE from competition."

Comments

Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[Anonymous Coward]

Nudge, nudge. Wink, wink.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[GigaHurtsMyRobot]

I'm thoroughly testing it, and thoroughly pleased. This is the first time in years I that I did not replace IE immediately. I've been using it for a couple weeks, now. One problem I eventually found is that Google Chrome won't install. IE has frozen several times (it's beta.) I hated Vista with a passion, but so far I am really happy with Windows 7.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[dov_0]

As much as I detest Windows in all forms, Windows 7 seems to be shaping up to be a half decent OS. Hate to have to admit it, but there it is.

Now all they need is a bash terminal, wget, vim, locate, grep, tail, touch, top, a package management system (emerge, apt, rpm - not really fussy), more text-based config files instead of a registry...

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[Anonymous Coward]

Now all they need is a bash terminal, wget, vim, locate, grep, tail, touch, top, a package management system (emerge, apt, rpm - not really fussy), more text-based config files instead of a registry...

But if you had all that stuff then it'd probably freeze every 10 minutes and no popular software development house would want to write for it and it wouldn't be stable with any hardware(using buggy half-baked drivers 'n' all), especially graphics and wireless chips. Then it'd be pushed into the hobbyist/scientific computing/server niche and be reduced to 1% desktop market share.

Oh, wait.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[benjymouse]

bash? No - Windows 7 comes with PowerShell. In many areas it is much more powerful than bash - and it is certainly a better "fit" for Windows than bash would be (PS is object-oriented and object-based and practically all of Windows API is now exposed as objects either through COM, WMI or .NET). Note, that is not saying that PS would be better for *nix than bash.

• wget - System.Net.WebClient
• grep - is the ? cmdlet (alias for Where-Object)
• tail - is part of the select cmdlet (alias for Select-Object)
• touch - is still an executable file - but you can also manage a fileinfo's attributes by simple assignments.
• top - sort and select.

Windows is moving towards xml config files - not the line-based delimiter-of-the-day config files of *nix. Xml files are arguably better for describing many more complicated structures. They also are more bloated ;-) . PS has support for reading/writing/manipulating xml files

Incidently, PowerShell treats the registry, certificate store, the PW function list etc. just as a file system. It means that to manipulate the registry you access registry keys/values just like directories/files - using the same commands.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[Hatta]

What about sed and awk?

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[value_added]

In many areas it is much more powerful than bash - and it is certainly a better "fit" for Windows than bash would be (PS is object-oriented and object-based and practically all of Windows API is now exposed as objects either through COM, WMI or .NET). Note, that is not saying that PS would be better for *nix than bash.

Feel the power:

Get-WmiObject -Class Win32_PingStatus -Filter "Address='127.0.0.1'" -ComputerName . | Select-Object -Property Address,ResponseTime,StatusCode
PING 127.0.0.1 (127.0.0.1): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 127.0.0.1: icmp_seq=0 ttl=128 time=46 ms
64 bytes from 127.0.0.1: icmp_seq=1 ttl=128 time=0 ms
64 bytes from 127.0.0.1: icmp_seq=2 ttl=128 time=0 ms
^C
----127.0.0.1 PING Statistics----
3 packets transmitted, 3 packets received, 0.0% packet loss
round-trip (ms) min/avg/max/med = 0/15/46/0

No doubt PowerShell offers unheard of (til now) functionality, and to the degree that statement is more meaningful than saying "Best Windows version yet!", I'd say PowerShell is awkward, clumsy, and verbose and indicative of how Microsoft still doesn't "get it".

Who know? Maybe in Windows 8 they might even take the bold step of rewriting cmd.exe, the Notepad of terminals, and really impress everyone, leaving us waiting with baited breath for symlinks in Windows 9.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[mR.bRiGhTsId3]

PowerShell is actually an intriguing concept. Granted, it's not bash, but there is something to be said for the idea of constructing pipelines through which objects flow instead of text. That and being able to cd around inside the registry and environment is an intriguing concept.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[benjymouse]

Why don't you just do a regular ping? Jeez, anyone can come up with an artificially lame example in any language.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[benjymouse]

First thing to realize about awk is that it was really only necessary because bash pipelines are text-only. You need awk, cut etc. to "find" the correct columns and emit something as a result.

Once you move to an object-based pipeline the need for something like awk disappears, at least for combining commands.

Example: The PS ls command is an alias for the Get-ChildItem cmdlet. Executed on a filesystem it will return a sequence of DirectoryInfo and FileInfo objects. Standard formatting rules (the ToString method) of those objects ensures that if they are written to the console they will appear as (somewhat) familar ls lines. But you can also pipe then thorugh another cmdlet, e.g. filtering on size *without* needing to parse the "filesize column":

ls | ?{ $_.Length -gt 30kb }

• ? is an alias for the Where-Object cmdlet.
• { ... } is a script block
• $_ is the FileInfo/DirectoryInfo object
• Length is a property of that object
• -gt is the "greater than" operator 30kb should be intuitive

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[benjymouse]

sed is pretty much covered by the script language. Text files are by default processed as a "sequence of strings". Through the pipeline those strings can be changed, filtered; new string can be inserted etc.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[drinkypoo]

I actually thought that was kind of cool. To me it implies that ping.exe can be replace by ping.psx or whatever the fuck a powershell script extension looks like (if it is .ps someone has to die, but microsoft loves three letter extensions anyway...) to save a few bytes. I wonder how many other examples of redundant commands there are. You could potentially save quite a bit of space by removing all the compiled wrappers to common windows components and replacing them with scripts, which you could then extend to be more featureful than the originals.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[Gauthic]

NTFS has had Symbolic Links built into the file system for years.... it's just unsupported in the default installation of windows.

You can download junction.exe (the NTFS version of ln) from Microsoft's Technet.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[swillden]

As much as I detest Windows in all forms, Windows 7 seems to be shaping up to be a half decent OS. Hate to have to admit it, but there it is.

Do you think it will finally surpass Windows 2000? Until now, that has been the best of the lot.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[i.of.the.storm]

Umm, I'm pretty sure junctions in NTFS on Vista are similar to symlinks.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[Hatta]

I guess that's ok, if all you need to filter are objects. If I have tabular data emailed to me as text files, and I need to extract a column, what do I do?

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[i.of.the.storm]

I think it's built into Vista, because it uses junctions to point apps to the new AppData\Roaming folder that were expecting Application Data. Of course this is a bitch when you're using robocopy to backup your home folder, and wondering why after several hours it's still copying. For anyone who might be interested, you use the switch /XJ to keep it from following junctions in a neverending loop.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[Ortega-Starfire]

Now all they need is a bash terminal, wget, vim, locate, grep, tail, touch, top, a package management system (emerge, apt, rpm - not really fussy), more text-based config files instead of a registry...

You can get nearly all of these things for windows already. Well, except the registry, but that will never leave windows.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[denarii]

I'm thoroughly testing it, and thoroughly pleased. This is the first time in years I that I did not replace IE immediately. I've been using it for a couple weeks, now. One problem I eventually found is that Google Chrome won't install. IE has frozen several times (it's beta.) I hated Vista with a passion, but so far I am really happy with Windows 7.

Chrome installed without a problem for me, it was the first thing I did after installing 7 in a VM.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[PJ1216]

I had no problems installing Chrome on the 7000 build. I installed it almost immediately just because I've come to like the interface, not that I had a problem with IE8. Maybe I'll give IE8 another go.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[Anonymous Coward]

Vista's NTFS already has symlinks. Please continue.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[BhaKi]

I must really protest against the "Object-oriented vs text-ONLY" mindset. A text stream is always the same text stream regardless of which platform I send it on to. Say I generate a text stream on Linux and send it using netcat to a system running Solaris or AIX. It'll be received correctly and can be easily processed. OTOH, the "object-stream" has no inter-operable survival beyond Windows machines. Secondly, text-streams are ubiquitous. Files are text-streams. TCP connection data are text-streams. The standard I/O interface of programs is text-stream. This ubiquity of text-streams is the main reason behind UNIX's appeal for power-users. At first sight, (for those who don't fully exploit UNIX) it will appear that this "object-stream" concept is more powerful than text-stream. But it's just snake-oil.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[BarryJacobsen]

I guess that's ok, if all you need to filter are objects. If I have tabular data emailed to me as text files, and I need to extract a column, what do I do?

You can gc tab-delm-file.txt |% {$_.split("`t")} which will split the file 'tab-delm-file.txt' into objects based on tabs.

The Powershell Guy Blog has LOTS of great examples to questions. (The answer to this question came from here)

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[Anonymous Coward]

The funny thing is that when you use an interpreter like Python, Ruby (irb!) or Perl in some kind interactive mode (or filter mode, to transform commands into function calls), and when you add some functions/routines that implement shell-like behaviour, then you'll probably end up with a similar shell like this. In the end, to me, PowerShell looks more than a *scripting language* rather than a sophisticated shell to me. True, all UNIX shells support scripting too, and it is very satisfying for some to impress one with difficult awk/sed stuff, but most (if not all) of that stuff can be done more easily nowadays in a more suitable scripting language. Real shell scripting semantics should be really geared towards *interactive command shell* usage: running commands, job control command completion and last but not least: something simple. Does PS cover that too?

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[Hashi Lebwohl]

Hmmm. I use Linux at home, but at work I am a Windows Admin. I was given the task of automating a procedure to synchronise (whole CRUD thing, really) Active Directory from a CSV file FTP'ed daily from a SAP user store. ie create security groups, add / delete users, etc. I wrote a Powershell script to do it, ended up ~40 lines of script, probably less, as I used a lot of white space and comments to make it maintainable. I tried Python first, BTW, as I was familiar with it, but to me it was not a natural fit for the problem. Long story short, Powershell is THE way to administer Windows server - eg Exchange server since 7 has used PS exclusively for admin, and MS has indicated that all server functions (except maybe SharePoint, but - meh) will use PS as the primary admin tool. Cheers!

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[shutdown -p now]

I guess that's ok, if all you need to filter are objects. If I have tabular data emailed to me as text files, and I need to extract a column, what do I do?

In .NET (and therefore PSh), strings are objects, too, so you can split and parse them to your heart's content. Then, of course, there are regex.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[shutdown -p now]

Say I generate a text stream on Linux and send it using netcat to a system running Solaris or AIX. It'll be received correctly and can be easily processed.

How often do you actually use cross-OS, cross-machine process pipelines on the shell?

Secondly, text-streams are ubiquitous. Files are text-streams. TCP connection data are text-streams. The standard I/O interface of programs is text-stream.

There are many applications where text streams make sense, which is why PSh supports them, too - they're just another kind of object. Furthermore, since any .NET object has a ToString() method, you can always pipe an "object stream" into another program that only accepts a text stream (such as awk from Cygwin or GnuWin32) as plain text.

However, for stuff like directory listings and such, it makes sense to preserve the original types of entries in the list rather than converting it all to plain text, only to have the next step in the pipeline use text parsing tools to extract that same information back. Doing the latter is both less convenient, and very inefficient.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[collinstocks]

...You could potentially save quite a bit of space by removing all the compiled wrappers to common windows components and replacing them with scripts, which you could then extend to be more featureful than the originals.

Huh... I wonder why so many things in linux are written using shell scripts...

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[value_added]

Why don't you just do a regular ping? Jeez, anyone can come up with an artificially lame example in any language.

That could have been a really good question.

A better question would have been is "If everything is a frigging object, then WTF is this ping executable doing on my drive?" Or how about, "If you folks can write ping, WTF can't you write programs for standard sysadmin functions (i.e., coreutils) and we can all skip this passing object nonsense?" Or maybe "Why am I forced to use WMI for certain things, but not others?" If the inconsistencies are starting to dawn on you, do let me know.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[Arterion]

Junctions have been around for a while. Vista has real symbolic links.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[ozmanjusri]

Do you think it will finally surpass Windows 2000?

No.

Despite all the hype, there's been no real workflow improvements in any version of Windows since W2K. Windows 7's major enhancement to usability is a better "Start" menu.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[drinkypoo]

Huh... I wonder why so many things in linux are written using shell scripts...

There was a trend of perl for a moment, and lately big pieces tend to be written in python.

I think if I made a distribution today I wouldn't even include a gnu userland by default, I'd just make a super-stuffed busybox. You can have the full gnu userland if you need it.

Anyway, I've appreciated the awesome power of shell scripts since 1991 or so (I know, I know, I'm getting off the fucking lawn all you old geezers) when I got a free shell on an open-access UUCP node running SCO Xenix-386. I deliberately let the irony iron on its own. It's still a great idea of a way to slim down the super bloatfest that is Vista, or for that matter, Windows XP. I can install powershell, and remove a bunch of executables. I wonder how well powershell works on XPe, it would be even more useful there.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[Mattsson]

I hated Vista with a passion, but so far I am really happy with Windows 7.

But what does that have to do with not replacing IE? I assume W7b comes with IE8b, unless they're developing a new W7-browser alongside IE8.
Personally, I think both IE7 and IE8b sucks more than IE6 ever did, in an interface point of view.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[drsmithy]

Despite all the hype, there's been no real workflow improvements in any version of Windows since W2K.

The updated Start Menu in XP, then the search box in Vista, were both significant improvements in "workflow".
The breadcrumb trail in Vista's Explorer is a significant improvement in "workflow".
The per-application grouping of buttons in the Taskbar is a "workflow" improvement. Personally I don't like the collapsing-all-buttons-into-one aspect of that and "disable" it by setting the collapse threshold extremely high, but some people think it's great.

Those are just off the top of my head. I'm sure I could find more if I wanted to waste time doing an in-depth comparison.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[lamapper]

... there is something to be said for the idea of constructing pipelines through which objects flow instead of text...

Perhaps I am being too literal here, but it seems to me that any code written to pass an object from one program to another would be slower, less efficient and less optimized than passing a pointer to that object (whether stored in memory on in a file) or am I missing something here...

I feel like I am missing something here...am I?

I would thing this would be true even if passed from one machine to another or one system to another (using system loosely to include any environment even if geographically distributed...not in the normal system as in a PC or machine).

Can someone enlighten me here, because I honestly feel like I am missing a point or something? Sign me curious.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[mR.bRiGhTsId3]

I don't know if there is a good way of doing it as you suggest, since I believe each element in the pipeline is a seperate process, as you might expect in traditional unix utilities. I guess you could do something clever with shared memory, but you don't lose anything this way, since in the traditional model the text has to flow the the different i/o buffers anyway to get between processes. Also, it is my understanding (though I could be completely wrong) that for objects with few fields it might actually be faster than passing text.

Re:Oh yea, we'll test it really hard.

[spiralx]

Something like

gc test.txt |% { $_.Split("`t")[2] }

would just extract a particular column, you'd probably create an object for each line using New-Object and set properties on it for the data you're extracting so you can perform further processing - see here for a function that does it automatically based on the first line containing headings.

Virii

[s1lverl0rd]

First we got antivirus software, then they invented antispyware software. Yeah, Antitrust software is obviously exactly what we need.

Re:Virii

[I'm not really here]

Hahahahahaha... look it up, it is viruses. Virii is not a word.

Re:Virii

[dov_0]

I thought Windows was enough in itself to inspire a lack of trust?!?

Re:Virii

[Anonymous Coward]

If we keep using it, it will eventually become accepted. Language doesn't just evolve, sometimes it is designed.

In this case designed not intelligently, but to annoy pedantic twits. We will win, because the public at large don't care, and your bleating is more than reward enough motivation.

Octopi is already accepted.

Re:Virii

[jabithew]

If we keep using it, it will eventually become accepted.

Yeah, but who wants virii?

Re:Virii

[nschubach]

Grammar Nazii?

Re:Virii

[steelfood]

Anti-trust computing is Microsoft's next big thing.

You can't trust your hardware not to sell you out, you can't trust your software not to sell you out, you can't trust the web services you use not to sell you out.

Re:Virii

[shutdown -p now]

Antitrust spyware FTW! Quietly monitors your PC for any signs of IE usage, and reports them to the EU anti-trust committee. Once a certain percentage is reached, it automatically removes IE icon on a number of randomly selected IE-using PCs and installs RND(Firefox, Opera, Safari, Chrome) instead.

Re:Virii

[Randall311]

It's viruses. You sound like a damn fool when you get it wrong.

Re:Virii

[s1lverl0rd]

Hey, wait... you mean the plural of autobus is actually autobusses and not autobii?

I am skeptical

[bogaboga]

Microsoft's compliance with the 2002 antitrust settlement will test Windows 7 'more thoroughly' than earlier versions of the operating system were tested, according to a new status report filed with the federal judge watching over the company.

Wasn't this done for XP? If I cannot remove IE or Windows Media Player, then these folks will not have done their job.

But the better move would be to force Microsoft to use open formats for all their applications. That way, we all can be sure that alternative apps have the opportunity to work as required. The only hindrance here would be for programmers to "deliver."

Re:I am skeptical

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree. Let Microsoft do whatever they want internally. So long as close defacto formats don't force everyone to use it.

Re:I am skeptical

[BadAnalogyGuy]

the better move would be to force Microsoft to use open formats for all their applications.

No, the better move would be to force Microsoft to open their formats.

Luckily enough, they've already done that. So go ahead and implement to your heart's content!

Re:I am skeptical

[GigaHurtsMyRobot]

Why do you need to remove it? How about just not clicking the icon? This has always worked for me, and is similar to my argument for abortion (just don't have one, instead of outlawing it.)

Re:I am skeptical

[Andypcguy]

I don't see why anyone would be upset with Microsoft including useful programs with there operating systems. I use IE and WMP. I Agree that they should be uninstallable though. As long as Microsoft doesn't force anyone to use the software I'mm cool with the extras. Hey Microsoft, wana throw in a free office suite, usenet app, programming language, CD/DVD burning app, and PDF creator? I'm tired of paying for all these things. I'd ask for some anti-malware/anti-viri software but I know how good you guys are at security so I wont bother.

Re:I am skeptical

[erroneus]

You are wrong. Forcing them to "open their formats" is exactly the wrong approach. OOXML is the kind of thing you can expect to see in all of their published documentation and there is no liklihood that anyone would be able to faithfully implement anything they have published. But if there are known standards for, let's say, browsing the web, they should be prevented from writing apps that use the internet protocols in ways that are not standards compliant and they should be prevented from supporting only MSIE under such circumstances.

On the other hand, opening their formats is also important for immediate relief. I am thinking long term and future uses.

Re:I am skeptical

[cozmoz365]

I agree interially with your argument, beside's how can I install Firefox without a default browser? Also I personnally like WMP but wish it came packaged with codecs like VLC is. Also I'm not sure if anyone noticed but Mac's come packed with a media player and web browser, I'm not sure what the big deal is here? Not to mention most Linux distro's come packed with loads of software out the box!

Re:I am skeptical

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft itself still hasn't been able to produce a faithful OOXML implementation that adheres to their ill-gotten standard, and they wrote the format spec!

As it stands, Microsoft Office is on track to support ODF long before it will support the (MS)ISO OOXML spec, if it ever does.

The docx, etc. format currently used in Office 2007 is a proto-OOXML format that may not be completely compatible with the ISO "standard" OOXML.

Re:I am skeptical

[ByOhTek]

Second.

I don't like/use IE or care for WMP (most media gets winamp'ed, only videos go for WMP, although I'll usually just put them on my BSD box and watch them in Noatun or Mplayer.

As for IE? It has it's uses... As the sibling posted - If lets you go and download Firefox (or other browser of choice) on a fresh system.

Having these on a system doesn't prevent you from using other software, they simply don't encourage you to do so. Preventing people from using other software should validly fall under anti-competitive, and can validly include paying people not to sell competitors products, or not dealing with people who do, not following published standards that the other use, and not publishing your standards (or not letting people use them for a reasonable price). However, not encouraging people to use another's product is not anti-competitive, that's just rational practice.

Re:I am skeptical

[jellomizer]

Open Formats: Designed so anyone can use them, and is encouraged. Usually fairly easy to implement and can save a lot of time in development costs.

Opened Formats: Designed to be hard for other people to copy. Trying to implement them can be rather difficult as it was tightly integrated with their applications that use it. So the cost of implementing the Opened Format is almost as much as it would be to purchase the software or the library to use it from the original vender.

Re:I am skeptical

[FudRucker]

this is exactly backwards, it would be better to make microsoft's closed & proprietary file formats & protocols illegal, and force microsoft to use open file formats & protocols that are not written by microsoft...

Re:I am skeptical

[Anonymous Coward]

It's legitimate if the specs was useable (i.e. force them to release a spec other people can implement). OOXML is NOT an open spec despite what any so called organization says. The EU just needs to define their own solid definition of open specs and then there is no room for argument by Microsoft. With that, it be relatively simple for the courts to tell if it's compliant or not should they get complainst against any organization.

Re:I am skeptical

[Anonymous Coward]

I wondered how many comments it would take as I read through to get to something like this. You must be about the 1000th person to make these comments in the last few weeks.

how can I install Firefox without a default browser?
If you can't work this out, you shouldn't be using a computer
a/ OEM installs one or more browsers of *their* choice, which must not be influenced by MS incentives. As OEMs already install and support various non-MS software this would present no problem at all. I'm sure some OEMs would already be installing Firefox if MS din't threaten their discounts etc.
and/or
b/ (Particularly for non-OEM installs) MS is required to include a simple 'browser chooser' gui application which uses ftp or equivalent behind the scenes to get and install your chosen browser. MS is allowed to warn that browsers other than IE are not supported by them but by company x, y etc.
And don't quibble about the details, it's clearly doable.
For example: 'but they'd have to include links to every crappy little browser with spyware etc.'. Well then, charge each company that wants their browser on the 'chooser' (say) $5000 to have it independantly spyware vetted and listed. That would probably cut the list down to less than 5-10.
Other objections can be dismissed equally easily.

The usual 'I don't understand or want to understand the very basics of competition law' comment.
So, for the nth time:
MS has a *legally defined* OS monopoly (no it doesn't matter if *you* think they haven't got a monopoly; the EU, US etc. courts *do*). Apple and the various Linux distros do not have legally defined OS monopolies.
Under competition law it is illegal to use a monopoly in one area (OS) to create, attempt to create, sustain or attempt to sustain a monopoly in another area (browser). And no, it doesn't matter that MS's market share in the browser market is down to about 70%. It's their OS share that matters. And yes (as per below) a legally defined monopoly does not mean '100% of the market'.

You may not like or agree with this; maybe you think there should be no competition laws (even if that leads to no free market - this was *why* these laws were introduced in the first place). But it *is* the law and it looks as if the EU will actually attempt to get MS to comply with it.

Note that a legally defined monopoly can kick in at as low as about 25% of the market (e.g. 4 major companies carve a market 4 ways and shut out other competitors - that might be an illegal cartel as well). So, if Apple or (say) Ubuntu gets to as little as 25% of the OS market, they might be hit by these laws as well. Until then, they are free to bundle what they like because it is not legally deemed to have an adverse effect on competition.

Re:I am skeptical

[indi0144]

hummm... the difference is MS have a dominant share of the market so they abuse that position to the point that a lot of users think the internets ARE inside the blue icon. And yes you can install Firefox without a web browser, thats a thing You'd do with external storage or Am I doing it wrong? When you're just first booting a new Win install you should not start to look after drivers, help and random software with a vanilla system, unpatched and a wooping IE5 legs wide open.

Re:I am skeptical

[commodore64_love]

>>>abortion (just don't have one, instead of outlawing it.)

That's like saying, "No need to outlaw slavery; just don't buy a slave." In other words, your proposed solution is a non-solutionf or those who consider slavery or abortion to be a violation of human rights.

