I would submit that the EU relevent market is broader than "desktop operating systems" as it touched server functionality.
You have this backwards. The EU definition specifically excluded server OS's from the market definition. Otherwise, it would be legal for MS to tie their desktop and server OS's since it would be part of one monopoly. The EU recognized that Server OS's and desktop OS's were separate markets and took action to forbid MS from illegally tying the two and providing incentive for companies that used Windows on the desktop to also use Windows on the Server.
FWIW, defining a market so narrowly to exclude legitimate competitors is equally absurd IMO.
The problem is, most people can't understand that a product is not the same thing as a market. Windows is a product that is mostly sold to computer manufacturers as a component of the computer systems they sell. Very nearly every manufacturer that buys an OS to put in their computers buys Windows. MS has monopolized that market. Dell and HP and Lenovo and Apple all sell computer systems including an OS. This is not the same market. The product sold is different and the customer is different. No one has monopolized that market. "What about OS X?" you ask. Can Dell and Lenovo and HP buy it? Nope. Thus it is not in that market. "What about Linux?" you ask. Very few of these companies buy or trade for Linux and the number that pre-install it on desktops is insignificant to the market. "But, but, but I can just install Linux" you say. Fine, but you are not an OEM looking for an OS as a component of your system and the number of people who ever install a new OS is so small as to be insignificant to the market.
I think the market definition makes a hell of a lot of sense. Can you come up with a better one?
microsoft would have to pay to integrate pdf into office or the operating system (as apple does) and they (ms) appearently don't like the idea[1] (hint, hint, spyglass). so they seem to try to drive adobe out of this business.
Nope. MS cannot integrate PDF into Windows regardless what they pay because it is a violation of the Sherman Antitrust act. Also, Apple does not pay. They made their own implementation of the open PDF standard. There are GPL PDF generation tools that would not be possible if it was licensed in a way that put such a restriction on the format.
There is - and always has been - at least one alternative to a computer running Windows (or DOS). Macs, OS/2, Amigas, DRDOS, etc.
That's not the market MS sells into. MS does not sell "computers running some OS." They sell OS's. People who purchase OS's are primarily OEMs and they have no reasonable alternative that won't put them out of business.
Well, it's pretty hard to avoid being ruled a monopoly when the game is so stacked against you. When someone has the ability to arbitrarily