Re:I am skeptical

[GigaHurtsMyRobot]

Well I don't believe an unborn fetus has the same rights as everyone else, so the analogy doesn't work for me. I believe outlawing abortion is the more relevant violation of human rights, the right to make choices about your own body.

Re:I am skeptical

[Pvt_Ryan]

If you can't work this out, you shouldn't be using a computer

Ahh I forgot Computers are only for People like us, you know Sys Admins & Engineers. Not anyone else. Certainly my parents couldn't work that out and they aren't techno-phobes.

a/ OEM installs one or more browsers of *their* choice, which must not be influenced by MS incentives. As OEMs already install and support various non-MS software this would present no problem at all. I'm sure some OEMs would already be installing Firefox if MS din't threaten their discounts etc.

Sorry but you are talking shit.No they wouldn't. They get NO incentive to install IE, it's part of the OS. Why would an OEM waste time (which is effectively money) installing a product on an OS that already ships with a similar product installed?

For example: 'but they'd have to include links to every crappy little browser with spyware etc.'. Well then, charge each company that wants their browser on the 'chooser' (say) $5000 to have it independantly spyware vetted and listed. That would probably cut the list down to less than 5-10.

Ahh so basically only companies ablee to afford that amount could have their's listed.. Hmm sounds like stiffling choice to me. Not so good for those free non-profit browsers. I suppose the list could have... IE and Netscape?

Re:I am skeptical

[furby076]

But the better move would be to force Microsoft to use open formats for all their applications

"But the better move would be to force Everyone to use Microsoft products for all their work"
"But the better move would be to force Everyone to eat Wheaties products for all their lives"
"But the better move would be to force Everyone to do what Uncle Sam wants for all their lives"

See the problem with forcing people/companies to do things? Regulation is important, but there needs to be a time where you gotta say "hold on this is overstepping". Put it this way - if you created a product (think time and money) for sale so you cuold make profit - how would you feel if someone came up to you and said "No sorry, you need to invest more time and money and configure your product the way *I* want it, not how you want it. BTW, you need to divulge any trade secrets you have. While you spent time/money developing these secrets and would like to make a profit, *WE* feel it would be better to give it out for free. Oh and btw, here is your food stamp starter pack since your business venture was artificially destroyed"

Re:I am skeptical

[stim]

While i totally agree with you... You have to be an idiot to not see his point.

Re:I am skeptical

[mweather]

So being born gives you rights? What about premature babies? Why shouldn't babies of the same age that were not born early have the same rights? If they should get rights, then obviously they get rights before they are born. When is that, and why? Things are not as simple as you'd like to think.

Re:I am skeptical

[mweather]

I agree interially with your argument, beside's how can I install Firefox without a default browser?

sudo apt-get install firefox

Re:I am skeptical

[mweather]

Certainly my parents couldn't work that out and they aren't techno-phobes.

They install their own OSes, and they can't figure out not-http file transport?

Re:I am skeptical

[jabjoe]

Even assuming there is enough documentation to match the exact behaviour of their implementation, you will always be playing catch up.

Personally I don't believe you can have a closed reference implementation control by one company who controls the standard. It just can't work.

Re:I am skeptical

[Anonymous Coward]

You and your false standards can go where the sun doesn't shine. I really don't give a crap about you or Linux. Using Linux, it is impossible for a 1 man software engineer / LLC owner to make a living creating, selling, and servicing software. You bastards would wrongly lynch me if I tried to house my company on Linux since my product is for sale. FOAD Linux, the sooner the better.

Re:I am skeptical

[apoc.famine]

I wonder how many times the GP's comment needs to be posted and answered before all the idiots here understand that there are non-browser ways to download things?

I had assumed that between bit torrent clients, other peer-to-peer software, instant messages, email, and ftp sites that most people would understand that there is more than one protocol to transfer data over the internet. And that list excludes some protocols more common under *NIX.

Re:I am skeptical

[BlackSnake112]

By being born early the child is still actually born. The only difference is the child's birthday.

Re:I am skeptical

[BlackSnake112]

Wasn't microsoft not allowed to include those things from the antitrust lawsuits? A free PDF add in for office is there but not included. I wish it worked for any program not just office, but that is what cute PDF and a slew of other programs are for. If PDF is an open standard and companies are free to implement it if they want too, why is all but microsoft allowed? The trend is that Apple and Linux are gaining ground, so if microsoft drops to 50% or less will the antitrust rules go away?

Here is the long ass link for the office add in for those interested:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=4D951911-3E7E-4AE6-B059-A2E79ED87041&displaylang=en

Re:I am skeptical

[V!NCENT]

Lol Apple is using false standards lol... lol programming for Apple doesn't make you any money lol....

Lol go to www.digg.com instead LOOOOOOOOOOL

Re:I am skeptical

[Anonymous Coward]

I really love when males speak about abortion. please, if you have a modicum of respect, shut the fuck off.

Re:I am skeptical

[V!NCENT]

The real matter here is not about having IE installed by default, but about not being able to remove it.

Re:I am skeptical

[commodore64_love]

A human being is a human being. It does not matter if that human is an adult, teen, child, infant, or fetus.

Re:I am skeptical

[drinkypoo]

However, not encouraging people to use another's product is not anti-competitive, that's just rational practice.

Exactly. When Microsoft told OEMs that if they bundled another browser (let alone made it default) they'd lose their privileged pricing on Windows OEM, that was illegal (and wrong.) But when Microsoft put IE into Windows, they were (attempting) to improve Windows' functionality. When Microsoft made IE super non-compliant to standards and created their own new closed "standard" ActiveX to attempt to tie people to Internet Explorer, they were doing something fucked up, but not necessarily illegal - but that is at least a matter for discussion. We explicitly protect reverse-engineering for the purpose of interoperability, so it's not like it's illegal for you to figure out how IE works and institute compatibility. Difficult and annoying, yes. Illegal, no.

Re:I am skeptical

[Anonymous Coward]

su -c 'pacman -S firefox'

Re:I am skeptical

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Put it this way - if you created a product (think time and money) for sale so you cuold make profit - how would you feel if someone came up to you and said "No sorry, you need to invest more time and money and configure your product the way *I* want it, not how you want it.

We have this thing called "rule by law" where we write laws that all companies and people are expected to obey. That way, companies are not surprised. They know the laws in advance and can reasonably expect those laws will be enforced. The problem here is not that the government is suddenly changing the rules. antitrust laws have been on the books for a hundred years.

No, the surprising thing here is that one company broke the law to drive other companies out of business, and that law was not effectively enforced. A good analogy would be a law that says you can't go rob liquor stores with a gun and if you do you go to prison and can't own a gun (the means of your crime) for the rest of your life. So some guy goes and robs a liquor store, and when he's dragged into court he donates half the money to the judge and sheriff's re-election fund. Then they decide to waive the jail time and let him keep his gun. He then goes on a robbery spree, and continues his donations. He gets sued and loses, but the settlement is less money than he's making as a robber. He gets arrested in Germany, but they give him a warning and ship him back to the states. The robber shopkeepers complain, but he takes out ads in the paper calling them whiners and says they are suing him about a wage dispute, when he really just robber them. He pays a few people to spread word of mouth and write editorials about how people are unfairly picking on him, saying he shouldn't be able to own a gun, when other people own guns.

MS broke the law and they knew the law before they did it. They're still breaking the law. It's hurting legitimate businesses, costing us money, and slowing innovation so we have worse products and services. There was no surprise for MS, just for legitimate businesses who stupidly though our courts were not so easily bribed and that the law might be enforced effectively.

Re:I am skeptical

[Insanity Defense]

I agree interially with your argument, beside's how can I install Firefox without a default browser?

How did people install their first browser in the days of Windows 3.1 (when I first got on the web)? Our ISP provided a disk with a browser on it (Netscape 1.1 for me). A download by a friend, family member, your ISP from an internet cafe, coworker or if you have an old computer download a copy using the prior computers browser. Pickup a Linux magazine which includes a LiveCD (with browser) and use it to go online and download one for the computer without a browser.There are many ways to get that first browser installed.

If you use Microsoft there is no reason they can't provide it as an optional component. Its only when it is mandatory and not truly removable that people get upset.

Re:I am skeptical

[Anonymous Coward]

But if there are known standards for, let's say, browsing the web, they should be prevented from writing apps that use the internet protocols in ways that are not standards. I am thinking long term and future uses.

Mod me down for not bashing MS, but actually you are thinking only of current uses, because under your regime no innovation is permitted, nor is any browser that supports only a part of the standard. Want to try to make a web browser, but don't have the time to implement the entire government approved standard? Go to jail.

Or maybe you just want to bash Microsoft, that's a popular option too. Guess what? I like Windows. It plays my games, runs my firefox and lets me do what I want to do without all the hassle of a linux setup. My IBM/Lenovo tablet pc doesn't work "quite right" under linux, Ubunto 8.1, suse 11, etc. My printer, webcam and nice 3d graphics card on my desktop all work in windows without a lot of hassle - that's not true in linux land.

I have configured linux for daily use as a desktop (on the right hardware) and I've also built WSUS servers to make it easier to keep windows updated from all the big scary internet threats. At the end of the day tho, if I want to just buy a machine from a retailer selling it as a loss leader for $50 usb printer cable profits, I'm not going to blow away windows to cobble together linux on it.

Different people have different needs (hence debian and suse coexisting). Please don't restrict my options by telling MS what they can't give me for free (once I paid to get in. You are from the same group of people that whine about how MS has too many versions of Windows, and yet at the same time you're railing against letting them just throw it all in one or two versions (home/pro).

This isn't meant as an insult but an honest comment: People like you disgust me.

You're like the Republicans in the US railing against the cost of infrastructure projects after going along with a $7 trillion debt run up under Bush.

Re:I am skeptical

[Anonymous Coward]

C:\>sudo apt-get install firefox
'sudo' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
operable program or batch file.

Drats.

Re:I am skeptical

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Mod me down for not bashing MS, but actually you are thinking only of current uses, because under your regime no innovation is permitted, nor is any browser that supports only a part of the standard. Want to try to make a web browser, but don't have the time to implement the entire government approved standard? Go to jail.

I think you're misunderstanding the scope of this discussion. This is about proposed punishment's for MS's criminal actions, punishments that will help undo the damage they've done.

An analogy would be if someone argues a vandal should have to clean the entire park, since we don't know the full extend of their vandalism, and another person replying with the argument that it is unfair to other kids who did not break the law for the police to force them to clean the part (something no one proposed).

Different people have different needs (hence debian and suse coexisting). Please don't restrict my options by telling MS what they can't give me for free...

I bet you're one of those people who really thinks "buy one get one free" sales are costing the store money too. When you buy Windows you pay for IE. As for the rest of it, please go learn why MS's bundling is an antitrust abuse crime and how antitrust abuse breaks capitalism and harms us all. Then, you can feel free to argue the particulars of why you think this antitrust abuse is an exception.

Re:I am skeptical

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

A human being is a human being. It does not matter if that human is an adult, teen, child, infant, or fetus.

Legally, that is not true at all. Ever tried buying a handgun when you're eight years old? Our society grants rights gradually as we supposedly gain responsibility and the ability to handle the added rights and responsibilities. You can argue they shouldn't differentiate, but it will be a tough argument to make without invalidating the basis for a lot of really important laws.

Re:I am skeptical

[Dragonslicer]

No, the surprising thing here is that one company broke the law to drive other companies out of business, and that law was not effectively enforced. A good analogy would be a law that says you can't go rob liquor stores with a gun and if you do you go to prison and can't own a gun (the means of your crime) for the rest of your life. So some guy goes and robs a liquor store, and when he's dragged into court he donates half the money to the judge and sheriff's re-election fund. Then they decide to waive the jail time and let him keep his gun. He then goes on a robbery spree, and continues his donations. He gets sued and loses, but the settlement is less money than he's making as a robber. He gets arrested in Germany, but they give him a warning and ship him back to the states. The robber shopkeepers complain, but he takes out ads in the paper calling them whiners and says they are suing him about a wage dispute, when he really just robber them. He pays a few people to spread word of mouth and write editorials about how people are unfairly picking on him, saying he shouldn't be able to own a gun, when other people own guns.

-1, Analogy Does Not Have Any Cars

Re:I am skeptical

[jaavaaguru]

there is more than one protocol to transfer data over the internet

And for some of these protocols there are many clients that are able to use them and not just a web browser.

Additionally, I wonder how many times the GP's comment needs to be posted and answered before all the idiots here understand the laws and regulations regarding monopolies and why they apply to Microsoft but not to all other software vendors.

Re:I am skeptical

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, because gods forbid those dirty, stinking, evil penis-possessors dare to have an opinion on something that can likely fuck up their lives for, at a minimum, the better part of two decades.

Two people fuck up, then one person unilaterally decides to relegate the other to 18 years of sentient ATM.

Shut the fuck up yourself.

Re:I am skeptical

[jonaskoelker]

what? sudo apt-get install it yourself!

Re:I am skeptical

[Artuir]

What is the point of Linux security when everyone is using sudo all the time to install shit?

That to me seems like a very dangerous and unnecessary step.

Re:I am skeptical

[Anonymous Coward]

gb2/kitchen

Re:I am skeptical

[Stormwatch]

The bigger problem, in my opinion, is not that it comes with a browser, but that you CAN'T get rid of it. Before XP, Microsoft claimed IE was "part of the system", and you couldn't remove it. People called bullshit and found a way - there was a third-party app for that. What did MS do next? Merge file browsing and web browsing for real, so now you really can't uninstall it. They made things WORSE ON PURPOSE.

Re:I am skeptical

[Creepy Crawler]

If women have the ability to abort what is only half their genetic material, then the men who shared that must also have a way to "abort", like relinquishing all parental rights completely.

Safe haven laws also do the same. Women have more power over "babies" then the men do, and that practice should stop. As of now, women should have equal power over the children as men do. The only court case to show as such was a mockery of "pay your due, Man".

Re:I am skeptical

[C0vardeAn0nim0]

same way we did back in 1997, the first year I had internet at home. we used this amazing technology called FTP !!!

yes, Win 95 came with a command line FTP tool, and most ISPs had FTP server that were well publicized.

FTP is a helluva lot more reliable on slow lines, specially the ones subject to frequent interruptions like dial-up, mostly because continuing an interrupted download is a no-brainer.

that's how I obtained and installed several versions of netscape browsers back at the day.

Re:I am skeptical

[shutdown -p now]

Microsoft itself still hasn't been able to produce a faithful OOXML implementation that adheres to their ill-gotten standard, and they wrote the format spec!

Here's how it went, chronologically:

1. Microsoft releases Office 2007 with implementation of its own OOXML spec (not a standard yet).
2. OOXML spec is submitted to ISO for standardization.
3. ISO introduces a number of changes and corrections to the spec, and releases that as ISO OOXML. As such, it is different from the original OOXML as implemented in Office 2007.
4. Microsoft announces that ISO OOXML will be fully supported in the next version of Office (initially support was claimed in Office14, but later on it was said that a service pack for Office2007 will do it).

What else did you expect? That they travel forward in time, grab the updated ISO OOXML standard, and use that to make Office2007 - released 2 years before the standard was published - to comply?

Re:I am skeptical

[shutdown -p now]

Ha! I hear that Microsoft bundling a terminal emulator with Windows competing with the likes of xterm and Konsole is next on the list of EU anti-trust investigations. ~

(and after that, it's cmd.exe)

Re:I am skeptical

[GigaHurtsMyRobot]

The man can pull out and blow it on her face, or to be less obscene... the man has the power not to inseminate.

Re:I am skeptical

[C0vardeAn0nim0]

Ahh I forgot Computers are only for People like us, you know Sys Admins & Engineers. Not anyone else. Certainly my parents couldn't work that out and they aren't techno-phobes.

then they can do something non-technical people used to do back in the day. call their ISP and ask them to send a free CD with all neccessary tools. My first ISP sent me a CD chock full of goodies, including software for OS/2 to run a BBS, opera, netscape, several IRC and FTP tools, HTML editors, freeware image editors and other stuff. of course, that was a time when ISPs really cared about their costumers

Sorry but you are talking shit.No they wouldn't. They get NO incentive to install IE, it's part of the OS. Why would an OEM waste time (which is effectively money) installing a product on an OS that already ships with a similar product installed?

Yes they do. it showed up on MS' anti-trust trial. OEM that shipped systems with a netscape or opera browser installed would be charged more for windows. in a market with paper thin margins like PCs, a few dolars more for a windows license can kill a business. when the anti-trust court forbade them from doing this, IE was already deeply integrated on the OS, so they added a small app on Windows XP to change the default browser to something else and hide the blue "e". but nothing convinces me that they completelly stoped using heavy-handed tactics to prevent OEMs from installing firefox on the factory.

Ahh so basically only companies ablee to afford that amount could have their's listed.. Hmm sounds like stiffling choice to me. Not so good for those free non-profit browsers. I suppose the list could have... IE and Netscape?

it could have a whole number of browsers. software developed by non-profits would be analized pro-bono. if they're clear from spyware, they're in. for-profit companies like mozilla and opera can afford paying for the certification, and they certainly would.

Re:I am skeptical

[Creepy Crawler]

A trite saying doesnt lessen the impact of the situation.

A man has less to no rights while a woman has many rights in terms of "sperm hits egg" to "baby pops out". And even then, a woman is shielded from extra offenses in certain states.

The Constitution demands equality between sexes. Right now, there isnt any.

Re:I am skeptical

[slimjim8094]

apt-get is designed to install for the system. it's perfectly possible to run most software (firefox, etc) in your home directory, e.g. local to a user.

Realistically, this isn't an issue. If I download PaintShit Photo Editor v1337 from sexyshareware.com, I'm going to be reeealy suspicious if it needs to run as root. If it runs as a user, then (theoretically) the worst it can do is hose that user. Running programs as a different user (nobody) fixes that, and is still easy.

If I get my PaintShit from my package manager, then it is trusted as much as I trust the distributor (Ubuntu, Fedora) and cryptographically signed so I know they put their stamp on it. Hence, since they have a good track record, I don't mind installing it for everybody.

Still won't run it as root.

The basic idea is you need to go out of your way to affect the whole system, and you can't do it by accident.

Re:I am skeptical

[Anonymous Coward]

Thanks for the cogent and rational reply, though I disagree.

I bet you're one of those people who really thinks "buy one get one free" sales are costing the store money too.

If it's a loss leader it sure does cost them money. That said, I understand "70% off diamonds at Macy's sales" don't bring the D'boer's rushing to pick em up cheap.

When you buy Windows you pay for IE. As for the rest of it, please go learn why MS's bundling is an antitrust abuse crime and how antitrust abuse breaks capitalism and harms us all. Then, you can feel free to argue the particulars of why you think this antitrust abuse is an exception.

I disagree. In 1995 it may have been - reasonable people could argue and understand the other's viewpoint. If MS doesn't bundle a browser, they will be gutted by a "free" linux distribution pushed by PC makers. It's like selling a car without a windshield at this point.

Someone else posted an excellent analogy of an electric utility provider bundling "free" bottled water to run bottled water distributors out of business and then just raising electric prices to cover it, so the negatives of a lack of competition are clear there - less efficient bottled water distribution.

The problem I have with this form of MS bashing is is doesn't help me as a "dumb" consumer as much as it confuses me as a "dumb" consumer. MS will be made to provide a browserless edition? Is it cheaper? Will I , the non slashdot reading consumer know why it's cheaper? I doubt that will work well for anyone.

If you are going to force MS to bundle Firefox, what about Opera and Chrome? Where does it stop? See Pastafarianism as a counter to Intelligent Design for a fun analogy.

No, the "they oughta" examples will not work in practice. It's like outlawing hate speech. Hateful to who? Religion (baptized or go to hell?) gets thrown under the bus or you're being arbitrary.

The only monopoly power MS has is that of patents and copyright. I think those need to be loosened a lot, but MS is doing nothing, QUALITATIVELY speaking, than Apple or any other vendor. The rest is just contracts and, IE or no, linux is getting to the point that MS won't have that level of power in ten years. Just look at the eee netbooks today. Linux may "suck" compared to MS Window's for diversity of out of box driver support, but it really has gotten good enough if you are getting it installed by the manufacturer.

Personally, for the harm MS has done, I see it as greatly, vastly outweighed by the good they've done. PC's are cheap. The MS-OS for a PC is cheaper today, adjusted for inflation, than in 1985 or 1995, though it is now a higher % of the price on a cheap machine). And I say that as someone who saw OS/2 get thrown under the bus.

Unlike a lot of people on slashdot (not saying you didn't), I have actually bought MS licenses for home use. I'm posting this on an ex Ult64 vista box which is now on the 7 beta. I've also bought a couple suse pro boxes and redhat before that.

But here's the thing. Because sometimes I just don't want to fight my pc to get it all working, I use windows 95%+ of the time on my various boxes. I only have MS Office installed on one though - open office is on the others.

MS never, in my opinion if not the EU and US courts, never had a real monopoly - you could have used Slackware and X back in 1995 if you didn't mind the extra effort (and missing out on cheap win modems). They don't even have half the power anymore that they used to have.

I think this is just over-regulation. Better to just dictate a standard that must be met for gov't purchases (and not allow lobbyists to steer it to anyone - that's the real problem) and then live up to it.

Before anyone thinks I'm a dittohead or whatever, I actually favor a flat, loop-holeless tax system with a negative income tax. We pay for it one way or the other, may as well skip the effort to mask it all in accounting games. :)

Is MSIE still in there?

[erroneus]

Yup! It's non-compliant. Actually, what are the compliance conditions precisely? I recall that part of the problem was the bundling of MSIE but I can't say if the exclusion of MSIE was ever a requirement.

The EU is just bashing an American company

[MikeRT]

Shielding IE from competition? Bullshit. Their "shielding" is apparently like a wooden shield against a .50 caliber rifle based on the marketshare growth of Firefox and Safari. Even Chrome is taking a percentage or two now. I think the real reason they're upset is that Opera is the only native European browser and it's failed to gain much traction outside of the embedded and portable markets.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[erroneus]

Actually, by making sure other browsers are not [fully] supported by their web service applications, they are locking out competing, STANDARDS BASED, browsers and client machines including those running Firefox and Mac OS X. It is not merely an issue of web designers not making things compatible, but whole applications and applications interfaces are closed to anything other than MSIE.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[BadAnalogyGuy]

Please. If you can't see how IE is shielded from competition like the night is shielded from the day, then perhaps you ought to look closer.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[thetoadwarrior]

Why would they want to ruin MS when they likely bring a lot of income into Ireland, an EU country if this is all about protectionism?

It could just be that some people realise that MS' mentality isn't beneficial to computing.

On the subject of protectionism you should look towards the US who has done more to Nintendo clearly show a case of protectionism. Especially considering the anti-Japanese mentality at the time. MS has been much worse than Nintendo yet the government lets them go and why? It's an American company. Had MS been Japanese or European you can guarantee they would have lost their case in the US.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[daveime]

Can you please explain why Firefox supports innerHTML, considering it is a Microsoft invention, and NOT STANDARDS BASED (as this seems so important you had to capitalize it) ?

Oh yes, I forgot, be standards compliant, unless it affects your market share. Bravo, Firefox. You stick to your guns, and the lemmings will keep trotting out their tired mantras.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[plague3106]

Sorry, but what "web service applications" are you refering to?

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[nine-times]

Actually, by making sure other browsers are not [fully] supported by their web service applications, they are locking out competing, STANDARDS BASED, browsers and client machines including those running Firefox and Mac OS X.

Actually I can say that I've begun seeing websites where, if you visit them with IE, they say, "Sorry, but the page cannot be viewed in Internet Explorer. Please use Firefox, Google Chrome, or Safari." It seems that, by not adhering to standards, Microsoft may be starting to locking themselves out of competition.

Karma. Wouldn't it be funny if Microsoft had to scramble to get their browser standards-compliant because websites weren't bothering to support them anymore?

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[BadAnalogyGuy]

Their Outlook Web Access application is decidedly more feature-filled for IE than it is for Firefox, for example.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[RedK]

Because a lot of rich-text editors on Webmails and other web pages made heavy use of innerHTML to present pre-formatted output instead of just BBcode type output. I am guilty of writing such an editor for a website I made once, I cringed at every line of code when it wouldn't display properly in Mozilla.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[morgan_greywolf]

Because supporting a property in JavaScript that returns the HTML string with in an element isn't going to break anything else. Just because something doesn't come from a standard doesn't mean it's not a good idea to adopt it. It's only when you adopt something that breaks a standard or is in conflict with a standard that it becomes a problem. Supporting extensions on top a standard that break nothing else isn't a problem.

Most of the problems around MSIE in terms of standards compliance have been fixed in IE 8. The other half of the problem, though, is ActiveX, which other browsers cannot implement on platform other than Windows. If ActiveX where implemented aa true open standard, without moving targets, without reliance on the underlying platform, then it would be possible to produce browsers on competing platforms that supported ActiveX.

Since Microsoft has deliberately chosen to keep certain details of ActiveX a complete an utter secret and tie it into Windows, there's no way for anyone to implement on a non-Windows platform.

This deliberate tie-in is an effort by Microsoft to create vendor lock-in. Microsoft can either compete fairly or they can fight dirty. They've consistently chosen to fight dirty and until they stop, they're always going to face criticism for it.

No Microsoft paycheck for you.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[erroneus]

That is not a bad idea ... and one, perhaps, I might attempt to sail at my own work place.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[Civil_Disobedient]

Can you please explain why Firefox supports innerHTML, considering it is a Microsoft invention

Because (successful) software developers are pragmatic more than they are pedantic. One only has to look at the relative successes of Linus Torvalds versus Richard Stallman as a prime example.

Microsoft also invented Ajax (well, they were the first to implement the XMLHttpRequest). Just because the devil gives you a pony doesn't mean he still isn't evil. And it doesn't make the pony evil by proxy.

I think I should probably stick to car analogies.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[Cowmonaut]

Poetic but not very accurate.

by BadAnalogyGuy (945258)

Ah, I see.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[daveime]

It's only when you adopt something that breaks a standard or is in conflict with a standard that it becomes a problem

Fine, I agree with you 100%.

So when you implement innerHTML on your web page, and then display it in a TRULY standards compliant browser, it will for all intents and purposes BE broken. It will not work. (That's what broken means).

So please stop calling Firefox "standards compliant" !

Now, for your next assignment, please show me which part of w3c is "broken" or "in conflict with" by Microsoft's ActiveX container ? That's right kids, nowhere, because ActiveX was NEVER part of the w3c, anymore than innerHTML was.

Quite simply Firefox chose to implement innerHTML (because it is useful), but chose not to implement ActiveX. Instead they quietly implemented plugins and the whole XPI thing (again not part of the w3c), but that's okay because it's not MS.

I'm not on a paycheck from them either, and I use both MS at home, and Linux at work.

I just want this goddamn hypocrasy to stop. NEITHER MSIE NOR Firefox are w3c compliant to the exact letter of the standard, so trying to say one is and one isn't is just utter BS or fanboyism.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey boss, we have this great product but because I want to help enforce standards on the internet we should exclude 20% of the market from accessing our site and buying our product.

right...

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[mweather]

I'd fire anyone who suggested that at my workpace, and I LOATHE IE, just not as much as I love our customers' money.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[ianare]

And which websites would that be ? Ones related to Linux perhaps ? I just can't see any sane web designer/master locking out something like 50% of the web.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[erroneus]

I don't propose locking them out, but I do propose detecting the user agent and responding by putting up a message stating something along the lines of "Best when viewed with..."

My web people here spend time designing pages that work and then waste countless hours tweaking them to work with MSIE afterward. Best to let some things look "weird" in MSIE and post a message stating why.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[jabjoe]

. One only has to look at the relative successes of Linus Torvalds versus Richard Stallman as a prime example.

The GPL is more important than Linux. With out GPL there would be no Linux, it never would have taken off. The GPL makes open source projects sticky, making it easier to hit critical mass. It's why GNU/Linux is bigger than BSD. Sometimes pedantic is the long term pragmatic.

Having said that, I think Firefox is right to support innerHTML, and OpenOffice is right to read/write doc files.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[benjymouse]

Most of the problems around MSIE in terms of standards compliance have been fixed in IE 8. The other half of the problem, though, is ActiveX

They sure have good CSS 2.1 compliance with IE8. The other half of the problem is not ActiveX, though, it is EcmaScript (javascript) compliance and DOM binding compliance. It is not too much of a problem if you use one of the many good JavaScript libraries, but all of those have had to build provisions specifically for IE because of the poor compliance.

... ActiveX, which other browsers cannot implement on platform other than Windows. If ActiveX where implemented aa true open standard, without moving targets, without reliance on the underlying platform, then it would be possible to produce browsers on competing platforms that supported ActiveX.

Since Microsoft has deliberately chosen to keep certain details of ActiveX a complete an utter secret and tie it into Windows, there's no way for anyone to implement on a non-Windows platform.

This deliberate tie-in is an effort by Microsoft to create vendor lock-in. Microsoft can either compete fairly or they can fight dirty. They've consistently chosen to fight dirty and until they stop, they're always going to face criticism for it.

ActiveX is really COM objects. COM is a binary Windows standard for object oriented APIs. Incidently it inspired Gnome which uses a binary standard very much like it. There is *nothing* secretive about ActiveX. There is tons of documentation. Anyone can implement ActiveX objects, anyone can implement ActiveX containers. The problem is that it is exactly a binary standard. With no virtual execution system involved objects are always tied to the platform. It is compiled code calling Windows APIs. That's why ActiveX does not exist on other platforms. It should be possible to implement through Wine, though. Wondering is somebody already did it...

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[Lecard]

Because supporting a property in JavaScript that returns the HTML string with in an element isn't going to break anything else. Just because something doesn't come from a standard doesn't mean it's not a good idea to adopt it. It's only when you adopt something that breaks a standard or is in conflict with a standard that it becomes a problem. Supporting extensions on top a standard that break nothing else isn't a problem.

Not completely true. I don't blame Firefox implementation, after all, HTML was designed with extensions in mind (including ignoring unknown tags). But it gives support to those extending standards (on a non standard way!). And surely, extending standards (even with non breaking stuff) is a BAD thing. It creates vendor lock-in. (Think about Visual J++)

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[UnknowingFool]

Even if MS were to open it up, I doubt anyone would implement fully because of the issues. I don't know much about ActiveX in detail but it seems to me that ActiveX is something MS won't let do despite its security failings. MS has constantly pledged more security and more stability yet most of IE security problems are related to ActiveX.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[benjymouse]

Forgot: The BIG problem with ActiveX is that it has a very poor security model. Because it really is binary code executing on your machine it can do everything the executing account can do. Which is why ActiveX have got such a bad security rep.

MS has progressively restricted ActiveX controls to the point where they are actually comparable to plugins (which share the same security issues). You now have to permit websites to run even the standard ActiveX controls.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[RightSaidFred99]

Sorry, the GPL has nothing to do with Linux's success. Linux was successful because it had less of a strict central-planning theme. People like the "some dude out there in a basement" idea and jumped on it because it was easy to tweak and modify.

Apache httpd is of course ridiculously successful - it's not GPL'd.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[anss123]

My web people here spend time designing pages that work and then waste countless hours tweaking them to work with MSIE afterward. Best to let some things look "weird" in MSIE and post a message stating why.

As long as the message is not obnoxious. While you web designers put a lot of importance in a pixel perfect look, me and I suspect most of the web inhabitants don't really give a damn.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[Hal_Porter]

Their Outlook Web Access application is decidedly more feature-filled for IE than it is for Firefox, for example.

That's because they added features to IE to speed up OWA. Including, interstingly enough XMLHttpRequest, the basis of Ajax. What's interesting is that Microsoft supported this in IE 5 in 1999 via an ActiveX control. Mozilla implemented it as a native object in 2002. Opera copied Mozilla's implementation in Opera 8 in 2005. Finally Microsoft added support for the Mozilla/Opera native object implementation in IE 7 in 2006.

The WWWC published a spec for XMLHTTPRequest in 2008.

So it's not true that Microsoft "don't follow standards". They actually support functionality before the painfully sluggish WWWC standardise it. So in fact do Mozilla, it's just that the WWWC end up making the Mozilla implementation the standard.

And they support OWA on Firefox, they just don't make as feature filled. That seems ok to me. It's not like they tie OWA to IE. I.e. you have an advantage of using IE with OWA, but they don't force you to.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[nine-times]

Yes, they were Mac or Linux centric sites.

It's not like I was trying to be tricky and sneak that past anyone. Of course they weren't super-mainstream sites where they were anticipating a lot of IE traffic. I was just saying I've seen a few, out there. Often they're web applications or something where it's a bigger problem than just whether things display properly. But, for example, Apple's MobileMe service advises that you don't use IE when viewing their site. I forget what the other sites were, but I've seen a few web apps that weren't necessarily Linux/Mac focussed that said they didn't advise IE, even if they then proceeded to allow you to access it in IE anyway.

Still, even though it's only a few sites, it's out there, and it's not just sites that are doing it to be snarky. They were reputable sites that were doing serious and functional things, run by people who clearly didn't want to put in all the time and effort to support IE's little way of doing things. As someone who's done some web development (not even all that much), I find it understandable.

And my post was implying that it's not very significant now, but it would be a funny little karmic joke if the number of sites doing it did become significant.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[BenoitRen]

That's true, but there are also other things to consider.

No one will use a web browser that breaks a lot of pages. I guess they must have decided that enough pages use innerHTML to warrant inclusion.

There's also the fact that JavaScript is also used by the XUL applications that run on top of the Gecko framework. innerHTML might be useful to some.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[BenoitRen]

It's a horrible idea. Websites should never discriminate against web browsers, even those strange ones from Redmond. The web is supposed to be open to everyone.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[plague3106]

So... you have one. One which is still completely usable in FF as well.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[nschubach]

No, the ponies are working for you... keep it going. ;)

April 1st, 2006 tells us ponies are okay here.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[fmoliveira]

Microsoft Project Server can only be acessed trough IE http://office.microsoft.com/pt-br/projectserver/default.aspx

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[i.of.the.storm]

I wasn't aware that being W3C compliant meant not including additional features. Does that even make any sense? AFAIK, most browsers have their own set of extra CSS tags prefixed with the vendor name, like -moz-rounded-corners and such, which Firefox uses for parts of the UI. Is that not allowed too? Oh crap, I guess we all better use lynx, none of that useless non-compliant GUI business.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[shutdown -p now]

Do you have any good standards-compliant alternative to contenteditable and innerHTML (BBcode isn't it, obviously - it's not WYSIWYG)? Maybe, you know, it was just a good idea overall, which is why all other browsers started supporting it eventually?

By the way, aren't they going to be standardize both innerHTML and contenteditable in HTML5?

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[shutdown -p now]

Since Microsoft has deliberately chosen to keep certain details of ActiveX a complete an utter secret and tie it into Windows, there's no way for anyone to implement on a non-Windows platform.

There are no details of ActiveX that are a "complete and utter secret". The spec and APIs are all completely open and have been for ages, which is why e.g. Wine has a COM implementation and can run IE with all its ActiveX plugins.

The "tie into Windows" part is there because an ActiveX control is really just a PE DLL which is free to use Win32 API. For practical purposes, ActiveX is not any different from e.g. KParts, and it mostly serves the same purpose - it's just that IE also exposes it for use from within web pages (which, I agree, was a mistake in the large scheme of things).

But worry not, with Silverlight now released, ActiveX usage in browsers is going to be killed by MS itself soon enough.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[BadAnalogyGuy]

It is terrible in Firefox if you have to deal with more than one language.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[complete loony]

Bah, I used Ajax style techniques with iframes or java applets years before I ever heard of XMLHttpRequest.

While microsoft engineers may have been in a better place to establish a standard way of doing it, Ajax is an obvious idea, and many people can claim to have implemented it.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[Anonymous Coward]

innerHTML is nothing, try xmlHTTPRequest.

See how far you get without that IE innovation.

Admittedly AJAX stuff can and was done without it via iframes, but you can't say it wasnt useful.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[morgan_greywolf]

Standards compliancy != no additional features.

Standards compliance == no additional features that break the standard.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[plague3106]

Wow... you're getting more and more specific with your complaint. Hardly seems like a valid complaint that "MS web service applications" are totally inaccessable. I suggest you drop this debate here.. even the OP can't really come up with anything, and my question was aimed at him.. not some guy that comes along and lists ONE application that may or may not even be what the OPO meant.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[Anonymous Coward]

The difference being that when MS does it, it's evil and monopolistic lock-in.

When someone other does that same thing, it's pragmatic and innovation.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[lamapper]

But worry not, with Silverlight now released, ActiveX usage in browsers is going to be killed by MS itself soon enough.

Silverlight, err, sure, that will not create more vendor lock in...ummm, yea, right....; Fortunately they have only a small percentage of the market so far and if a website attempts to force silverlight, as NBC attempted with the Olympics last year, we can just say no and find another source for the information. Thankfully there are open source codecs for H.264 which is superior to either VC-1 or VC-6 (I wonder if the newer VC-6L will be better or not?)

I agree with others that Active X opens up and creates more problems than it is worth, thankfully there are other ways to do everything that Active X will do for you. So if you decide to use ActiveX, then IMO you have made a questionable business decision that opens up more risk than you should assume for your website. Admittedly if your IT Mgmt has already drunk on the proprietary-is-the only-solution cool-aid there is not much you can do. I would suggest keeping that job until you find a better job with a more forward looking and thinking IT Management structure than you have now, but that is just me. It is getting easier as more of these stuck in the old way is the ONLY way attitudes move on and retire. It will get easier, honest.

More to the point of the article, how can any entity test proprietary code if the company will not release said proprietary code. And its not just proprietary code, as others have mentioned proprietary data storage and manipulation formats. How many of you are looking seriously at proprietary CODECS (audio and especially video)

Seems to me it would be a wiser course of action for all developers to avoid proprietary lock in, they probably can in 80% or more of all circumstances if they try. At least educate your management streams to the possibility, if presented correctly I really do not see the issue with, if we use this codec/data format, instead of xx% of users being able to use our information; 100% of our customers (regardless of their preferences of Microsoft, MacIntosh, Unix or Linux) will be able to use the information on our company's website. Seems like a no brain-er to me.

Take Silverlight for instance, you do NOT have to use it, there are other alternatives. Look at Flash, you can develop Flash with whatever code, even Adobe's, but makes sure it will play with the FREE Gnash Flash movie player, not just the Adobe player. Does your content play with other players than Adobes player, just because they have 80% of the market is no reason to get locked in. That just creates hassles for your customers.

Also more and more hand held devices are coming with Linux embedded because Linux will run faster and more apps with less memory and less of a processor than other embedded Oss. If you are producing video output for PCs and hand-helds you are already creating multiple output data streams as you must accommodate differences in processor speed, memory and available bandwidth (cellular, wifi and High Speed Internet)

Since there are open source and free players and free CODECs, why not just switch to a player like MPlayer, which not only works with Linux (BSD, Solaris, etc...), MacIntosh, but also Microsoft Windows. Why limit anyone? Best of all as more sites implement High Definition videos with higher than 30 frames per second, (too many people are in denial about this...if I can view something in a better quailty, higher fps, higher resolution, you bet I will PREFER that website) this player will be able to handle them. In spite of H.264 being a superior yet FREE codec, still the majority of sites default to Adobe Flash players (80%) and Microsoft Media Player; players that can NOT play h.264, go figure ⦠Okay, I get that it is easier for you. You would think you would like an

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[lamapper]

It's a horrible idea. Websites should never discriminate against web browsers, even those strange ones from Redmond. The web is supposed to be open to everyone.

As it is horrible to lock-in customers with proprietary data formats.

As it is horrible to lock-in customers with proprietary codecs.

As it is horrible to lock-in customers with software (.NET, Active X, Microsoft Project, Office, Outlook, Silverlight and many others) that will not let them share their data with others that do NOT use the Microsoft platform.

As it is horrible to act like you are working with standards setting committees when really you are there ONLY pushing your own agenda and refusing to compromise to better standards because that will prevent you from locking in customers with your IE browser.

As it is horrible to bully hardware providers into developing hardware for only your software.

As it is horrible to bully BIOS providers in catering to your software.

As it is horrible to threaten suppliers with pulling your products (which is over 40% of their profit) if they dare carry a competitors product. Or to force suppliers to carry additional copies of your not wanted operating system software (i.e. Vista) with the threats that the next release of your software will not be available to them in enough numbers if they do NOT accept the extra they cannot sale.

As it is horrible to market, extend and replace software with Microsoft's poorer, less functional software but bundled into the operating system software. Often at the expense of innovation in order to dominate the market. Kudos to them for this one, they have been very successful, but at what cost?

It is horrible to act like another companies partner and advocate only to replace them in their vertical market place. (There are too many examples to list, the most recent ones are the Virus and Ad Ware software companies that will not have a marketplace as Microsoft has publicly stated they are replacing them and the Linux and MacIntosh marketplace do NOT need them.

You really should read some of the blogs and posts on owners of website that honestly tried to work with Microsoft with the Web 2.0 standards...shame I do NOT have their links in front of me to share with you; as you would have to either work for Microsoft or be a Microsoft Shill not to see the truth in their statements. It honestly disgusted me.

While I agree with you that it is a horrible idea, I cannot condemn anyone for wanting to turn the tables on I.E.; it really has been a long time coming.

Fact of the matter, the only thing that will honestly bring them back to the standards setting table will be a huge loss of market share because of their resistance to adopting standards. While they have lost allot of market share, they have NOT lost enough yet to even consider changing their historically documented and factual past of interference and obstructionism.

I was forced to support their shenanigans years ago and experienced Microsoft support first hand stating that what I was experiencing was not happening, did not happen, or else I was doing something wrong. Thank goodness that I had enough knowledge to counter their BS, excuses and their LIES; as it almost cost me my Systems Administration job with a telco. That was my FIRST HAND EXPERIENCE back in the day with General Protection Faults...disgusting and horrible. I was in the IT field operations, programming and supporting users before Microsoft ever existed and I have seen almost all of it first hand. As you gain experience you learn what to avoid and it does become easier.

And I have been current with them through to XP, but am off the farm finally, thank goodness, because of their current (and past) business policies of forced updates, forced compliance checks and ignoring my experience. When I set something to not happen until I decide it should happen, that is what I expect to happen. Mid way th

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[shutdown -p now]

Take Silverlight for instance, you do NOT have to use it, there are other alternatives. Look at Flash, you can develop Flash with whatever code, even Adobe's, but makes sure it will play with the FREE Gnash Flash movie player [slashdot.org], not just the Adobe player.

Yes, but you can do the same with Silverlight and Moonlight. What makes Flash better?

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[lamapper]

Take Silverlight for instance, you do NOT have to use it, there are other alternatives. Look at Flash, you can develop Flash with whatever code, even Adobe's, but makes sure it will play with the FREE Gnash Flash movie player [slashdot.org], not just the Adobe player.

Yes, but you can do the same with Silverlight and Moonlight. What makes Flash better?

Most people when they refer to Flash are talking about Adobe Flash and Adobe Flash reader only. I am not. I am suggesting that create Flash content with whatever software tools that you want, but on your website, DO NOT offer an "Adobe" specific version as the first or only choice.

If how ever you encode it allows it to be opened with Gnash or Flash Player, great.

If how ever you encode it, lets say you use an Adobe specific library and/or function that only can be understood by Adobe Flash Player, so that Gnash or other non-Adobe- specific-Flash players can NOT open it, not good at all. Best to avoid problems due to lock in.

Personally I do not think either Flash or Silverlight either one are superior to a an encoded H.264 CODEC enabled video. Though admittedly it depends on the settings used by the person who encodes the video. It is telling that to get close, not equivalent to, H.264 quality with other CODECs you have to increase the resolution and the FPS. Per this evaluation of video codecs (H.264, VC-6, and VC-1) In all comparisons, H.264 exhibited the best still frame quality. . They analyzed individual still frames of various videos looking for problems with the images and side effects by inferior encoding and compression methods, not just still pictures. H.264 encoded Videos were better of higher quality and better to the eye to watch. H.264 can come in either proprietary or open source coding. The open source codec is superior or equivalent to all proprietary H.264 codecs...so why make anything proprietary unless you are lazy or have alternative motives..i.e. Software or Operating System Lock In.

Therefore I might suggest the MPlayer is superior to either Silverlight or Flash. And it will work under all operating systems that most people use: Unix, Linux, MacIntosh and yes even Microsoft Windows.

Flexibility, open to all; the fact that H.264 is a superior CODEC than what is standard for Adobe Flash and/or Microsoft Media Player is icing on the cake.

As a business that wants everyone to see my content and at the highest resolution and the most effective frame rate (fps) that makes sense for the bandwidth that I have available to me.

MPlayer is a movie player which runs on many systems (see the documentation). It plays most MPEG/VOB, AVI, Ogg/OGM, VIVO, ASF/WMA/WMV, QT/MOV/MP4, RealMedia, Matroska, NUT, NuppelVideo, FLI, YUV4MPEG, FILM, RoQ, PVA files, supported by many native, XAnim, and Win32 DLL codecs. You can watch VideoCD, SVCD, DVD, 3ivx, DivX 3/4/5, WMV and even H.264 movies.

Re:The EU is just bashing an American company

[BenoitRen]

While I agree with you that it is a horrible idea, I cannot condemn anyone for wanting to turn the tables on I.E.; it really has been a long time coming.

Why not? They're doing the same thing we hate about sites that refuse to acknowledge alternative web browsers that aren't IE or Firefox (and sometimes Safari).

IE is evil, but that does not justify the means. The better solution is not bothering to cater to IE's bugs. Users will see that the website doesn't display well, and as usual, they will blame the browser (rightfully for once).

Virii?

[Anonymous Coward]

Grammar nazi are truly sad.

One possible solution..

[Dotren]

Microsoft should follow the Linux lead here... the core OS should just be the bare necessities and there should be a user friendly GUI to connect to and download features and software that is supported on the Windows platform. This could be done for both free software (IE, Firefox, etc.) and software they currently charge for or that may be going to a subscription based system (Office).

They could kill two birds with one stone here, they'd just be packaging the OS so it is slimmed down and performs better AND they wouldn't be facing this legal crap every release.

Granted, I still don't see what the big deal is. Yes, IE can't be removed and it is annoying and so the law indicates it is a monopoly. I guess I've always viewed a monopoly as a system where you can't access, obtain, use, etc any competing product. This, of course, isn't the case with Windows as I'm typing this up in Chrome at the moment. I do understand though, this isn't the way the law sees it and I'm sure there are good reasons for this that I'd understand if I fully dived into the required reading.

Re:One possible solution..

[Ash-Fox]

the core OS should just be the bare necessities

No! I want a officesuite to come with every system, like Linux does.

Re:One possible solution..

[commodore64_love]

No! I don't want of officesuite, because I don't need one.

Why waste precious RAM loading a bunch of hooks & other junk for spreadsheets, powerpoints, and other programs I never use? Jeez. I remember when a multitasking OS could fit inside just 256K (Amiga OS). Although those days are passed, I don't see why it's necessary to have 2,000,000 K of RAM either. Eliminate all the optional shit (officesuites), and only load those components off the HDD as needed.

If they did that, they could probably pare down the OS to fit inside 96 meg or less (like my Win98 laptop).

Re:One possible solution..

[Anonymous Coward]

I dunno about you, but the last time I checked all the distros that weren't piles of crap were much more than just a kernel on the disk :/

Re:One possible solution..

[ColdWetDog]

Why waste precious RAM loading a bunch of hooks & other junk for spreadsheets, powerpoints, and other programs I never use?

Microsoft (and everybody else for that matter) isn't creating an OS for you, Mr. 640K-should-be-enough-for-anyone. They're creating a product for homeowners, small business persons, gamers, grammies, mommies, kids, idiots, politicians, secretaries and other riff-raff.

If YOU want to strip your OS to the bare minimum so your cassette tape drive runs faster, then fine. You are an edge case. RAM isn't 'precious' anymore. Neither is hard drive space.

Welcome to the 21st Century.

Re:One possible solution..

[commodore64_love]

Way to completely miss the point.

Microsoft can provide an officesuite AND they can provide a minimal operating system which works on 100 meg, at the same time, simply by not loading components until they are needed.

Re:One possible solution..

[Ash-Fox]

Why waste precious RAM loading a bunch of hooks & other junk for spreadsheets, powerpoints, and other programs I never use?

I have Microsoft Office 2007 installed (Access, Excel, Infopath, Powerpoint, Publisher, Word) and none of their "junk" is currently loaded into memory on my system, since I haven't started any of it.

Re:One possible solution..

[nschubach]

idiots, politicians

Dammit. Why do I never have mod points when something redundant is posted.

Re:One possible solution..

[Dragonslicer]

No! I want a officesuite to come with every system, like Linux does.

The kernel comes with a word processor, spreadsheet editor, etc.? Damn, I must have missed that in the change log.

Re:One possible solution..

[Ash-Fox]

The kernel comes with a word processor, spreadsheet editor, etc.? Damn, I must have missed that in the change log.

*Facepalm*

Okay, fine, "No! I want a officesuite to come with every system, like desktop Linux distributions do."

Pricing and OEM tactics are much more important.

[miffo.swe]

I think pricing and OEM tactics are much more important to look at. How is it for example possible for Microsoft do demand premium for XP on workstations while at the same time they sell it for spare change in the netbook market? Last time i checked it wasnt legal to use a monopoly in one area to expand into another.

The "marketing" support OEMs get is also something very fishy. Step in line and do as Microsoft tells you or buy your OEM license for much more than your competitors. This in a very low margin business where every dollar counts.

Wow

[Mystra_x64]

Its seems bashing Opera on /. make you feel both better and attractive at the same time.

Re:Wow

[Anonymous Coward]

Anti-Opera mods vs Funny Troll, now on Slashdot!

But if they don't include IE...

[TheJerbear79]

what am I going to use to download firefox? Do they really expect end users to learn to use FTP? I'm not sure the DOJ has thought this through.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Burnhard]

Why don't people mod this up more? It's a very important point. If OEM's want to put Firefox onto a box and make it the default browser, there's nothing stopping them from doing so but it would be silly of Microsoft to ship an OS without any browser at all. Are they saying MS should ship with Firefox instead?

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's actually quite diffucult with mozillas current ftp service. If there would be a simple path to download latest firefox binaries it could be usefull in cases where IE has stopped working.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[RedK]

Maybe you guys are too young, but back in the days, Windows 95 or Windows 3.11 didn't have a Web browser. And we still managed to get on the Internet. ISPs shipped CDs with browsers, or we would copy them over on disquettes (1.44 MB!). Nowadays, with USB flash drive and mass availability of computers, it should be even easier to get a Web browser on your browserless Windows. OEMs can also pre-install it for new computer buyers.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[jellomizer]

Windows 95 came with a primitive web browser it was good enough to download Netscape.
For Windows 3.1 if you talented enough to get Winsock working then figuring out FTP was no big deal. Besides most of the stuff on the internet was via, Telnet, FTP and Gopher the Web only had academic papers and some cheesy corporate websites that were nothing more then a bunch of fliers done in HTML.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Anonymous Coward]

Simple. Have a cut-down package manager-type program for installing browsers. It includes options for FF, IE, Opera, Safari, Chrome and any other serious browsers, and launches the first time 'web browser' is clicked.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[nine-times]

Well first, I think the big idea is that Microsoft allows OEMs and customers to uninstall IE and install Firefox.

Second, I don't think it would be all that difficult for Microsoft to develop a wizard-based application that allows end users to choose which browser to install from a set list, and even fetch the chosen browser from the Internet if need be. I bet Google and Mozilla would even be willing to cooperate with Microsoft by providing them a static link that always leads the the most recent version of their browsers.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Rogerborg]

Why don't people mod this up more?

Perhaps because we actually RT 2nd page of the FA, which suggests obliging MS to ship Windows with other browsers installed and presented to the user in addition to IE?

Wait... I'm on Slashdot, aren't I? Sorry, silly response.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Goffee71]

It goes back to the good old days of ISP CDs falling out of magazines by the dozen, that'll be fun and help magazine advertising sales

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[TheJerbear79]

OK, I'll bite... who pays for the development of this wizard? The very short answer is Microsoft does, the somewhat longer answer is we do. Why make them develop additional software the cost of which is passed to the consumer, that's a bit counter productive in an anti-trust case isn't it?

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Anonymous Coward]

It is simple.

Have no browser installed and include a DVD with Internet software that includes a selection of browsers. The other option is to have a feature in add/remove programmes that downloads the files to install any one of half a dozen browsers.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Inda]

1. Ask someone to email the install EXE.
2. Configure the bundled Outlook Express with your POP3 settings.
3. Install Firefox.

Easy!!!

(sorry, no need for my coat, I'll brave the cold)

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[SCHecklerX]

which is stupid. Nobody should dictate what Microsoft is or is not allowed (of their own creation) to include. The problem, however, is closed formats, APIs, and deals with OEMs. Those are the things that this stupid focus on bundling fails to address. Proper enforcement would focus on making sure you can interchange components at will. Let microsoft include whatever of their own creation they care to, so long as it can be removed and replaced.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Richard_at_work]

That was 14 years ago - today I expect a browser to be immediately available on any system I install. This would be a huge step backward, even if all I use it for is to bootstrap the rest of my system after a reinstall.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Anonymous Coward]

Windows explorer, which is internet explorer in disguise, obviously.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't wanna be in charge of the MS support call-center when your nan is asking why she can't explore the internet any more.

And what the hell is this application regarding foxes and fire. That just sounds cruel.

Really. It would be so much better to force IE to come inline with the security and standards regard of other browsers. Not just force users to change their habits.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Mathness]

Nah, make an application for windows based on gopher (proven technology!). Then add a feature or two, like make it possible to follow links and use http. And then, to prevent confusion amongst users call it Ni! (Not Internet explore!).

Only thing left to do is to have a default start site, where there are links to all (certified of course) browsers. And to keep it fair it would be headed by something like the International Organization for Standardization (Microsoft already works well with them).

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Fri13]

That is simple.

You get all most used web browsers on the CD/DVD disk what your internet operator gaved to you.

Or are you saying that you use Internet without Internet connection?

When Microsoft and Netscape were fighting browser wars, internet operators included Netscape and Internet Explorer browsers to same disk where was applications to set your system settings correctly for operator.

Netscape was winning then because they both were competitors, even both added nonstandard features. Microsoft was loosing badly so they used their dominating position on OS markets (Linux OS was just something 1.x version then!) and bundled the Internet Explorer to the Windows system and even integrated it to operating system in the windows system.

Then they released next Windows system version 98 and tadaa! all new Computer users were automatically IE users.... No worries about Netscape anymore. And no more need to install netscape browser from the CD disk because browser was preinstalled for the user.

To fix things, just demand removing the IE from windows system and ask internet operators to include IE, Opera, Firefox and few others to their Internet CD what you get when you get internet connection. No need to use FTP, just use the disk what came with the ADSL/Cable modem.

Oh, you do not use ADSL/Cabel modem... I see. (even the mobile phone 3G connection brings a CD with them. Internet browser would be included that too!).

btw, for what you need internet browser on your computer if you do not have internet connection?
(the html-engine still can be preinstalled on system!)

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Anonymous Coward]

what am I going to use to download firefox? Do they really expect end users to learn to use FTP? I'm not sure the DOJ has thought this through.

I'm posting AC because I work for a company that has Microsoft to thank for a lot of the money it makes (think in the direction of repairs and anti-virus), but it would be for the best if you could UNINSTALL IE AND WMP. They don't have to remove it as default, just make them uninstallable, there is NO reason why a media player should be embedded tightly into an OS, neither a browser. From a security standpoint, having the same app for local filesystems and teh interwebs is also something that only happens in Microsoftland. Give people choice.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[TheJerbear79]

The sarcasm! It is lost on you. :-D

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Kashgarinn]

It kind of is.. your reply that is

I think these lawsuits are just getting over the top. Microsoft in this case is interested in enhancing the user experience by integrating the web browser into the OS. I think that's fine.

And this has somehow given Europe access to suing them for as much money as they like? don't you think that's stupid? This is a clear-case of a company being attacked for being successful, this is just extra tax/bribes which is being conjured out of them, at least in asia the politicians call the bribes what it is: a bribe.

To me, as long as I can download whatever program I want and there's no artificial blockages, then I'm happy, and MS can do as they please.

The fact they add IE to the OS, I don't find anything wrong with that, and no, I don't think that other companies should get to piggyback on MS, MS made both an OS and a web browser, they can let people have the benefits of both if they so choose, If mozilla really wants its browser into a default OS, then they should make their own OS to spread it with.

It's also a tax/blackmail because other OS-companies don't have this problem. Apple doesn't have this problem, most linux distributions don't have this problem.

Hopefully they will win if they get sued because it's just a bloody stupid lawsuit.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[apoc.famine]

Because it's a stupid, ignorant comment. I would assume that anyone familiar with the internet would have used one of the following to transfer data:

bit torrent clients
other peer-to-peer software
instant messages
email
ftp sites
or even scp

It is not like there aren't many common ways to transfer data.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[nine-times]

Yes, because the price of Windows is determined purely based on development costs, and every extra penny Microsoft spends just gets distributed to customers, right?

In case you really don't know, that's not how these things work. I'm blanking on the correct marketing terminology, or else I'd find a good website to explain it, but basically there is a price point that Microsoft's marketing team determines is the "sweet spot", and that's how the price is chosen. If they increase the price, they get more money per sale, but make fewer sales, and therefore make less money. If they lower the price, they make more sales, but less money per sale, so they make less money.

The only thing that will cause Microsoft to change the price of Windows is if their marketing people think that the "sweet spot" has moved for some reason.

So no, the price doesn't just get passed along to consumers.

Besides, we're talking about a fracking "Wizard" that would fetch a file through FTP and/or HTTP and run it. Exactly how much do you expect that development to cost?

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[TheJerbear79]

Doesn't an additional development cost move the sweet spot though? I mean, I understand basic economics, but I'm not all that "into it." I would think any change in one parameter of your above equation would move the others. BTW I didn't mean to offend, I'm just playing devil's advocate for MSFT. :-)

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Anonymous Coward]

All MS has to do is emulate something like Synaptic. Fire up a gui frontend and download whatever Microsoft decides to make available - web browsers included.

Rumor has it they're already considering something like this for Windows 7.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[nine-times]

Nope, additional development doesn't move the sweet spot-- except maybe insofar as additional development changes the consumers' perceptions of the product's value. For example, if you add a great new feature, it can raise the sweet spot. But no, adding cost to the development doesn't change the sweet spot at all.

The significance of the "sweet spot" (I really wish I could remember the marketing term) is that it's essentially a function of "what consumers will pay for the product", and has nothing to do with the cost of producing the product.

If it helps, imagine this thought experiment: You've developed a product with a set of features, and your marketing people discover that if you charge $5 for it, you'll be able to sell 10,000 units. To simplify the situation, we'll only talk about 2 other possible prices: If you charge $100 for it, you'll be able to sell 4 units. If you charge $0.01 for it, you'll be able to sell 11,000 units. These numbers are based on marketing research of what people are willing to pay for a product with the features you specify.

So the money you'll make from selling them at $5 is going to be $50,000. If you charge $0.01 then you'll make $110. If you set the price at $100 then you make $400. Pretty easy so far, but we haven't talked about costs.

So it might well be that your costs are more than $0.01 per unit, in which case if you couldn't sell the product for more than that amount, you'd have to go out of business or find another source of revenue. But ignoring that fact, is there any cost per unit that could convince you to sell your product (given those three choices) at any amount other than $5 per unit? $50,000 > $400 > $110, and that mathematical truth doesn't change based on your costs.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[TheJerbear79]

I'm pickin up what you're puttin' down, and all of that makes sense. So essentially by adding to development cost you're not changing the end price of the product, you're changing your profit margin on said product. Essentially they make less money (however slight the shift is) and avoid trouble with the DOJ. That slight loss of profit, however, would inevitably affect consumers negatively at some point. Microsoft stock may take a slight dip, they may have to lay off a few employees. etc. Getting back to the core of my question, how does forcing Microsoft to not package IE with windows benefit consumers? If the answer is it will stimulate competition, there's already competition. Mozilla, Opera, Firefox, Safari etc. are all healthy competitors to IE. I would surmise that most consumers when given a choice as in our thought example, would probably click Internet Explorer simply because it's familiar. Just as most consumers use Windows over Linux because it's familiar. If the answer is it will benefit browsers competing with IE, while that may be true is that really in the spirit of anti-trust law? Microsoft does not have, nor have they ever had a monopoly. It's true they're a HUGE juggernaut, and a difficult organization to compete with... but they have competitors. To sum up, kudos to companies like Mozilla who have found new ways to compete in an unfair environment, rather than pointing out the lack of fairness in the environment. :-) Capitalism at it's best.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Anpheus]

But this makes all the currently free browsers have a very real, physical cost. And who will foot the bill? Certainly, I don't think Opera or Mozilla will do -better- in that environment given their significantly less capital to influence ISPs here.

I suspect that removing IE would only increase its market share, because ISPs would -only- distribute the most common browser, and most users wouldn't attempt to get another one after that sort of ordeal. (Regardless of how much easier the 2nd, 3rd, etc. browser install is.)

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[nine-times]

That slight loss of profit, however, would inevitably affect consumers negatively at some point. Microsoft stock may take a slight dip, they may have to lay off a few employees. etc

Well I guess you could argue that me buying a pack of gum could have an indirect adverse effect on the economy at large at some point down the road, but does it really make sense to make decisions through those sorts of twists and turns?

I think consumers definitely do benefit from increased freedom of choice, but anyway I don't want to get into a shifting argument here. You could argue that the economy would benefit indirectly from Microsoft being far more profitable, but I still wouldn't want the US government to be propping up private companies or giving them unfair advantages. Similarly, you could present an argument that the economy would improve if Microsoft were to go out of business, but I don't want the government to be in the business of shutting down private companies for theoretical economic gains.

My only point in this particular discussion is it would be trivial for Microsoft to provide a method for new users to download and install their own choice of browsers without incurring much cost, and that cost doesn't simply get passed on to consumers. Therefore, if requiring them to provide such a tool is considered appropriate due to anti-trust concerns, I don't think there's any valid and strong objection to be had.

To sum up, kudos to companies like Mozilla who have found new ways to compete in an unfair environment, rather than pointing out the lack of fairness in the environment.

Part of the problem with the argument, "other browsers are doing fine, which shows there's no need for anti-trust interference!" is that it's possible that the other browsers are only doing fine because of the anti-trust interference. One of the allegations against Microsoft, IIRC, is that they were making alterations to Windows for the specific purpose of sabotaging Netscape. It's possible that the only reason Firefox runs on Windows at all, instead of being a crashing mess of a program, is that Microsoft is worried about the punishments that sabotaging it would incur from various world governments.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

I think these lawsuits are just getting over the top.

This isn't a lawsuit. It's a criminal case.

Microsoft in this case is interested in enhancing the user experience by integrating the web browser into the OS. I think that's fine.

The laws around the world disagree. Would it be fine with you if the power distribution monopoly in your area decided to enhance your electricity using experience and ship you a new TV every year and roll the cost into your bill?

And this has somehow given Europe access to suing them for as much money as they like? don't you think that's stupid?

Well, it might be if it was true, but it isn't. Europe is charging them with a crime and working on punishing them for it while forcing them to stop, all without upsetting the US too much, since MS is a huge campaign contributor to both parties.

This is a clear-case of a company being attacked for being successful, this is just extra tax/bribes which is being conjured out of them, at least in asia the politicians call the bribes what it is: a bribe.

You mean like the large contributions MS made just before the US changed their mind about splitting them up for their crimes and instead decided to do nothing at all? This is a fine for a crime. That was a bribe, even if such bribery is stupidly legal in the US. The difference is the people in the EU making the decisions don't benefit, whereas the politicians in the US were re-elected using ads paid for by MS.

The fact they add IE to the OS, I don't find anything wrong with that...

I have no doubt. Of course you probably don't understand what the law was they convicted of abusing or why that law was written either. Maybe you should find out.

It's also a tax/blackmail because other OS-companies don't have this problem. Apple doesn't have this problem, most linux distributions don't have this problem.

Yeah it's funny how only the people who break the laws are convicted of breaking the laws. That's pretty nuts.

Hopefully they will win if they get sued because it's just a bloody stupid lawsuit.

Well, this article is about the US courts investigating MS's criminal acts. The EU thing is the EU looking to convict them for the criminal act, and MS will lose that case because it is open and shut. After reading your post the phrase 'bloody stupid" did come to mind, but that is unfair. You're probably not stupid, just ignorant and loud about it.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Dragonslicer]

2. Configure the bundled Outlook Express with your POP3 settings.

And when an antitrust case forces Microsoft to remove Outlook Express from the default installation of Windows?

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[RedK]

Windows 95 release didn't ship with Internet Explorer. You're thinking of NT 4.0, which came with Internet Explorer 2.0 (the one where downloads would prevent you from switching web page). Windows 95 began shipping with a browser only in its OSR A revision, which was a OEM release only. The boxed version never got updated.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[TheJerbear79]

I'll reply to your last paragraph since that's really the meat of the conversation, point taken that the money involved in the "Microsoft Browser Download Center" wizard really would be pack-o-gum trivial. I don't recall anyone having serious problems running Netscape if they chose to, I never had any problems when I tried it, although for me it was slower than a root canal with a hangover. Although that's perhaps a problem MS could've caused. I always thought that it was just inefficient coding.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[nine-times]

Yeah, it's been several years so I don't remember the details, but I think there was some allegation about a particular patch. Microsoft issued a patch, and suddenly Netscape would crash at launch or something like that. Netscape issued a patch fairly quickly that resolved the issue, but someone found some sign that Microsoft had designed the patch such to purposeful cause Netscape to break. I don't remember if there was ever firm evidence, but that was the allegation. Anyway, the whole trial was specifically about Microsoft engaging in an anticompetitive pattern of behavior against Netscape.

Also, there was a source code leak some years back-- again, my memory is fuzzy and I doubt I could find a definitive source-- and it was found that Microsoft had in fact altered Windows code in order to accommodate Office developers, specifically to give Office advantages over competitors. Don't remember the details, but there were comments in the code about "This is to allow Excel to do X," X being something that other spreadsheet programs weren't given documentation or APIs to do.

So the idea that Microsoft was using its OS dominance to leverage other markets in an anticompetitive manner isn't any kind of a stretch. Sorry I can't provide links, though.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[TheJerbear79]

I'll take your word for it. I am, afterall playing devil's advocate for the devil himself. :-D

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[tnk1]

I learned FTP to download NCSA Mosaic, as I recall.

Wait.. maybe I used Gopher.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[shutdown -p now]

This would be a huge step backward, even if all I use it for is to bootstrap the rest of my system after a reinstall.

Why, just imagine, a stage-1 installation of Windows 7: the first thing you do is compile VC++...

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[C0vardeAn0nim0]

car makers are dictated to install seat belts, air bags, all kinds of flashing lights on the front and the back, put some basic tools to change a tire, plus a spare tire...

would you like walking on the sidewalk at night knowing that cars whithout all that stuff could be rolling down the street ?

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Hashi Lebwohl]

Hear hear! All the effing hypocritical whingers here -demand- , nay, -insist- on freedom of choice, well, Microsoft is one of those choices, believe it or not. Grow up, get a life, pick the OS you want, and stop trying to stuff open source down our throats. THAT is restriction of choice.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[rmdashrf]

While most VB hackers could make such a tool quicker than you can spell anti-trust, you have to take into account that if MS has to develop a tool that does that, you need to have at least 4 quadcores and 32GB of memory to be able to run it and they would need a development budget of around 300 million dollars.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Nero Nimbus]

No, no, no. You've got it all wrong!

They're supposed to telnet to port 80 and type their own HTTP commands!

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[Mattsson]

They should have a tool that gives you a list of software that is available for free and that automatically downloads and installs them for you if you select them.

Re:But if they don't include IE...

[TheJerbear79]

Hahahaha someone mod this up funny. (I don't have the Karma, I'm an evil bastard)

Re:Pricing and OEM tactics are much more important

[gbjbaanb]

How is it for example possible for Microsoft do demand premium for XP on workstations while at the same time they sell it for spare change in the netbook market

I think YAATL (yet another anti-trust lawsuit) is coming on :)

How to really make it anti-trust proof...

[Goffee71]

Have one version with all the usual guff cut out (no "security", no browser, no apps, utilities or themes.) Make this the "Basic version" and let the user choose what browser to use, what security to install, what apps to run. Effectively this "lite" version is the gateway to the net and our chosen apps, where most PC time is spent.


Think of it as going to Subways - choose the boring brown roll of an OS, then add all your own yummy meats, juicy salads, hot peppers and sauces.


Sell it cheap and you kill Linux and stop the Mac horde in its tracks, problem solved - longer version - http://goffee-freelance.blogspot.com/

... and if you don't comply, we'll gratuitously...

[Anonymous Coward]

We're warning you, Microsoft!

And we warned before! And if you don't comply this time, well, we'll gratuitously warn you again. And again.

Heaven forbid, let's not think up incentives that would actually make it more attractive for you to comply than not...

I user IE exactly once on a new computer

[kitgerrits]

http://www.getfirefox.com/

Re:I user IE exactly once on a new computer

[Anonymous Coward]

But if you use any help files at all when using windows, you are using IE. It is used to render them. Also, automatic updates uses IE.

Re:I user IE exactly once on a new computer

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't even use it that many times.

Just copy it over from the thumbdrive.

Re:I user IE exactly once on a new computer

[Anonymous Coward]

Windows firefox download tool (IE), is much more bloated than the Debian equivalent (apt-get)

Re:I user IE exactly once on a new computer

[Anonymous Coward]

But how do you do that on WinX without a web browser. Sure, its easy on tux. apt-get or just wget the file. But... on Windows? With a non-technical audience?

Re:I user IE exactly once on a new computer

[wastedlife]

Help files I am not sure of. But as far as I can tell, Automatic Updates uses wuauclt.exe to connect to the update website, not IE. Going to Tools->Windows Update from IE obviously uses IE. One thing that pisses me off, is when applications call "iexplore.exe programwebsite" instead of using the default browser. When I change the system to use a specific browser, the app should not override my preferences. I guess that's just bad programming though, something in abundance in Windows apps.

Re:I user IE exactly once on a new computer

[dk90406]

You don't even need IE to get Firefox.
FTP it from ftp://releases.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases/latest/win32/en-US/

Is it still an issue?

[Deathlizard]

like I said in the last thread, Is IE that big of an issue when it's losing market share to competitors? IE8 isn't going to save it because it still has abymissial JScript performance and as more sites everyday are using AJAX, IE gets slower and appears to lock up more.

Over the last 2 years, it lost market share, and According to these guys IE dropped from 79.9 down to 68.1. Now Google chrome is in the mix and already eclipsed Opera's share of .7% within 4 months and stands at 1% market share, and it only going up from there.

This isn't 2000, When all you had was a reliable and fast IE, a buggy Mozilla, a decripid and virtually useless Netscape, and a "HTML compliant" Opera that can't render any site correctly. Now, there's a slow and locking up IE, a reliable and fast rendering Firefox, a solid preforming Safari, a super fast and easy to install Chrome and a better, but still renders funny sometimes Opera.

Re:Is it still an issue?

[Paradigm_Complex]

The problem with bundling IE isn't an issue with computer-savvy folk like us, but rather with Joe Sixpack who isn't going to go out of his way to get a new browser when he's already got one bundled with his computer.

Re:Is it still an issue?

[Dotren]

The problem with bundling IE isn't an issue with computer-savvy folk like us, but rather with Joe Sixpack who isn't going to go out of his way to get a new browser when he's already got one bundled with his computer.

This brings up an interesting point.

Lets say that they do get Microsoft to actually do some proper programming and separate out IE from Windows so that it can be uninstalled in such a way that the OS can go about it's business. Furthermore, lets say that they even get Microsoft to develop a wizard during installation that lets a Joe Sixpack choose from a list of browsers to install.

Is this going to make ANY difference to Joe Sixpack or is he still just going to install the first one on the list (which would probably be IE... fair enough since it is Microsoft's OS and they're obviously going to be a bit bias here)? If the average user is confronted with a choice of browsers, are any of them going to know enough about the choices to make an informed decision?

Re:Is it still an issue?

[RightSaidFred99]

OK. And...what is this bad, again? Joe Sixpack gets what he wants, why does he care?

Don't worry, I know what your boringly cliche answer will be. For the record, standards are picked by the market, not little committee's made up of one's commercial enemies.

Re:Is it still an issue?

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Lets say that they do get Microsoft to actually do some proper programming and separate out IE from Windows so that it can be uninstalled in such a way that the OS can go about it's business. Furthermore, lets say that they even get Microsoft to develop a wizard during installation that lets a Joe Sixpack choose from a list of browsers to install. Is this going to make ANY difference to Joe Sixpack or is he still just going to install the first one on the list (which would probably be IE... fair enough since it is Microsoft's OS and they're obviously going to be a bit bias here)? If the average user is confronted with a choice of browsers, are any of them going to know enough about the choices to make an informed decision?

It will make a difference, the question is how much of a difference. Probably not a lot, which is why that proposed solution is not a very good remedy by itself. In fact, it would be more effective to require multiple browsers be installed by default than it would be to have a one time installer. Better yet (from a market perspective) would be requiring multiple browsers and a mechanism for Web developers to launch other Web browsers from within IE (although there are numerous practical and security problems with such a solution).

Any real solution will have to be in multiple parts, to motivate Web developers to target standards, to motivate MS to target standards, to motivate users to choose the best browser for their needs. The free market has been broken long time and most people simply assume it is working anyway. A lot needs to be fixed in order for it to function effectively again and a one time browser installation option, is not going to be close to enough on its own.

Re:Is it still an issue?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't care.

I don't like you.

is this a little one sided?

[wjh31]

ive never had a mac so i wouldnt know for sure, but i would assume that OSX or leopard or whatever its called bundles something, itunes and safari maybe? if i am right then surely for fairness such rulings should apply to them aswell and to linux as the market share for both are slowly climbing

Re:is this a little one sided?

[Ash-Fox]

Linux distributions include competitor products, provided they are FOSS. They won't have a anti-trust issue, no matter how big Linux distributions become - since they arn't preventing others from competing with their operating system.

Re:is this a little one sided?

[Anonymous Coward]

The difference between Apple and Microsoft is a monopoly. It is the monopoly which makes bundling illegal, the bundling itself is not illegal.

Re:is this a little one sided?

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem is when you try to prevent others from competing with you. I think it's been pretty well established that WMP and MSIE were made only to strangle the media player and web browser markets...

Re:is this a little one sided?

[Anonymous Coward]

Bundling is only an issue if the product you're bundling with has an effective monopoly (over 85% of market share or something). The idea is that the monopolist is trying to leverage its existing monopoly in one product space to drive potential competitors out of other product spaces by giving the product away free (and undercutting competitors who charge). If the product does not have the largest market share in its product space, then it's ok to bundle.

Re:is this a little one sided?

[tb3]

Safari is bundled with OS X, as are a lot of utility programs. However, you can easily download and install another browser and delete the safari.app file from your /Applications folder. Then you can run System Preferences and set your default browser, if the browser itself hasn't already done so. And anyway, Apple has not been found guilty of violating the Sherman Act. Microsoft has, therefore different rules apply to them.

Re:is this a little one sided?

[Ogive17]

Maybe they were in the past, now they are just the industry leader in market share (which seemingly goes down every year). When does the EU leave MS alone, when Apple over takes them in market share?

I'm not one of the people who's answer for everything is "let the market decide".. but to me it seems like the regulations against MS in the past are working. In the US, at least, I see more and more people getting Apple laptops. I don't think MS is a monopoly any more.

Re:is this a little one sided?

[RightSaidFred99]

They haven't been a monopoly for a long time. Defining a monopoly by what people choose to purchase instead of what's available is stupid. There have been highly viable alternatives to Microsoft for a long time. The John T Trustbusters of this new socialist age, though, like to attach ridiculous market definitions and silly criteria (but, umm, what other OS's run Windows applications!?). Largely they're motivated by psychological issues common to your dweeby underdog who was picked on in school and they hate MS beyond all rational capacity.

Maybe some day they'll realize Microsoft wasn't the hot chick in high school who didn't look twice at them, and they're also not the "popular kids" dudes who laughed as they crammed them in their lockers and gave them wedgies/swirlies.

Anti-trust law should be applied to companies who collude to price-fix or who have government granted monopolies over physically limited resources.

Re:is this a little one sided?

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Safari is bundled with OS X, as are a lot of utility programs. However, you can easily download and install another browser and delete the safari.app file from your /Applications folder. Then you can run System Preferences and set your default browser, if the browser itself hasn't already done so.

None of this is important to antitrust abuse.

And anyway, Apple has not been found guilty of violating the Sherman Act. Microsoft has, therefore different rules apply to them.

No, the same laws apply to both companies. The case against MS, however is made simpler because most of the findings of fact are done and because MS is a repeat offender. Apple can bundle anything they want with OS X or Safari because that does not constitute antitrust abuse. You have to be leveraging monopoly influence through bundling, i.e. one of the bundled products has to constitute a monopoly. Neither Safari nor OS X is monopoly in the legal or economic sense.

Re:is this a little one sided?

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

is this a little one sided?

No.

ive never had a mac so i wouldnt know for sure, but i would assume that OSX or leopard or whatever its called bundles something

They bundle lots of things. But bundling, in general, is not what MS is being charged with. They're being charged with undermining markets, bundling just happens to be the mechanism.

Analogy. Bob fires a gun into Tom and kills him. Bob is arrested for murder. Jake fires a gun into a target and wins the olympics. Jake is not arrested for murder. Is that one-sided, or is it that firing a gun is not illegal, while murder is?

Re:is this a little one sided?

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Ha! You're a hoot! Those socialists and their antitrust laws huh? Whew! Keep it coming RightSaidFred99!

You won't like me when I'm angry

[Ash-Fox]

Microsoft, you have made the eeeooo very angry! And if you don't comply, we will write many angry letters to you, informing you of how angry we are!

Re:You won't like me when I'm angry

[cloakable]

Or, you know, grab a few million dollars a day again?

Re:You won't like me when I'm angry

[RightSaidFred99]

Yeah... that old rehash of the "teehee, they won't do nuttin'" doesn't really make a lot of sense. I mean, I get it - you're angry! Hulk Smash! Nobody has gone in and beat up that bully who picked on you in high scho... I mean Microsoft!

The only problem with your funny but serious joke is the EU did steal a bunch of money from MS already, and will probably steal more. Maybe the DOJ will have a another competitor-driven witch-hunt and you can use this jokey joke again.

Re:You won't like me when I'm angry

[swillden]

Or, you know, grab a few million dollars a day again?

Which, to Microsoft, is about as unpleasant as an angry letter.

As long as profits from sales in the EU exceed the cost of the fines by a significant margin, Microsoft can simply decide that their benefit from the lock-in is greater than the cost of the fines.

If the EU commission really wanted to hurt Microsoft, they'd ban or limit sales. The only problem is, that would also hurt the EU businesses and consumers who want to buy Microsoft products (the poor fools). It would also provoke an angry reaction from the US government.

Re:You won't like me when I'm angry

[Anonymous Coward]

The EU got far more out of MS than the DoJ ever did.

Re:You won't like me when I'm angry

[Ash-Fox]

The only problem with your funny but serious joke is the EU did steal a bunch of money from MS already, and will probably steal more.

I am suprised you call it "stealing" when they're trying to force a company into compliance. I remember when the EU was applying pressure on Microsoft by billing them the maximum they could (and after analysis, they found that the cost was nothing to Microsoft, trying to get the rates increased).

Meanwhile, the EU had a lot of pressure from the States to cease this action and the US government did have some limited success over this. Microsoft just kept releasing a lot of rubbish documentation in the meantime that has been stalling the EU for a while too.

Today is Jan. 29, 2008...

[Anonymous Coward]

That means it's time to kick off the 2012 U.S. Presidential campaign race! Yes, that's right! The only way we can top the level of hype that was achieved in the last election is to begin the next election season immediately! Please commence verbal fellating of the Democrat candidate and character assassination of the Republican candidate immediately. Hurry up, because the 2016 election cycle begins next week!

Read

[Anonymous Coward]

"We will make sure the NSA has full backdoor access to the operating system before we will allow it to release."

Re:Read

[indi0144]

Is it possible to detect a backdoor in a close source OS? how?

Has the world woken up?

[jabjoe]

I feel part of the reason Microsoft have got away with a lot of their bad practices is because no one with any power to do anything about it cared.

Now these people of power are waking up. It's not just the wining of nerds and does matter. Computers are like anything else competition is required or things become expensive and broken.

Closed source is broken anyway, but to have a company to make closed software on a closed platform, how can that ever be a level playing field?

Re:Has the world woken up?

[JasterBobaMereel]

Closed source is not broken for custom or specialist software (it never has been) but for mass market software it is and always has been non ideal

Closed source is great if it is part of a "solution" package where you buy the hardware, installation, support, and maintenance, oh.. and a licence for the software, all from one company as a package

In mass market software you are so far removed from the developers and do not normally get support included so the support systems end up being the same as open source but with none of the benefits ...

Re:Has the world woken up?

[Paradigm_Complex]

The EU has woken up to late. When MS was bundling IE in and abused it's monopoly to destroy Netscape, that was the time for something to be done. Today the idea of a browser-less OS isn't acceptable to people who want their computer to "just work." Firefox and other free browsers aren't going to sink because MS is bundling IE free of charge. It's a different market now which needs other things - such as open standards and standards compliance.

Nonsense

[Kupfernigk]

The EU Competition Commission is doing its job. In case you didn't realise, the US has a similar organisation which has investigated Microsoft, concluded there was a case to answer, but seems to have been pulled off by the previous maladministration. The last similar case was Honeywell Bull. EU competition law and US law are closely aligned because the EU took the US model as a basis. And I'm sure you realise that the two superstates are polite to one another, because the last thing they ant is a trade war. I am sure that the US Competition authorities are delighted to have the EU do the job, away from all those lobbyists in DC.

Just a simple example: the embedded FTP client in IE that integrates with Windows Explorer. It's a good idea, a sound implementation, but why should it be denied to other browser makers? It's not like I didn't pay for Windows Explorer.

Contrary to what you might think, I would like W7 to do a good job. I would also like to have it work properly in diverse networks, and be able to deploy applications and shares across those networks without regard to OS. I would prefer installing IE8 not to break some of my old .NET applications when it doesn't interfere with similarly ancient Java apps. If it takes Neelie Kroes to make Microsoft do this, I say bring on Neelie Kroes. She's now up there on my "great women in IT" pedestal along with Rear-Admiral Grace Hopper.

Possible solution for whom?

[Paradigm_Complex]

For the time being it remains more profitable for Windows to purposefully limit their platform (by ensuring it isn't as flexible as you describe, limiting it's compatibility with other platforms, etc) and have to deal with the EU then to just make a damn good product for the end user.

Re:Possible solution for whom?

[Nossie]

damn good product? ha ha you are hilarious,

I tip my hat to you sir:)

If they'd broken up the OS and office suite into separate entities I believe everyone would have gained in the long run (inc MS)

I'd suggest splitting up the console side too... but you wouldn't want the xbox to go bankrupt now would you?

There is a very easy solution...

[Vertana]

The only solution would be to enable the complete removal of Internet Explorer's GUI. The only reason I don't say to completely remove it is because it is crucial to Windows Update, among other aspects of that OS. However, to force the OS to tell the user, "You must install one of the above to get on the Internet," is ludicrous. The same people claiming that Microsoft's packaging are the ones who have no problem with Firefox being installed by default in Linux distributions. The only difference is that we have the ability to remove Firefox in favor of Opera, Epiphany, or what have you. Therefore the only way to achieve "equality" is for MS to include a way to give the user the option to remove Internet Explorer in favor of a different browser.

Re:There is a very easy solution...

[RedK]

Windows update doesn't use Internet Explorer anymore, it's been this way since Windows Vista. There's now a fat client that runs on your PC that takes care of updates. So one less reason to even have the Internet Explorer GUI/shortcuts by default.

Re:There is a very easy solution...

[drinkypoo]

Windows update doesn't use Internet Explorer anymore, it's been this way since Windows Vista.

Windows Highlander 2 edition what? How long is Windows XP still going to be available to OEMs? Ostensibly Microsoft is going to have to "fix" Windows XP.

One thing to Note

[Anonymous Coward]

Last I checked IE is considered free software - you don't have to pay for updates, it is [or at least was] available for free outside of a Windows install (IE for Mac comes to mind, though canceled now).

So why such a big stink about 'market share' for free software?

Am I missing something that says that if started giving away something free that was like something else someone else gave away, the someone else would have to support my lack of backing? Welcome to our world.

-/wordy-

Mod down, positive review of Windows

[Anonymous Coward]

If we allow this sort of behavior to continue, it could hurt Linux adoption. MOD DOWN.

Re:Mod down, positive review of Windows

[GigaHurtsMyRobot]

Lol, are you serious? I was serious... I'm liking Windows 7, and I'm not an Anonymous Coward.

Re:Mod down, positive review of Windows

[LingNoi]

You're serious? Like windows? *head explodes*

Re:Mod down, positive review of Windows

[jackharrer]

Woooosh...

People don't upgrade from what they're given

[Brian Kendig]

Right now, according to MarketShare, IE6 and Firefox 2/3 are roughly tied for market share (about 20% to each). TheCounter says that IE6 has 34% of the market while Firefox has 17%, and even W3Schools says that IE6 still has about 20% of users.

The moral of this story is: lots of people don't upgrade. They don't even run Windows Update. They use the browser they got when they installed XP, and they probably don't even know anything else is out there.

This is why, whenever Microsoft ties an application to the operating system, the market suffers. It becomes really hard to compete in that space. Right now, nobody's making money selling a web browser that competes with the one that comes with Windows. This is the way it's been for more than a decade now. The antitrust action against Microsoft was nothing more than a slap on the wrist; it did nothing to restore competition.

If Microsoft is so interested in bundling high-quality apps with the operating system for the good of its users, then why haven't they bundled Microsoft Word?

Re:People don't upgrade from what they're given

[Civil_Disobedient]

Additionally, a lot of people are running hand-me-down systems that are only powerful enough to run under Windows 98SE (which won't run Firefox).

Re:People don't upgrade from what they're given

[Brad_McBad]

In my case, this is because I am revolted by the IE7 interface, and am pissed off that it can't be turned back to IE6 mode.

Re:People don't upgrade from what they're given

[Pope]

Install Linux, problem solved?

Re:People don't upgrade from what they're given

[Anonymous Coward]

Additionally, a lot of people are running hand-me-down systems that are only powerful enough to run under Windows 98SE (which won't run Firefox).

I put Firefox it on my parent's computer. It runs faster than IE and is less annoying. Said computer runs 98SE, has a 200 Mhz Intel Pentium processor and about 16 Megs of RAM.

Re:People don't upgrade from what they're given

[ColdWetDog]

In my case, this is because I am revolted by the IE7 interface, and am pissed off that it can't be turned back to IE6 mode.

Since you're relatively new here, I won't try anything really sarcastic. Just a hint. NEVER, EVER say anything nice about IE6 around here. You can get away with saying good things about Microsoft (in general, but only on Tuesdays and Thursdays). You can even diss Apple or Google occasionally.

But IE6? That's toxic. Like Plutonium. Or George Bush. Welcome to Slashdot.

Re:People don't upgrade from what they're given

[recoiledsnake]

It becomes really hard to compete in that space. Right now, nobody's making money selling a web browser that competes with the one that comes with Windows.

Mozilla is making a whole ton of money from Google. And Opera gets paid from Google, Amazon etc. for searches too.

Re:People don't upgrade from what they're given

[drinkypoo]

This is why, whenever Microsoft ties an application to the operating system, the market suffers. It becomes really hard to compete in that space. Right now, nobody's making money selling a web browser that competes with the one that comes with Windows. This is the way it's been for more than a decade now. The antitrust action against Microsoft was nothing more than a slap on the wrist; it did nothing to restore competition.

You're assuming the right to make a profit. There is no such thing. There is no reason why anyone should ever have to pay for any kind of software over the long term. The only reason anyone should ever have to pay is if some software doesn't exist and nobody feels like making it exist for free. It's not like you have a right to software, either.

Re:People don't upgrade from what they're given

[Blakey Rat]

"Revolted"? Seriously? "The 'home' button is on the right! PUKE!"

Re:People don't upgrade from what they're given

[BenoitRen]

W3Schools lists the stats for their site only. It's not representative of world-wide market share at all.

Re:People don't upgrade from what they're given

[BenoitRen]

Firefox 2 will run on it. So will SeaMonkey and K-Meleon.

Firefox 2 only recently got its support dropped, while SeaMonkey and K-Meleon will still be supported on Win9x until the end of 2009 or so (6 months after the release of Thunderbird 3).

Re:People don't upgrade from what they're given

[Brian Kendig]

Correct - they note that their statistics are likely to be skewed because most of their visitors are interested in using alternative browsers. This is probably why they show a 44% share for Firefox. However, it's still telling that 20% of their visitors are using IE6.

Re:People don't upgrade from what they're given

[jwilty]

This is a bad analogy. Microsoft charges money for Word and provides IE for free. Even if Windows and IE are separated, Microsoft will most likely not charge for IE as the other major browsers are also free. While including a browser may "stifle" competition, it is not the same kind of competition (read: the sale of products producing revenue) that we are used to. While I personally use Firefox, and have for some time, I recognize that the ability to browse the web and the ability to browse my computer are sure to merge within the next few OS iterations. I predict that future versions of Windows (Linux and Mac OS too) will use the same executable, display manager, and even window when viewing most locations; be they local or remote (this may even include simple text files). Windows already does some of this, though if you type a web address into explorer it will change to IE. How will you tell Microsoft not to tie IE to Windows when their response is: they are the same thing!

Re:People don't upgrade from what they're given

[Brian Kendig]

Of course Microsoft charges for IE. This cost is hidden by being part of the cost of Windows.

Re:People don't upgrade from what they're given

[Creepy Crawler]

And I looooooove IE6, Dubya, and I hates teh Apples! Go Pollution!

Re:People don't upgrade from what they're given

[Anonymous Coward]

On my 486DX 50MHz/16MB RAM/800MB HDD laptop even Windows 98 runs better than current Linux distributions. Old Linux distributions that can run on that laptop have crappy GUI.

To GP: Windows 98 runs Opera, but you really feel that 16MB RAM is a bit too little...

Posting AC because I have already moded...

Re:People don't upgrade from what they're given

[scientus]

mozilla/firefox is making million from google

http://www.scroogle.org/mozilla.html

Re:People don't upgrade from what they're given

[petermgreen]

Right now, nobody's making money selling a web browser that competes with the one that comes with Windows.
And they probablly never will, that ship has sailed long ago. Even if MS were to stop bundling with all of the top 4 web browsers free (as in beer) and OEMs and ISPs likely to provide at least one of said free browsers it's going to be pretty difficult for any payware offering to compete.

Why not just...

[Kindaian]

Instead of having IE and WMP installed, they have just the link to the installer?

The user at their discretion should be able to decide if they want that bloat or not in their OS.

(either at runtime, or during the instalation)

Windows 7 CMD Edition

[Anonymous Coward]

In other news: Microsoft, tired of dealing with the increased scrutiny, will be shipping Windows 7 CMD Edition to the EU instead.

Windows 7 CMD Edition will come on a 9GB DVD and boot in under 30 minutes. After which, the user will be greeted with a brand new "monochrome" interface capable of running exciting programs like "COPY", "ECHO" and "MORE"... much more!

No more worrying about which browser is your default while you're playing with "DIR" or saving the environment with "TREE".
Windows Media Player objections no longer apply as you can now play your favorite MP3s directly your built-in PC speaker with "MORE".

UAC will be a thing of the past as users are completely secure from Internet-based viruses and worms because CMD Edition isolates users from the internet.

Re:Windows 7 CMD Edition

[Kushieda Minorin]

Joking aside, a Windows 7 CMD Edition wouldn't be such a bad idea. A Windows install you could build from the ground-up, akin to Linux distros like Arch.

Not only would MS have a piece of the enthusiast market, but Windows 7 CMD Edition could eliminate the need for other potential editions (i.e. "for Legacy PCs", "Embedded Edition").

MS did it with Server 2008 Core, so it's entirely possible. However, since they scapped the Minwin kernel, it wouldn't come out as nice as one would hope.

Oh well, here's to hoping for a Windows 8 CMD Edition.

Heh

[pyster]

Not really sure why anyone should be allowed to tell MS what they can and cannot bundle with their software. Sounds like a fascist load of shit to me.

Re:Heh

[shentino]

MS can bundle all they like.

It's when they start giving their own browser preferential treatment that we quite rightly cry foul.

This is the very essence of product tying.

Using market power in the tying product (MS Windows), to restrain competition in the tied product's market (IE, browsers).

Re:Pricing and OEM tactics are much more important

[Paradigm_Complex]

You'll be hard pressed to successfully make the argument that OS's on workstations and OS's on netbooks are sufficiently different markets.

Whats the problem?

[EricX2]

Back when IE's competition cost money I could see why they would be in trouble for bundling a free program would cause people to think they were using their power as a monopoly. How many web browsers does OS X bundle? In KDE, isn't the web browser also the file manager?
In 10 years when MS is gone due to their so called non competition (and lawsuits) we'll have the same issues with whoever is the BIG company at the time due to these laws not being enforced across the board. Either you can bundle whatever you want or you shouldn't be able to bundle anything.

So... lets imagine a PC with every single web browser installed by default... which one do they put in their start menu? Do they put a program that says pick a web browser? What order to you put them in? Alphabetical? Well, who is at the top, they have a better chance of becoming the standard due to people being lazy and picking the first one. And you better hope it doesn't have anything selected by default or definitely that will be the monopoly version in no time at all. How about anytime a new browser comes out it should be a automatically installed as a critical windows update and so nobody is the majority, when you click Internet in your start menu it randomly picks a different one each time.

So what's next? I think freecell has a monopoly.

Re:Whats the problem?

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Either you can bundle whatever you want or you shouldn't be able to bundle anything.

Either you can fire a firearm at whatever you want or you shouldn't be able to fire firearm at anything.

Yeah ignoring the results of actions and writing laws that prevent actions that cause negative results instead of just banning actions. Brilliant!

So what's next? I think freecell has a monopoly.

Your lack of information and understanding is astonishing. You managed to completely misunderstand antitrust law or the reasons behind it. The funny thing is, I don't think MS should be bundling freecell, but that is not because "freecell is monopoly" Windows is a monopoly. Because of that power, MS can break other markets (like Web browsers or solitaire games) and consumers suffer. Products are worse, costs passed on are higher, and innovation is slowed or stopped. Please go learn what antitrust law is about and why it was written then come back and comment from an educated perspective.

Re:Whats the problem?

[drinkypoo]

The funny thing is, I don't think MS should be bundling freecell, but that is not because "freecell is monopoly" Windows is a monopoly. Because of that power, MS can break other markets (like Web browsers or solitaire games) and consumers suffer.

Look, Microsoft broke the law when they told OEMs they couldn't bundle other web browsers. Now everyone and their mother, including you, is upset at Microsoft for bundling their browser with the OS. But bundling isn't illegal unless it is anticompetitive, e.g., telling the OEMs they can't bundle an additional browser.

If I install Ubuntu I get the fucking kitchen sink. I get so much more software than when I install Windows it isn't even funny. How is that not anticompetitive? Poor little Opera software can now only make money selling their mobile browser, and that's only because there is so little competition in that space. Minimo for anything but Linux is over, because Firefox is supposed to get its own mobile version down the road, and meanwhile everyone else is just waiting for Windows CE to die the death of a thousand dogs amen, so basically the only slightly credible option is Mobile Opera. I have installed it on my iPaq and it is complete crap; both versions downloadable from their page crap all over themselves while loading the majority of sites which use more than a couple lines of javascript. They only have a chance because Pocket IE is complete crap.

So here's the issue: does Opera Software have a right to make a profit? If Minimo for WinCE had been continued, Opera Mobile wouldn't be worth a fucking penny either (Minimo on Angstrom is actually a pretty credible browser, if slow. It's VASTLY more reliable than Opera Mobile on WinCE) and Opera wouldn't have any salable web browsers. Oh noes! We should go kill Minimo!

YES, I realize that Microsoft has a monopoly position and abused it. But taking functionality out of the operating system is not the answer. The answer is just to take away their ill-gotten gains. Take them to court, announce you're taking away a bunch of their money, seize their assets if necessary, pour salt on their ground, poison their wells, piss in their cheerios. Punish them. If they decouple IE from Windows it can only make Windows faster and more reliable (IE, meanwhile, could hardly get slower) and that's hardly in the world's best interests :)

Re:Whats the problem?

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Look, Microsoft broke the law when they told OEMs they couldn't bundle other web browsers. Now everyone and their mother, including you, is upset at Microsoft for bundling their browser with the OS. But bundling isn't illegal unless it is anticompetitive, e.g., telling the OEMs they can't bundle an additional browser.

Your assertion that telling OEMs they can't bundle other browsers is the only thing that would be illegal is absurd. That's not even important. Simply making IE bundled, even if they allowed OEMs to remove it is still an antitrust abuse. Anything that gives them an advantage their competitors cannot replicate because of the Windows monopoly is an antitrust abuse. Antitrust abuse is leveraging one (monopolized)market into another market. They have to keep Windows separate from other markets they enter and it is MS's responsibility to insure that happens. A responsible company would ship Windows and IE on separate disks to OEMs and have different branches of the company and different individuals contacting said OEM about including them.

If I install Ubuntu I get the fucking kitchen sink. I get so much more software than when I install Windows it isn't even funny. How is that not anticompetitive?

Jesus Christ on a Segway! Please go learn what the hell a trust is and then how they can be abused to undermine other markets. If you'd bother to educate yourself even a little on this topic you'll see the answer to your question is obvious. Ubuntu does not constitute a monopoly on anything and thus cannot be leveraged to undermine anything. Your question is like asking why one person is arrested for murder just because they fired a gun, when another person fired a gun and was given a silver medal at the olympics. You have to completely misunderstand murder laws to even ask such a question, just as you completely fail to understand antitrust laws. I'm not going over it again. Go find out what the laws are and why they exist and come back. I'm not even reading the rest of your post.

Re:Whats the problem?

[drinkypoo]

Your assertion that telling OEMs they can't bundle other browsers is the only thing that would be illegal is absurd. That's not even important. Simply making IE bundled, even if they allowed OEMs to remove it is still an antitrust abuse. Anything that gives them an advantage their competitors cannot replicate because of the Windows monopoly is an antitrust abuse.

Actually, that is entirely untrue. You should go look up the legal definition of 'bundling' in antitrust, because you have it wrong. There are specific conditions which must be met in order to have antitrust bundling or tying.

Your question is like asking why one person is arrested for murder just because they fired a gun, when another person fired a gun and was given a silver medal at the olympics.

Uh no. While all analogies are suspect, it's much more like asking why one person is arrested for murder, while another person is lauded for attempted murder. If Ubuntu gained the monopoly market share, would you be screaming that Kubuntu and Xubuntu are evil and must be destroyed because they eliminate market opportunities for versions of Ubuntu with alternate desktop environments? Would you be shouting that Firefox must be unbundled because it decreases the chances for uptake of Opera?

The simple truth is that bundling by a monopoly is not necessarily a case of breaking the law, and until you read up on that law and see what actually has to happen (I would provide cites but I don't have access to all my bookmarks and scrapbooks right now, not being on my own computer, which is currently in the hands of HP for repair) then you're just going to make this error again and again.

One last time: Microsoft broke the law not when they bundled IE with their operating system: That is an example of a competitive advantage. They broke the law when they told OEMs that if they bundled the competition they would raise Windows OEM pricing and essentially destroy that OEM in the marketplace. That was an example of illegal, anticompetitive bundling. It's not the inclusion of the software in the operating system, it's what was done with that software (i.e. it was crammed down the throats of OEMs in a deliberate attempt to prevent the distribution of other browsers.) IE is installed when you install Windows, yet Firefox's market share is still increasing faster than that of Windows, which implies that simply bundling a piece of software doesn't guarantee a stranglehold. The software has to actually provide some kind of advantage, or you maintain its position with skullduggery. Microsoft did indeed use the latter approach, but including a web browser with the OS is not an example thereof.

Re:Whats the problem?

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Actually, that is entirely untrue. You should go look up the legal definition of 'bundling' in antitrust, because you have it wrong.

I have it right and you obviously don't know what you're talking about. Do you even understand what antitrust laws are supposed to be preventing? I'll give you a hint, it isn't preventing companies from making money by offering better products.

Go, read, learn, come back. Heck, read the post I made right after this thread and see why the bundling is the illegal part in the example I showed.

Re:Whats the problem?

[Creepy Crawler]

It seems what he's saying is that Linux might be the excuse to get Microsoft to be non-monopolized.

The only real way to compete with free is free. And MS cant do that.

Re:Whats the problem?

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

It seems what he's saying is that Linux might be the excuse to get Microsoft to be non-monopolized.

I'm not sure I understand. Linux might, some day, take 30% of the market and lead to MS no longer having monopoly influence, but I don't see how much Linux costs an OEM to have anything to do with whether or not MS's Windows OS constitutes a monopoly right now. If anything the fact that their main competitor is free and developed as a community effort bolsters arguments that the market is severely monopolized.

The only real way to compete with free is free. And MS cant do that.

I guess I still don't see the argument. Companies don't become un-monopolized. They either have monopoly influence in a specific market or they don't. How does someone else giving away an OS make MS not have a monopoly in that market? Given that they do have a monopoly, how does someone giving away an OS effect whether or not MS is breaking the Web browser market?

Re:Whats the problem?

[R4nneko]

You sort them randomly! Every time the OS is installed it fires up the good old phase of the moon generator and sorts em randomly.

Irritating for support yes, but it avoids the who is at the top problem.

*sigh*

[SCHecklerX]

It's not necessarily what is bundled or not. It's their #!@$@ business practices and closed APIs. I really don't give a crap if an alternate browser is on the system or not. What they should care about is that it is easy to put it on, remove the one you don't like, etc. You should be able to mix and match as you see fit.

This focus on 'bundling' has always annoyed me. Why should we force microsoft to bundle anything that they themselves didn't create? that's stupid. We definitely should look into their dealings with OEMs though! That whole forcing OS/2 out of the market with their exclusive contracts were not cool. Educate yourself on the real criminal behavior: http://www.usdoj.gov/atr/cases/f3800/msjudgex.htm

To test for antitrust, they need simply test how easy it is to mix and match different components. If the OS is getting in the way of that, fine the hell out of them.

Re:*sigh*

[ljw1004]

Alternate browsers are already easy to mix and match.

Any installed software can replace the default action when you click on .html files. Any installed software can replace the default action when you open an attachment of a given mime type. Any installed software can register itself as CLSID_WebBrowser2 so that *EVERY SINGLE APPLICATION* in the entire system who uses an embedded web-rendering control will instead use that alternate installed software.

(Has mozilla bothered to provide a web control which implements IWebBrowser? No. Has Opera? No.) But the APIs and hooks here are entirely open.

Re:*sigh*

[Creepy Crawler]

Why isnt the registry properly documented via comment code? There's soo many of those {qwrgqrwgq-wqrg-q3gqtrgqrg} crap that does X unspecified action on the system.
What would be wrong with mounting the registry on a drive letter (yeah, heresy, whatever) and having a structure like Reg:\System\Microsoft\Explorer\Window_Attributes\.. ? With that structure, it would be easy to understand what's going on in there. But I dont think they want us to.

You can pry /etc from my cold dead hands.

Re:*sigh*

[shutdown -p now]

What they should care about is that it is easy to put it on, remove the one you don't like, etc. You should be able to mix and match as you see fit.

For IE at least, the end user can do all that since at least XP SP2 (or was it even SP1?).

You can even make it so that when you paste an HTTP URL into Windows Explorer address bar, it opens your configured default browser, and not IE. I believe KDE's Konqueror in file browser mode doesn't even do that.

Re:*sigh*

[assertation]

Your other points are good, BUT IT DOES MATTER SIGNIFICANTLY which software comes bundled with the operating system as most users will only use that software and not download anything else.

How about Samba3 aka NT4 Domain support?

[Anonymous Coward]

Apparently this is broken intentionally or unintentionally in the Beta of Windows 7. This is a big issue as Samba 4 is not ready for production.

I hope the Samba guys focus on this rather than Openchange for the moment.

Re:How about Samba3 aka NT4 Domain support?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why offtopic. MS changing domain authentication to break w/ open-source file services is an Anti-trust issue.

Two cents from a Firefox user

[Anonymous Coward]

For the longest time I have hated IE due to its non-standards compliance and sluggish security update cycle; however, enough is enough. I don't see what is wrong with an operating system offering a web browser as it has become basic functionality required for many daily tasks. Is there something preventing people under jurisdiction of the EU to go and download Firefox? No. Does Windows throw a hissy fit when more then one browser is installed? No. (maybe competition over file formats though...)

This is just like someone building a new car and having the government take out the transmission because there are alternative after market versions. Why should the stock transmission be sheilded from competition!

coward anonymous

[Anonymous Coward]

Technical advisers to the antitrust regulators: if you need a magnifying glass just ask :))

You people are idiots

[Anonymous Coward]

I tried creating an account but that doesn't work, user id will be Throgorss. (for those dumb flammers who think people care that they don't like us not logging in). Anyway.

-----

You people are idiots.

This is like saying IE's browser renderer should be able to be disabled and replaced with firefox's renderer. Itunes music search feature should be able to be replaced with shareaza or kazaa's, instead of the default. Why should they allow this? It's their software, they wrote it, they control it. You buy it if you WANT it. You don't NEED it.

It's like buying a game, then trying to suit the company who made it because it doesn't have the feature you want, or you can't change the rules to the way you want them to be.

Noone is forcing you to use microsofts windows. Noone is forcing you to use a computer. Just because it's a normal thing to do nowadays doesn't mean you "have" to do it. You do not "have" to drive a car.

You need to remember that microsoft makes its products for the majority of the population, not for cults and nitches. Could you imagine tech support on a system which doesn't default to anything?

And here comes the flames.
Your all starting to sound like americans - Buy a SUV then complain about gas prices. Buy a gas only car and complain that it can't take ethanol or electricity alone (I have actually seen this). If you don't want it, dont get it!

And to sum it up.
Don't go to Mcdonalds and complain that there's only Mcdonalds food there, you can't require Mcdonalds to carry Wendy's chicken nuggets, so lay off!

Security out of the box, but ...

[Krneki]

Maybe, just maybe this time they will solve the security out of the box.
But what will happen after 1 month, when everyone has installed all they need and started to use Internet?

More EU "justice"

[Anonymous Coward]

The EU created an entire subset of the legal system which only applies to Microsoft. It's a protection racket- give the EU a few billion every year, and they allow them to operate in the EU.

Otherwise, their law would prevent Apple from "shielding" Safari from competition. And let's extend that, too- Google, the iPhone, Windows Mobile, and Blackberry all have to bundle "competing" applications on their devices, allow OS choice on the phones, etc.

But they won't do that, because that entire area of law only applies to one company.

Re:More EU "justice"

[jabithew]

The problem is not so much bundling, as the impossibility to unbundle e.g. WMP and IE.

I do think, even as a Good European, that the EU would not be doing this if MS were French. Maybe if they were British.

Mods: Offtopic? Really?

Re:More EU "justice"

[Anonymous Coward]

They won't do that because the reasonable examples you gave (Google? Google what?) are not connected to a monopoly.
If Apple would have monopoly in the smart phone segment they would be kicked to Mars for their behaviour.

Re:More EU "justice"

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

The problem is not so much bundling, as the impossibility to unbundle e.g. WMP and IE.

Legally speaking, that isn't true.

I do think, even as a Good European, that the EU would not be doing this if MS were French.

They convicted Telfonica of illegal bundling in violation of antitrust laws, and Telfonica is Spanish.

Re:More EU "justice"

[shutdown -p now]

It is absolutely possible to uninstall IE-the-browser (not the rendering engine DLL though) and WMP from existing version of Windows, as well as Win7. So that's there, and it's good enough.

Now, I do not know, but it may well be that OEMs are forbidden from doing so by license agreements with MS. If that is the case, I can certainly agree that it's anti-competitive and should be stopped. But that's just a matter of changing those license agreements. The technical measures needed to implement this are already in place.

Re:More EU "justice"

[Anonymous Coward]

>that the EU would not be doing this if MS were French.

Have you been paying attention to how many European companies have got their asses handed to them by Nelli Kroes?

She's the one in charge of all of this. See her most recent speech on this topic:

http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=SPEECH/09/1&format=HTML&aged=0&language=EN&guiLanguage=en

Called "Avoiding the protectionist trap"

So, to answer your question, the EU would go much further if MS were European.

It is actually the fact that it is American, and they can't risk a trade war, that they are this soft on Microsoft compared to how strict european companies are regulated.

Re:More EU "justice"

[Anonymous Coward]

(posted anonymously, since saying anything good about Microsoft on Slashdot is tantamount to showing up at London Gay Pride wearing a Margaret Thatcher T-shirt)

> The problem is not so much bundling, as the impossibility to unbundle e.g. WMP and IE.

In the entire history of Windows, has there ever been at least one verified case of some real person spending real money to buy a retail copy of Vista without IE and WMP? You know... the version that has a SKU and everything, and even has a lone, unloved copy behind the glass at the store, but nobody ever seems to actually BUY except by accident?

Yeah, I've intentionally used IE maybe 3 or 4 times in 2 years, and can't remember the last time I actually used Windows Media Player for anything, but for the love of god, the way some people go on about being unable to "unbundle" IE and WMP borders on religious fanatacism. If you don't like them, do what everyone else does: install something you like better, and forget they exist. Delete the shortcuts if it makes you happy. Change the file associations, and you'll never have to look at them again.

What? Microsoft doesn't give a discount for buying Windows without IE and WMP? OK, let's add up the prices of competing products:

Firefox: free
Winamp: free
DVD viewing app: de-facto free if you've ever bought a retail DVD-whatever drive... or even most OEM drives, for that matter. God knows, I've never paid actual money for one, I've bought OEM drives, and have yet to encounter one that didn't include a free copy of NERO & WinDVD (or some comparable alternative).

I swear, sometimes I wonder whether the people who scream about IE and WMP being impossible to unbundle get into fights with Papa John's because they don't want the fake garlic butter, and threaten to get the government involved when the manager refuses to give them a discount for its omission. Maybe IE4 DID bankrupt Netscape (the original company). Well, great. Circa 1997, Netscape (the browser) utterly and completely sucked, and they deserved to go bankrupt. Netscape 4 sucked so badly, Microsoft could have probably ported IE to Linux and sold retail copies of it for the same price as Windows95. It's not a secret... prior to Firefox (maybe, MAYBE Konquerer), there WAS NO browser for Linux that didn't completely suck. Oh, and how exactly DOES one "unbundle" and "remove" Konquerer from KDE, anyway?

As more than a few have pointed out, the pre-installed copy of IE DOES come in handy for at least one thing... downloading Firefox.

Plus, let's not forget the wonderful days when the only way to get "networking" was to spend a few hundred dollars on thirdparty clients. Especially Novell Netware. By making TCP/IP and NetBEUI free, Microsoft essentially destroyed the market for commercial network clients. Frankly, I'm quite thankful they did. I'm just barely old enough to remember dealing with some wacky thirdparty file & printer-sharing client for Windows 3.1 for a few hours at my first job after college, before figuring out that it wasn't needed at all for Windows 95 because it was built into the OS. I even remember the existence of thirdparty "Winsock" clients, though thankfully both OS/2 and Windows 95 spared me from that barbarity circa 92-94.

Is it just me

[Anonymous Coward]

Or does it always take forever to download FF from getfirefox.com with IE (no matter what kind of connection you're on). Almost feels like it's programmed to IE so that users would get frustrated to slow FF download and stay with IE instead..

That is exactly what MS fears the most

[SmallFurryCreature]

That windows will become nothing more then a gateway to the net. A basic OS nothing more and everything else is supplied by others. Because a basic OS isn't that hard to write. Most Uni IT students do it as an assignment. You think Linus was the first guy to program an OS at home? Hardly.

The trick is that building a complete solution is what is hard to do AND is what MS has made a fortune out of doing. MS doesn't sell an OS, it sells ALL the tools you need to run a computer. This in itself is not enough, what really powers MS is that for a long time THEIR tools were the ONLY tools you could use and be certain they were compatible.

MS doesn't give a SHIT about IE, for a long time it was perfectly happy to let netscape have it. Until it dawned on them that the internet might be big and that if they didn't control the internet, someone else would.

It is the same as with their office suit. people use MS office not because they need all its features or because it is the best but because everyone else uses it too. Since for a long time all documents where MS.DOC format you better be able to open them and write them if you wanted to do business. MS sells their software NOT because it can compete but because if you don't buy theirs you can't connect to anyone else.

This is changing and it is scary as hell to MS. Why are all cars petrol powered? Because that is the fuel that is available. By a car that moves on say compressed air and you won't be driving it far because there are no compressed air stations, just petrol stations. If this changes, then people can change the fuel for their car.

IF MS were to truly create a core OS for which others would then provide the frills, then it would very quickly find that someone else can not just supply the frills but the core OS itself.

Example? MS Outlook. For the longest time Linux users have had to jump through hoops to connect to their employers Outlook servers. More and more however I see companies going to purely webbased mail and voila. Not only can I use that with ANY OS, neither do I need to jump through hoops anymore to access MS software. It is a dangerous thing for MS. If parts of it are no longer the universal standard, what reason have you got to buy their software when there are far cheaper and better solutions out there?

No, your solution would not kill Linux or Apple. It would empower them and others to rise to new heights while MS would quickly die.

Try this, MS opens up DX10 to be implemented freely by say Linux and Apple. Exactly how many gamers would stay with XP/Vista/W7 and migrate away? 99%? Why do think MS is pushing Game for Windows after years of neglecting the market and even having their own rival the X-box?

PowerShell ???

[C0vardeAn0nim0]

is it just me or do other people read the name of that thing as PowersHell ?

I know I used to emphasize dosshell as dossHELL.

someone tells microsoft's marketing dept. that whatever you put in front of the word "shell" MUST be separated by a white space OR be turned into an acronym, three leters minimum, like CSH, KSH, Bash, etc.

or sick MoFos like me will find a way to emphasize the "hell" in "shell".

Re:PowerShell ???

[benjymouse]

I agree that the name is lame. The technology is not, however.

Re:PowerShell ???

[Techman83]

PowersHell indeed. Absof'ing useless. I watched my boss type some commands into the exchange box... my god it's just stupid! How long do commands really need to be???

We should file anti-trust suits against...

[Tdawgless]

...Ford, Chrysler, and GM since they're obviously using closed standards and preventing their customers from being able to use competitor's parts... Seriously, let Microsoft do their thing. When the competitors start doing a better job then we'll see them around more... for the time being, I'll stick to Gentoo.

Re:We should file anti-trust suits against...

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

We should file anti-trust suits against... Ford, Chrysler, and GM since they're obviously using closed standards and preventing their customers from being able to use competitor's parts...

Yes and since each of those companies has a monopoly on cars (thus the influence to be a trust) they are obviously undermining the market and abusing that trust so antitrust law applies.

.. Seriously, let Microsoft do their thing.

I'll consider taking your advice on economics when you understand the meaning of all the words you use. Seriously, learn what 'antitrust' means before presuming to advise people about laws regarding trusts.

Ignorance

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Look it's another antitrust story about Microsoft! Look it's already filled with dozens of comments by people who don't know what antitrust abuse is. Seriously people, you're making Slashdot look as ignorant as other Web forums. Don't people think it might be a good idea to know what they're talking about before telling us what they think about it?

Antitrust abuse is undermining free trade in a market using the large amount of influence a company or group has in a separate market. Antitrust laws were made because trusts discovered they could undermine capitalism by tying markets they controlled to markets they did not and then they did not have to work hard and spend money to make the best product in the second market; they could dominate it with an inferior product that did not cost them to produce. This also resulted in them having little or no motivation to please customers, improve that product, or reduce costs... undermining all the important benefits we were gaining from capitalism in the first place. Without antitrust laws, capitalism collapses into a series of competing monopolists, which is why pretty much every country around the world implemented very similar antitrust laws, which have stabilized economies and prevented the worst abuses.

Example: How to abuse a monopoly. Suppose I gain a monopoly or trust. It doesn't matter how. Say I contract with a city to lay the wires that distribute electricity. Fine, this is a common monopoly scenario in the US. Now suppose I decide I want to move into a new market, like selling bottled water. Legally, antitrust law says because water is a separate pre-existing market, I cannot tie those two markets together. The most common form of illegal tying is bundling. Suppose I start shipping every one of my electrical distribution customers a "free" case of bottled water every month. The vast majority of sellers of bottled water go out of business, because everyone already has bottled water. This is both unfair and destabilizes the market by driving good companies out of business without having a better product. Then, I slowly raise the price of electrical power distribution to cover my expense in purchasing and distributing bottled water. What if my water is not as good and tastes slightly off? What if the bottles are non-recyclable? What if it costs me more than it did previous companies and I'm passing on higher costs to you?

In capitalism all those problems are solved by the market. I'm motivated to solve them because it will make my bottled water more attractive and get me more sales. With monopoly abuse, I have no motivation to solve those problems. If people want electricity in their houses they will buy my bottled water, so who cares if it sucks and is overpriced? What can they do?

I'll tell you what they can do. They can pass criminal laws that make such bundling illegal. If you tie a product in a market where you have a huge amount of influence (either as a company or a cartel) to a separate pre-existing market, you are breaking the law. That law makes a lot of sense and has stabilized our economy an insured competition. A lot of people have proposed solutions other than antitrust law, that would let some currently illegal bundling continue and try to solve the problem in a different way, basically trying to solve a specific case by writing laws to cover that case instead of general laws that cover all cases. I think that is a myopic view and misguided.

So what did MS do? They took a product (Windows) where they had huge influence on the market and bundled numerous other products with it. These are products from separate pre-existing markets. When they did it, they knew it was breaking the law, but they figured they'd make enough money to buy their way out of trouble. They paid off companies with enough money to sue them successfully. They made huge campaign contributions to the people who were supposed to be enforcing the laws. They spent large amounts of money on misinformation campaigns to confuse people about the law and spread mi

Re:Ignorance

[Frenchman113]

Wow, what a long rant that says exactly nothing and is completely offtopic.

Re:Ignorance

[jaavaaguru]

Thankyou for explaining this. I was getting frustrated with the amount of people coming out with comments like "Why doesn't company X not get forced to give customers a choice of what browser they get?" and the general lack of knowledge of the subject they have while commenting on the story.

Re:Ignorance

[Creepy Crawler]

Antitrust law has always been concerned about physical goods and services.

As per your example, a state mandated monopoly starts giving out free water bottles while displacing the other water dealers. Ok, I agree that's misuse of a monopoly position. Now, we look at Microsoft. Back when Netscape and others were for-profit businesses, bundling a web browser was fair to call abuse of a monopolistic position.

I could argue and say that due to the boom of the internet, FTP, POP3, SMTP, HTTP, NNTP and others are protocols that an OS should provide basic services for. How else, especially in todays Internet, do you get a web browser if you dont understand commandline ftp? Or for that matter, find the server that hosts it?

And about the Monopoly position: do they really have that kind of influence any more? There's another price influence called FREE. Linux is free to download, free to change, free to do nothing with, free to develop on, and free to ignore. Linux is no company or organization to bankrupt. Linux doesnt care if it makes money. In fact, Linux is no more than thousands of independent groups working for the benefit of all.

How does Microsoft, champion of Capitalism, deal with thousands of neer-do-wells, many of which make this software for fun?

If there was a monopoly, there isnt now. That's because there IS a choice and that choice will never go away.

Re:Ignorance

[dhavleak]

My problem with treating IE bundling as an antitrust issue is pretty simple -- I simply don't recognize browsers as being a separate market. They're more like an 'aftermarket accessory'.

Web applications are pretty pervasive these days. Social networking sites, online banking, web mail, Google docs, photo sharing sites, etc. are all examples thereof. In that context, a browser is merely another 'framework' on which applications run. An OS without this framework is an incomplete OS.

So I still contend that the EU is just trying to extract money in this case.

Re:Ignorance

[dhavleak]

Well put. Installed base is a significant factor, but at the same time in the software world distribution and production barriers of the physical world don't apply the same way. Linux and OS-X at whatever low market share are worthy and serious competitors to MS -- and both have a price point of 'Free' on their browsers.

In fact, related to what I said in my reply to GP -- both Linux and OS-X accept the reality that a browser is an integral part of a desktop OS -- not a separate market by itself.

Re:Ignorance

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Antitrust law has always been concerned about physical goods and services.

I've never seen any such restriction and I know it has dealt with copyright in the past.

I could argue and say that due to the boom of the internet, FTP, POP3, SMTP, HTTP, NNTP and others are protocols that an OS should provide basic services for.

This sentence seems a bit incomplete. I'm not sure what you're getting at.

How else, especially in todays Internet, do you get a web browser if you dont understand commandline ftp? Or for that matter, find the server that hosts it?

You seem to have jumped ahead from MS's actions to being an abuse to discussion about the merits of potential remedies. One could just as well ask how does one use an OS that doesn't come bundled with a monitor. You can't even install it by sound. I'm just not sure what this really has to do with the discussion at hand.

And about the Monopoly position: do they really have that kind of influence any more?

If the CEO of Dell is looking to license an OS to put on his new line of consumer desktops, how much influence does MS have over him? Is it significantly less? If he doesn't want to license Windows from MS, can he expect to have his job in a month? Does he have any other viable options?

You could argue that he does and he could hire someone to customize a Linux distro, but the general measure of how economically viable that is, is how much market share Linux has on the desktop. So far, it is pretty much nil, so yeah I think MS still has monopoly influence by a large margin.

How does Microsoft, champion of Capitalism, deal with thousands of neer-do-wells, many of which make this software for fun?

MS isn't the campion of capitalism, seeing as monopoly abuse is anti-capitalism. In any case, they simply have to make a better product at a better price. They seem to be doing fairly well so far. In any case, this isn't about MS maintaining their monopoly against Linux. This is about the Web browser market.

If there was a monopoly, there isnt now. That's because there IS a choice and that choice will never go away.

MS's Windows OS still qualifies a monopoly legally, and they still have enormous influence economically, more than enough for their bundling to undermine the Web browser market and destroy innovation. They are clearly violating the law and since you can understand the purpose of the law in general. I don't see that there is much question.

Re:Ignorance

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

My problem with treating IE bundling as an antitrust issue is pretty simple -- I simply don't recognize browsers as being a separate market. They're more like an 'aftermarket accessory'.

People did and do make money from creating and providing browsers without an OS attached. People sell browsers as payware directly. That's a separate market under the law. It's not even a question at this point.

Web applications are pretty pervasive these days. Social networking sites, online banking, web mail, Google docs, photo sharing sites, etc. are all examples thereof. In that context, a browser is merely another 'framework' on which applications run. An OS without this framework is an incomplete OS.

You're making an arbitrary distinction, but it's a technological one. One could argue that an OS without BIOS to run on is incomplete and unusable and argue that on technological grounds. Antitrust law is about insuring the integrity of the free market and as such applies not technologies, but markets. It's not about what works with what, but about who buys what (or more specifically profits from what).

So I still contend that the EU is just trying to extract money in this ca

You can contend that all you want, but there isn't any evidence. In terms of the law, they are clearly in violation. A criminal complaint was filed by a competitor. They're a repeat offender and have done this in numerous markets. The EU has prosecuted other companies for the same crime, including companies based in the EU. The EU commissioners don't profit from this judgement in any way. So I'd ask you, why do you think this is about the EU going for money instead of trying to enforce the law and fix the markets for the good of the people?

Re:Ignorance

[Creepy Crawler]

me---I could argue and say that due to the boom of the internet, FTP, POP3, SMTP, HTTP, NNTP and others are protocols that an OS should provide basic services for.

I should have completed my thought. We have how many, perhaps 10 extremely popular and well used ports that represent vital services on the Internet. Shouldnt part of a Network Operating System (yeah, old vernacular) be part of providing tools that allow access and use via those ports? Isn't that what puts "Network" in Network Operating System?

These days, you need a web browser to go download, or even search where to download a web browser. Gopher is gone, as are all similar services. Search is care of Google, Altavista, Lycos, and friends; all who have no analogue to search other than HTTP (no simple analog: email search is still possible).

___

me---How else, especially in todays Internet, do you get a web browser if you dont understand commandline ftp? Or for that matter, find the server that hosts it?

you---You seem to have jumped ahead from MS's actions to being an abuse to discussion about the merits of potential remedies. One could just as well ask how does one use an OS that doesn't come bundled with a monitor. You can't even install it by sound. I'm just not sure what this really has to do with the discussion at hand.

What? If we go back to before IE, or perhaps before Winsock, what good would that do for the user? I remember Trumpet who sold their IP stack along with what I consider basic internet tools. There was also Mosaic, which you needed a gopher client and an ftp client to get. During Win95, they included IE and Winsock. Yeah, it was a monopoly which killed Trumpet and eventually Netscape, but it goes down to the core question: "What software should an OS provide? When is bundling extra software considered illegally utilizing a monopoly?"

you--- Paraphrased about influence upon top execs in the computer industry.

Lets look at Asus now. When they made their netbook, what was their first choice in OS? Linux. Linux potentially costs 0$, until you hire people to make customized installs, which Asus did. And that cost was, Im guessing, nil. Instead, MS exerted little/no influence. Its customers did, by requesting what they were already familiar with, and that was Windows. However with the netbook segment booming, MS decided to lower its prices to "be competitive with" Linux.

If that's not a sign that MS had to bow to competitive pressures, as in NOT A MONOPOLY, I dont know what is.

you---MS isn't the champion of capitalism, seeing as monopoly abuse is anti-capitalism. In any case, they simply have to make a better product at a better price. They seem to be doing fairly well so far. In any case, this isn't about MS maintaining their monopoly against Linux. This is about the Web browser market.

I know that a monopoly is more close to anti-capitalism, but as I said above it being software changes the whole argument. And no, simply making a better product at a better price is impossible unless MS offers software for free.

Just as we saw back in '00, web browsers are approaching commodity. I'd say they are now 100% commodity. Firefox is free. Chrome is free. Safari is free. Konqueror is free. Even Opera, which was one of those holdouts for charging, is now free (except in weird markets like handhelds and game systems). And for anybody to claim that IE is NOW an extension for bundling is laughable and non-existent. It was, back in 95-98. That was 10 years ago.

The bigger fear, is not just web browsers, but the whole OS is time for commoditization. We expect web browsers, mail clients, file managers, media players, compression tools, network tools, document editing suite, image manipulation and categorization suite, IM program, and other lower tools that come in handy at times. Microsoft would be fined if they provided these from their professional side. For that matter, even their 500$ Ultimate edition comes with about none of these.

Instead, we see Mac and Linux both

Re:Ignorance

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Gah! Learn to use "quote" tags, please.

What? If we go back to before IE, or perhaps before Winsock, what good would that do for the user?

It determines if MS's actions were legal when they started them. It's not fair to punish a company if they accidentally happened upon a violation. You questioned if their was a pre-existing separate market. There was when MS started and there is now.

that's not a sign that MS had to bow to competitive pressures, as in NOT A MONOPOLY, I dont know what is.

I'm sorry, when you have 99% of the install base for desktop OS's, you have enough influence to undermine other markets. In rare cases such as Netbooks or high end workstations or ultra secure systems there are a few other options, but nothing that makes a dent in the overall market.

...but as I said above it being software changes the whole argument.

You've said that, but you haven't explained how. Do you think for some reasons the rules of the market don't apply to intellectual property? If so, why not? How are markets for intellectual property fundamentally different? Since these laws have applied to intellectual property in the past, even if there is a reason for them not to apply, MS still violated the law when they did it and refused to follow the same rules as everyone else, so they would still need to be punished to be fair, no?

And no, simply making a better product at a better price is impossible unless MS offers software for free.

So they should make it better and offer it for free. I have no problem with that. The problem is that they have bundled it. That is illegal.

Just as we saw back in '00, web browsers are approaching commodity.

Again, I don't see what this has to do with anything. Commodities are still ruled by antitrust law. Free doesn't matter either so long as someone is making money from them, which most companies do by using them as advertising platforms.

Instead, we see Mac and Linux both with all these tools and more.

So, how does that violate antitrust law or undermine any market?

That default installation would break every anti-trust instance of law IF Microsoft did it, regardless if they chose open source apps as their options.

No, that would not. What would violate antitrust law is if they bundled those things with Windows or any other monopolized product. They can bundle them with their server OS, a Linux distro, or anything else they feel like.

That recent article about companies relying too much webapps goes deeper: Get rid of the branded servers. Buh bye MS mail server.

So if your revenue model is threatened by cheaper and better competitors that gives one an excuse to break the law to prop up your inferior products and force people to use them anyway? Is that your argument? If I run a sandwich shop but someone else makes better sandwiches can I burn it down to insure my revenue stream?

Commoditization of an OS is what MS has to rightly fear.

Who cares? They have monopoly influence now and are using it to break the Web browser market. Are you arguing their being threatened (so far unsuccessfully) in their primary market justifies their destroying other markets? I think that's absurd.

Apple's already entrenched on the high price side, slowing moving down.

Apple doesn't sell their OS to OEMs or site licenses. They aren't even in the desktop OS market. They were forced out of it by MS's monopoly in that area.

Linux is on the low side, at free, going only up in quality taking what works and ditching the rest.

Bu so far they have less than 1% of the market.

And we call them a monopoly.

Yes we do. It is not

Re:Ignorance

[Creepy Crawler]

Well, about the quotes: I hate web forums with a passion, because of my extensive usage of Usenet. Second, I hate HTML. That tends to go back to html-sending nntp clients.

---You've said that, but you haven't explained how. Do you think for some reasons the rules of the market don't apply to intellectual property? If so, why not? How are markets for intellectual property fundamentally different? Since these laws have applied to intellectual property in the past, even if there is a reason for them not to apply, MS still violated the law when they did it and refused to follow the same rules as everyone else, so they would still need to be punished to be fair, no?

Back when browsers were made for profit, Microsoft did infringe. That resulted in the death knell of Netscape, and other browser companies.

But then I'll argue what is the boundary to an operating system? Is it the kernel? Is it the basic drivers? Filesystems? Commandline tools? Gui environment? Window manager? Administration accessories? Basic tools like text editor and calculator? Network tools? Office suites? Network applications? Graphic, audio, and video editors?

Where's the boundary? By your argument, even one extra tool kills a segment, and should never be allowed. That's gobbledegook. So if there's a new protocol or something, we should actively prevent Microsoft from entering because of a monopoly? Now, the second they prevent a 3rd party program from RUNNING, yeah, bust their ass for anticompetition. But aside that, anybody can hop online, download their favorite client (pay or free), and use it on MS operating systems.

And to the argument that Microsoft is no longer a monopoly: I can download, legally for free, a network operating system that can handle all server duties, client duties, open nearly all MS file formats, run MS executables, join MS networks, and share it with anybody I wish. The only restriction is that if I develop using code from these projects, that I make the code freely available.

These interworking systems have took down the price of said software to approach 0$. Apache vs IIS, Postgres/MySQL vs Oracle (low end), XWindows vs Citrix, BIND vs MS DNS server, NFS/Samba vs Windows Server file sharing, WINE vs Windows API, and more. It's to the point that I can run Linux, log into another WINE application server, display Windows APPS via WINE over SSH. I used no MS libraries or software, but succeeded in using .exe's over a Linux network to display remotely Windows programs.

It leads me to believe that the only reason MS is still considered a monopoly is that people choose MSWindows, not the theoretical situation of the State mandated power company handing out "free bottled water". Choice is the factor that makes a monopoly position. There's choice at "Free", "Declared Monopoly", and "Expensive". Tells me there's not one any more.

Re:Ignorance

[dhavleak]

People did and do make money from creating and providing browsers without an OS attached. People sell browsers as payware directly. That's a separate market under the law. It's not even a question at this point.

You're misunderstanding my point. The browsers sold (for money) are aftermarket 'enhancements' to an OS. The reverse is not true -- nobody provides Desktop OSes without browsers.

You're making an arbitrary distinction, but it's a technological one. One could argue that an OS without BIOS to run on is incomplete and unusable and argue that on technological grounds. Antitrust law is about insuring the integrity of the free market and as such applies not technologies, but markets. It's not about what works with what, but about who buys what (or more specifically profits from what).

How is that arbitrary? I called out numerous, common, and specific consumer scenarios that depend on having a browser present, and concluded from them that an OS sans browser is incomplete. I can call out a specific case to invalidate your scenario as well -- if you get machines sans BIOS -- and bundle the BIOS with the OS -- how do you load the BIOS into the ROM? Technical distinctions are important when talking about technology...

You can contend that all you want, but there isn't any evidence. In terms of the law, they are clearly in violation.

Look, you can repeat that line about the law all you want -- and the EU may well agree with you, fine MS 10 billion dollars, force them to strip IE etc. -- that doesn't mean it's correct. The law might say whatever it wants about monopolies -- that doesn't mean that browsers are a separate market. The EU might rule that browsers are a separate market -- that doesn't mean they are right.

The EU commissioners don't profit from this judgement in any way.

The EU stands to gain overall by reducing dependence on MS software. The EU stands to gain financially by fining MS. The EU commissioners are actors for the EU. You know this already -- I don't have to spell it out. Everyone in this debate looks at it with colored lenses depending on where they stand. The law, and rulings based on it are also colored by these lenses. You need to stop pretending that the law (and results of court cases) are always right/just/fair. You have to accept the law -- no question about that. But in a debate you can certainly call into question it's wisdom, and rulings based on it. In this case, I am calling into question any ruling that says browsers are a separate market -- if the EU commission does rule along those lines, MS has no option but to comply. No question. But they will feel hard-done, and I will agree with them, because the commission will have ruled wrongly, and it will be their conflict of interest that leads to such a ruling.

Re:Ignorance

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Back when browsers were made for profit, Microsoft did infringe.

Opera gets paid by an advertising deal to make Google the primary search. OmniWeb charges a shareware fee. Google profits by making their services run better. Undermining the market injures all of them even now.

But then I'll argue what is the boundary to an operating system? Is it the kernel? Is it the basic drivers...

It doesn't matter. The law doesn't care what the boundary of an operating system is. Economically, it doesn't matter. What matters is the boundary of the market, when the bundling first occurs.

By your argument, even one extra tool kills a segment, and should never be allowed. That's gobbledegook.

No, only products from separate, pre-existing markets at the time of the bundling, which is, admittedly, a lot in the case of what comes with Windows. The thing is, nothing prevents MS from creating and providing extra products. They can sell them or give them away. Nothing prevents OEMs from bundling products with Windows. MS is just not allowed to force it on everyone. That's the law and when you understand how antitrust abuse undermines markets or simply look at the mess that is Web technologies today, it becomes clear why.

So if there's a new protocol or something, we should actively prevent Microsoft from entering because of a monopoly?

No, if there's a new market for a type of program, MS can make a program to fill that niche and sell it or give it away. They just can't bundle it with Windows, just like every other software developer.

And to the argument that Microsoft is no longer a monopoly: I can download, legally for free, a network operating system that can handle all server duties, client duties, open nearly all MS file formats, run MS executables, join MS networks, and share it with anybody I wish.

If Dell or Sony or HP decides it is a valid competitor and it gets installed on about 30% of desktop and laptop computers, then MS will be on the verge of not having undue influence in the market. As it is, they have enormous influence and can destroy other markets and have already done so. Sorry, but the argument that MS does not have monopoly power (when they have 99% of the market) just doesn't fly.

It leads me to believe that the only reason MS is still considered a monopoly is that people choose MSWindows, not the theoretical situation of the State mandated power company handing out "free bottled water".

You're missing the point. It doesn't matter at all why MS has a monopoly. It's legal to have a monopoly, just as it is legal for a company to have the exclusive contract to distribute power in an area. It's illegal to abuse the power that comes with having a monopoly. With the example of the power company, people can choose to run their own generators and bypass the monopoly. It just isn't in their best economic interests in the short term, so they don't. It doesn't matter. Antitrust abuse isn't about forcing people to do something at gunpoint. It is about making more expensive and worse products the right economic choice for purchasers because of power in a completely different market. OEM CEOs feel Windows is the only real choice they have to stay in business and there is plenty of lock-in and reason for that. As a result, the separate market for Web browsers is undermined.

Choice is the factor that makes a monopoly position. There's choice at "Free", "Declared Monopoly", and "Expensive". Tells me there's not one any more.

Except how do you evaluate what is a real, practical choice and what is an impractical or non-working choice. Is driving to the power company with a truck load of car batteries, filling them up, and driving them back to power your house choice? Yes. Is buying tens of thousands of dollars in solar panels a choice? Sure. Are they reasonable choices? The answer to that legally and practically is the percentage of people that choose them. At 1% for Linux and 99% for Windows, there's a long way to go before Linux is a practical choice according to consumers.

Re:Ignorance

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

People did and do make money from creating and providing browsers without an OS attached. People sell browsers as payware directly. That's a separate market under the law. It's not even a question at this point.

You're misunderstanding my point. The browsers sold (for money) are aftermarket 'enhancements' to an OS. The reverse is not true -- nobody provides Desktop OSes without browsers.

So? In terms of the market, no significant amount of desktop OS's comes without a computer it is pre-installed on. An OS is a component, just like a monitor or hard drive. By your logic it would not be a problem if MS required an MS branded video card to be purchased with every copy of Windows? How does that not undermine the market for that component?

How is that arbitrary? I called out numerous, common, and specific consumer scenarios that depend on having a browser present, and concluded from them that an OS sans browser is incomplete.

Because none of those scenarios you mention have anything to do with the market and this is a law about undermining markets. That's its purpose and how its defined.

I can call out a specific case to invalidate your scenario as well -- if you get machines sans BIOS -- and bundle the BIOS with the OS -- how do you load the BIOS into the ROM?

I could explain how to flash ROM, but why? There's no reason the BIOS can't be on the ROM already. You're making arbitrary distinctions that have nothing to do with the crime involved. The crime is undermining a market, so the crime is defined by the markets involved. People buy browsers separate from OS's and profit from providing browsers separate from the OS's That's the only distinction needed for a market to be undermined and that's the only distinction the law cares about. Rearranging the chairs on the Titanic is not helping your case.

Look, you can repeat that line about the law all you want -- and the EU may well agree with you, fine MS 10 billion dollars, force them to strip IE etc. -- that doesn't mean it's correct. The law might say whatever it wants about monopolies -- that doesn't mean that browsers are a separate market. The EU might rule that browsers are a separate market -- that doesn't mean they are right.

Make up your mind. Earlier you said your argument was that browsers weren't a seperate market. Now that I've shown that argument to be flawed you're changing your argument to a belief that antitrust laws in general are wrong, or is it that you think MS's case is an exception in some specific way aside from your failed argument?

The EU stands to gain overall by reducing dependence on MS software. The EU stands to gain financially by fining MS. The EU commissioners are actors for the EU. You know this already -- I don't have to spell it out.

So? What's their motivation to target MS? They don't profit personally, so you think they're compromising their values to benefit the EU for some reason?

You need to stop pretending that the law (and results of court cases) are always right/just/fair.

I think I already demonstrated the need for this particular law and showed how it is applied. The onus is on you to show why that demonstration was incorrect or why it is different in this case. I live in the US where we have this fundamental value of "rule by law" instead of rule by man. The same laws apply to everyone. This is the same laws as have been enforced against other companies being applied to MS the same way. Even if you think the law is wrong, MS is still obligated to obey the laws and try to get them changed and should be punished for their crimes. They don't get to break laws they disagree with.

You have to accept the law -- no question about that. But in a debate you can certainly call into question it's wisdom, and rulings based on it.

I'm g

Re:Ignorance

[dhavleak]

But then I'll argue what is the boundary to an operating system? Is it the kernel? Is it the basic drivers...

It doesn't matter. The law doesn't care what the boundary of an operating system is. Economically, it doesn't matter. What matters is the boundary of the market, when the bundling first occurs.

Now you're coming up with some fairly arbitrary stuff. How is the market boundary defined? By consumer expectations? By the EU? By someone simply charging for a product? Why is it right to take a snapshot of a market at a point in time and say "this, here, now, is what the market looks like -- and you cannot act on any foresight you might have that this market will naturally get absorbed into another one. Worse -- you, as a monopolist have to artificially prolong the existance of this market by refusing to follow the market trend -- by refusing to bundle a browser with your OS no matter how many of your competitors do that. Of course, once you lose the power to prop up the market artificially, feel free to again act as you please."

In today's environment all desktop OS competitors bundle browsers, and common everyday consumer scenarios (applications) require this framework (browser) to be present -- a browser belongs in the OS. Given that, how does it matter what the boundary of the market was when the bundling first occurred? What are you going to find MS guilty of -- having great foresight??

Re:Ignorance

[dhavleak]

OEM CEOs feel Windows is the only real choice they have to stay in business and there is plenty of lock-in and reason for that. As a result, the separate market for Web browsers is undermined.

How did you come to that conclusion?? Windows is the only real choice for OEMS -- ok, agreed.
Plenty of lock-in (ensuring that windows is the only real choice), well, yes and no -- but let's stick to the main point -- so agreed.
From there how did you get to the web browser market being undermined??

Re:Ignorance

[dhavleak]

By your logic it would not be a problem if MS required an MS branded video card to be purchased with every copy of Windows?

How did you get that from what I said?

Because none of those scenarios you mention have anything to do with the market and this is a law about undermining markets. That's its purpose and how its defined.

They have nothing to do with the market? See what I mean about colored lenses?

I could explain how to flash ROM, but why?

And I could show you a ROM chip I designed. Now, do you want to bundle ROM flashing hardware with the OS disk, or are you ready to admit that your analogy simply proves my point. Bundling a ROM with an OS doesn't make sense -- so it never happened. Customers didn't care for it, companies didn't see the need for it, it never happened. Browsers and OSes are natural allies. Bundling it made sense. Customers expect their OSes with a dash of browser. Bundling it simply made sense.

Make up your mind. Earlier you said your argument was that browsers weren't a seperate market. Now that I've shown that argument to be flawed you're changing your argument to a belief that antitrust laws in general are wrong, or is it that you think MS's case is an exception in some specific way aside from your failed argument?

??? I still say they are not a separate market. You did not find any flaw in my argument. I was merely pointing out the abundance of grey areas in your assertion that "In terms of the law, they are clearly in violation." -- it's a really tall claim you're making there -- you shouldn't need to argue semantics to back it up if it were true.

I live in the US where we have this fundamental value of "rule by law" instead of rule by man. The same laws apply to everyone.

I live in the US where we believe that the "rule of law" should never silent dissent. The law applies equally to everyone -- but we should never fall into the trap of thinking that it's perfect, and cannot be improved upon -- it was made by us, and is as imperfect as we are.

You may note the ruling hasn't happened yet but I'm speaking with confidence that MS will be convicted.

I share your confidence regarding the outcome -- but that's because of my faith in human imperfection -- and the EU commissioners are only human.

It's a crime against humanity

Watch those colored lenses..

angers me to know end that one greedy company clearly broke the law for so long

There you go again. Be very specific. Break it down into tiny parts. By bundling IE - how did MS break the law? Once you're done breaking it down, I'll show you the flaw based on which your argument crumbles.

Re:Ignorance

[dhavleak]

That was supposed to read "bundling a BIOS with an OS".

Re:Ignorance

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Now you're coming up with some fairly arbitrary stuff. How is the market boundary defined?

Defining a law about undermining markets in terms of markets is arbitrary? I suppose you think laws about theft that define it in terms of who has possession of items are arbitrary to? Markets are defined by the economically viable options customers consider when purchasing a product or service for their purpose. Since MS's customers are almost entirely OEMs the monopolized market is mostly what desktop OS's OEMs consider when licensing OS's they resell.

By the EU?

The courts make the determination as they make all determinations of fact in legal cases.

Why is it right to take a snapshot of a market at a point in time...

Because it s the point in time when the action occurs. To continue with the theft example, it's who owns the property at the time of the theft, not who owns it years later after it may have been resold.

...you cannot act on any foresight you might have that this market will naturally get absorbed into another one...

Except it hasn't happened. There is still a separate market for browsers as demonstrated by Opera, Safari, Firefox, etc.

- by refusing to bundle a browser with your OS no matter how many of your competitors do that

Every company is free to bundle anything they want with anything they want so long as it is not monopolized. I can bundle socks and Cable tV service and sell it, because I don't have a monopoly on either. Why does that matter to someone who does have a monopoly on one of the two items in question? Does that make the market any less broken by their action? If one person runs a cable to their neighbors house and sells them the electrical distribution service (but does not take enough share to undermine the monopoly, they can bundle water with the deal. Does that mean it is any more fair to people who are forced to buy it from the power company? Does that make their actions hurt existing bottled water companies any less?

In today's environment all desktop OS competitors bundle browsers...

In today's environment there aren't any other desktop OS competitors that have enough market share to mention. In today's environment, OEMs sell bundled OS's+computers+support services. Does that somehow invalidate bundling with a monopolized component by the monopolist? How? I'm just not seeing how any of this makes any difference. Please explain using my electrical distribution and bottled water example to abstract the concept.

Given that, how does it matter what the boundary of the market was when the bundling first occurred?

Umm, one of the primary requirements for the law can be ignored is a given? I don't think so.

What are you going to find MS guilty of -- having great foresight??

Undermining the Web browser market, intentionally breaking it to prevent innovation, hurting competition and competitors. You know, antitrust abuse.

Re:Ignorance

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Plenty of lock-in (ensuring that windows is the only real choice), well, yes and no -- but let's stick to the main point -- so agreed. From there how did you get to the web browser market being undermined??

That was a demonstration and refutation. The claim from "Creepy Crawler" was that MS no longer had monopoly influence. I already explained in my original post how antitrust abuse works, in particular bundling. They bundled a product from a separate, pre-existing market (web browsers) with a product from a market they had monopolized (Windows). It's open and shut.

Re:Ignorance

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

By your logic it would not be a problem if MS required an MS branded video card to be purchased with every copy of Windows?

How did you get that from what I said?

You argued that people providing browsers separately was not enough for them to qualify as a separate market (which I find absurd) but then you argued that browsers are "aftermarket 'enhancements' to an OS. The reverse is not true -- nobody provides Desktop OSes without browsers." Desktop OS's don't sell by themselves either, they are almost always bundled with hardware for sale, including a video card. So following your logic, MS should be able to bundle them too, since they aren't a separate market according to your new rules.

Because none of those scenarios you mention have anything to do with the market and this is a law about undermining markets. That's its purpose and how its defined.

They have nothing to do with the market? See what I mean about colored lenses?

No. I think you're having problems. Defining antitrust abuse in your terms is not any more valid than defining it in terms of things that come in blue boxes. It's a law about undermining markets. Claiming it should be defined by what you want to call a complete OS is nonsensical. No one undermined a "complete OS" they undermined a market.

And I could show you a ROM chip I designed. Now, do you want to bundle ROM flashing hardware with the OS disk, or are you ready to admit that your analogy simply proves my point.

As near as I can tell you don't have a point and you still don't seem to understand antitrust abuse at all. I'm not sure how much more dumbed down I can make this. My point is you're making arbitrary inclusions to define what you call a complete OS, but it is irrelevant because it has nothing to do with the crime as to what makes up a complete OS, just what makes up the markets as defined by what people buy.

Bundling a ROM with an OS doesn't make sense -- so it never happened.

It happens all the time. The vast majority of OS's sold come ith a complete computer system including ROM and BIOS. Get it?

Bundling a ROM with an OS doesn't make sense -- so it never happened.

I see, you want "natural allies" codified into law? Yeah, that will go over well.

Why don't we cut this short. Tell me, what do you think antitrust laws should say and explain how they will solve antitrust abuse, then I'll explain why you're clueless.

I still say they are not a separate market.

Ahh, with your brilliant "natural allies" definition instead of oh, you know customers and what they purchase which is used to define markets in every aspect of law and are the definition of what a market is?

You did not find any flaw in my argument.

You don't even have an argument, just an assertion.

"In terms of the law, they are clearly in violation." -- it's a really tall claim you're making there

Yeah, it sounds pretty crazy except for them already having been convicted in three different jurisdictions all of which defined them as a separate market and it being a nearly textbook case. Please.

I live in the US where we believe that the "rule of law" should never silent dissent.

Am I silencing you? No I'm encouraging you to go on and on apparently. That doesn't excuse breaking laws they don't agree with. This isn't a civil rights issue, it's time tested antitrust law applied to large corporations who clearly knew what they were doing and have been spending money not to change the law or inform people, but to spread misinformation about the law and get favors from politicians with legalized bribes.

I share your confidence regarding the outcome -- but that's because of my faith in

Re:Ignorance

[dhavleak]

Desktop OS's don't sell by themselves either, they are almost always bundled with hardware for sale, including a video card.

I suggest you go to Best Buy and ask for Windows. You'll find it on a shelf. All by itself. No video card or BIOS in the box. You can actually buy Linux this way too. No BIOS or video card there either. Browser included in both cases.

Defining antitrust abuse in your terms...

I merely said that browsers are a necessary part of a desktop OS. I don't need antitrust law (or it's absence) to make that claim.

My point is you're making arbitrary inclusions to define what you call a complete OS

They were specific, customer-driven, commonplace, concrete scenarios detailing why one specific component belongs in an OS. Nothing arbitrary.

It happens all the time. The vast majority of OS's sold come ith a complete computer system including ROM and BIOS. Get it?

The BIOSes in these machines were not installed from the OS disk - ergo they were not bundled as part of the OS. So it's never happened. Get it? Sometimes you say the OEM is MS's customer, and then sometimes you treat the end user as the customer and then consider the whole package as one bundle. Be consistent. There are two points here -- nobody has ever provided a BIOS with their OS because that's plain dumb, and this whole thing about BIOSes is a waste of time. You used a bad analogy. It happens. Get over it. Stay on topic.

That doesn't excuse breaking laws they don't agree with. This isn't a civil rights issue, it's time tested antitrust law...

They didn't break the law. They added an essential component to their OS. You're in a serious state of delusion if you think this is time tested. Antitrust law itself has been around for a while -- but it's application always ends up being in some new area or new circumstance or previously unforeseen situation. For anything technology related it's usually a case of law not keeping up with technology, and antitrust law being used as patchwork. I can explain further, but I don't think you're inclined to listen.

What would you consider it if any other corporation was discovered to have discussed specific plans to stop research and progress in an area of technology for profit. Would you be so forgiving of drug companies that paid researchers working on cures to work on other things so their profits in selling treatments were not threatened? This is a company tht said they were going to cripple the Web, then did it, in order to profit. And you don't have a problem with that?

Those lenses are doing their thing again. This is a long and baseless rant that really exposes your bias, but let me try and address it point by point anyway:
1. MS cannot stop other entities from doing research.
2. MS cannot stop other entities from making progress.
3. The drug company stuff you mention -- unrelated BS. Equating IE-bundling with not developing cures -- trolling.
4. This company said they were going to cripple the web? Reference please.
5. Me having a problem with MS is immaterial -- my 'problem' won't change the fact that they correctly anticipated the need to include a browser 'component' into desktop OSes.
Better check those lenses..

They took IE, which was competing in what was then a free market. They bundled it with Windows, in order to artificially give it a large market share, even if it was not significantly better than competitors

You're still missing lots of detail. Why so vague -- afraid the details won't hold up to scrutiny?

I guess I should stop discussing it with you. You have your mind made up and are never going to change it, because you don't want to have to alter your preconceived opinions.

Cut the psychobabble. Nobody has 'preconceived opinions' about browser bundling. Lots of people have 'preconceived opinions' about MS being guilty about everything including third world poverty, and you're just one such example out of millions.

Re:Ignorance

[dhavleak]

...you cannot act on any foresight you might have that this market will naturally get absorbed into another one...

Except it hasn't happened. There is still a separate market for browsers as demonstrated by Opera, Safari, Firefox, etc.

Except that it did happen. All these browsers are aftermarket enhancements to OSes that already have bundled browsers. And while they're profitable, they're also still free -- you have MS to thank for that.

Re:Ignorance

[dhavleak]

The refutation isn't valid, if the logic behind it is faulty -- you still haven't explained how you made that leap of logic.

Re:Ignorance

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

. All these browsers are aftermarket enhancements to OSes that already have bundled browsers. And while they're profitable, they're also still free -- you have MS to thank for that.

What you call them doesn't matter. MS makes a browser. Other people make browsers. They profit from them. Some premium ones are payware. That's a separate market in every way that matters to antitrust issues. Trying to make up your own definitions is pointless. Your definition of "free" I might mention is not the same as economics.

Re:Ignorance

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

You already admitted in other posts that MS has a monopoly on desktop OS's. Give it up already.

Re:Ignorance

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Sorry, I gave up on you. You can' understand my arguments and you persist in trying to redefine everything, which simply does not make for a productive conversation. When I ask for your ideas as anything but examples you fail to provide them. The conversation is pointless. You don't care if the market is undermined or how people go about deciding that logically or under the law. All you care about is finding some way you can claim any explanation of how MS has been determined to do that can't be proved. It's sad.

Get a new hobby.

Re:Ignorance

[dhavleak]

That was never a point of contention. Non sequitur response as usual.

Re:Ignorance

[dhavleak]

That's a separate market in every way that matters to antitrust issues.

And you can repeat that line as many times as you want -- but you still need references to back up that claim.

Re:Ignorance

[dhavleak]

It's sad. Get a new hobby.

Can't deal with someone disagreeing with you?

I use IE exactly 0 times on a new computer

[Anonymous Coward]

http://debian.org/

My Honda has a Honda radio OH NOES!

[Anonymous Coward]

I really don't get this. SO WHAT if IE comes with Windows? Windows also comes with dozens of other applications too, and no one seems to complain about them. It's THEIR OS. The "competition" argument doesn't hold up, as you do have a choice of NOT using Windows! Install Linux. If you choose Windows, then bonus, it comes a browser that you don't even have to use!

My Honda came with a HONDA radio. And HEY, Honda seats too. Gosh. What a Monopoly Honda has on Honda cars.

Am i missing something here...

[Richard.g.k]

How exactly is it illegal, or should it be illegal to include in your operating system? Shit. Windows comes with a file compression utility, theres other software companies that make them... MONOPOLY. Crap. Windows comes with a file browser, theres other file browsers out there, OH FUCK, ABUSE OF POWER. WTF...windows includes a game of solitaire, media player, taskbar, simple text program, and even a taskbar, WOE IS ME, POOR COMPUTER USER. And wtf...windows even includes SCREENSAVES AND WALLPAPER?!?!?!? what the fuck are all of the websites that give you screensavers and wallpapers going to do...MICROSOFT MUST BE STOPPED. If you want to buy an operating system that comes preloaded with a bunch of shit, buy windows or apple, based on your preference. If you want to figure all that shit out on your own, use linux. Its not so complicated...Mods...go to work Oh, right, to the people suggesting that microsoft should have to bundle COMPETITORS software on its operating system... ARE YOU RETARDED...and thats not a comical question, i'm 100% serious....are you retarded? Please try and identify other markets where companies are FORCED to market their COMPETITORS services...

Re:Am i missing something here...

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

This is funny as the first post after my post complaining about how ignorant people are posting their uneducated opinions anyway and my very long explanation of why bundling is sometimes illegal... which you obviously did not read.

ARE YOU RETARDED

No, are you willfully ignorant and opinionated? Go read my explanation and then if you want to argue with any particular point go ahead. Or you could remain ignorant and be content with that, but stop making posts based in your own ignorance and embarrassing yourself. Or you could just go on ranting about things you know nothing about and using lots of capital letters in the hopes that it will make you more convincing.

Re:Am i missing something here...

[Mystra_x64]

Nobody RTFA&C. Bashing feels good, while reading and analyzing requires well... you know, some thinking.

Don't worry, it's paid for.

[Erris]

I don't think anyone here is going to be fooled by hype or astroturf. Nor do I think the EU is going to be fooled by more M$ promises while they are still dragging their feet on the last batch.

I for one do not trust "Windows 7"

[TimSSG]

Windows 7 To Be 'Thoroughly' Tested For Antitrust Compliance

I for one do not trust "Windows 7" since it is really Windows version 6.1 or 6.2. I say it passes my "Antitrust Compliance" test; because Antitrust means NOT trust, right? Tim S

Warning: Known sockpuppet/troll

[Anonymous Coward]

User maintains more than a dozen sockpuppet accounts on Slashdot.

Will OSX and Linux also be monitored/tested?

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

Why does Microsoft have to take it in the ass? Their software has been gimped enough thanks to the antitrust nonsense.

Because of all of the stupid so called "Monopoly" bullshit, we can thank the governments of the world for holding back graphic viewing capabilities in windows, better graphic management solutions, media player functionality, explorer features.... etc

How about APPLE be taken to task for their OS. I cant even legally install it on a PC that I bought, unless i buy it from apple.

Apple has a lot of "be all end all" solutions in its os... so why doesnt Apple take it in the ass?

I guess monopolies are ok when they're "cool".

Re:Will OSX and Linux also be monitored/tested?

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Why does Microsoft have to take it in the ass?

Because they broke the law.

Their software has been gimped enough thanks to the antitrust nonsense.

Please. MS crippled their own software. They also helped cripple everyone else's by holding back the Web for a decade.

How about APPLE be taken to task for their OS. I cant even legally install it on a PC that I bought, unless i buy it from apple.

Yeah, except what they're doing is legal.

...why doesnt Apple take it in the ass?

They obey the law?

I guess monopolies are ok when they're "cool".

What market, exactly, do you think Apple has monopolized?

Re:Will OSX and Linux also be monitored/tested?

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

Apple has a lot of intergrated document format viewers, graphic file formats etc. Hell windows couldnt view tif by default until vista!

MS cripples their software because they're A) terrible at designing software or B) scared to be labeled anti competitive.

Frankly i think its B... because as you said "microsoft broke the law" And ever since... they're scared shitless to improve their software in professional ways.

ALL graphic viewers and media organization tools that come with windows, are shit and poorly designed. And i think B is the reason for it.

What has Apple Monopolized? Their OS.

They dont allow us to install it on non APPLE computers. Imagine if MS decided to force a requirement that everyone must by a MS PC if they want windows. And dont give me the typical linux zealot answer of "good" ;P

Doesn't make sense

[ShashFool]

I use 3 different OS Platforms everyday. Mac osX, Windows XP/Vista/7 and Ubuntu. So understand that this question does not come from a one sided user. Why hasn't Apple been slapped with the same anti-trust suit for the software that comes on their machines. I had to use Safari, Reader, or Mail. I was not given a choice when I booted up my Mac Pro. I can always download something else. What am missing? It's very convoluted to me.

Re:Doesn't make sense

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Why hasn't Apple been slapped with the same anti-trust suit for the software that comes on their machines.

The law says you can't bundle a monopolized product with one from a separate pre-existing market because it undermines free trade. Did you think Apple had a monopoly on desktop OS's, computer systems, or on one of the software packages?

What am missing? It's very convoluted to me.

A basic understanding of antitrust law. I went to all the trouble to write a lengthy explanation and it is modded to +5 a ways up.

Re:Doesn't make sense

[Anonymous Coward]

I was thinking from a "software package" point of view. I don't see the difference between MS putting IE with windows and Apple putting safari, mail and reader with OSX. Or is this more to the file type level?

I'm curious

[Dotren]

What are the numbers showing about Firefox these days? Last I checked, the VAST majority of Firefox users were staying up-to-date.

One could argue that these numbers indicate that almost all Firefox users are tech-savvy and keep their software updated, however, I've seen plenty of Firefox users who are not. I think the difference here is that Firefox has a far more user friendly update method. It's very easy to do and it's not constantly in your face asking you to upgrade.

I think people don't run Windows Update for two reasons. The first is that, well, it kinda sucks. It's slow and sometimes it errors and you have to start all over (oh great, another 10 minute scan to tell me the same thing it just told me before the error?). The second reason would be that there are probably still quite a few people running illegal copies of Windows. Maybe not intentionally, they could have just passed it to a friend or relative who set up their computer for them and then told them never to run Update.

So, to summarize, I think people DO update and upgrade, but they do it when it's not going to prevent them from doing their work or otherwise interfere with their computing experience.

Hypocritical

[Anonymous Coward]

Why is it Microsoft goes under so much scrutiny but Apple and it's iPhone don't

Re:Hypocritical

[lamapper]

Why is it Microsoft goes under so much scrutiny but Apple and it's iPhone don't

Okay I'll bite, I am in that mood today...

With Apple, you can NOT develop for them if you do NOT pay them a royalty. No way around that. In fact they designed their iPhone so they could delete any app that is not 'authorized' by them. So you are effectively locked in 100%.

IBM's Microchannel architecture was superior in the day to other bus architectures, however, to use it you had to pay a royalty to IBM...thus its market share was diminished, not as widely adopted as if it were free...like the PC was as it was free and open. This is also one of Microsoft's problems, they write proprietary software for an open platform. Sure they irritate many by limiting BIOS and hardware device driver development. But the platform they develop for is wide open.

Because of Apple's model, everything is proprietary, they do NOT get as wide an adoption for their hardware and software as they might have. Thus their market share is controlled and artificially limited by their own business model and methods.

If they had more market share than they do, and spent years doing spreading FUD on everyone and everything else, denying they ever make any mistakes at all cost, than perhaps people would be as frustrated with them. Apple is smarter than that, and Jobs usually did NOT release software until it at least worked. (A Blue Screen of Death when Gates was demoing comes to mind)

Customers understand they must buy Apple stuff from Apple when they go there, so they accept it and happily pay more. Heck they do not even get mad enough to churn when valid technologies, like FireWire, still widely used in Video circles and will be for years, are removed from the platform (as it has been recently) and no longer standard...even a couple of years ago they touted Firewire as a superior technology and sold products based on that. Go figure, as a developer no way was I going to develop any product where I would be forced to pay a royalty to any other company without them doing anything for me...just not smart.

With Microsoft, sheeple don't realize they are being locked in, until it would cost them too much money to get out. At that point, they just follow along oblivious without thinking too much, thus the term sheeple is appropriate. They happily pay more and more and more to Microsoft each and every year, even in bad economic times when their coworkers are getting laid off due to less business and less cash flow. Like an ostrich, they never raise up their head and look for better alternatives that are available and have been for a couple of years now, nope they just go about their Merry way and pay up. They accept the business as usual and future marketing promises that is just enough to have them hang on a little bit longer. By the time they get frustrated enough with yet another wave of missed marketing promises, another wave of marketing promises are issued to get them to hang on yet a little longer. It will be better tomorrow. The next release will fix this. Yes we know its bad, but its not our fault its your fault, but do not worry the next release will be better.

Insanity, yes; as they keep doing the same thing, paying more and more and more, and expecting Microsoft to play nice, not lock in their data where they can use it anywhere else.

I think the real issue is

[mahadiga]

Who will decide whether an application code can be bundled into KERNEL code or not?

1. Supreme Court
2. Congress
3. Administration
4. Company Management
5. Company Customer
6. End User
7. Software Developer/Designer/Security Expert
8. OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer)
9. Depends on Competitor Software

console market was also abused

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft get away with a lot of monopoly extension abuse. They create a monopoly, up the price on their monopoly product, then use the profits to run at a loss in another market, to kill off people in the other market so they can take it over. Look at the x-box brand. Microsoft sunk billions into it, they are still billions behind. The first xbox lost 10x more money than sega lost, yet microsoft funded it anyway because there purpose was to push Sony and Nintendo out of the way, then make a profit later. EU were also close to stomping on the xbox until the 360 actually started to turn a profit recently.

Mod parent informative

[BhaKi]

Agreed.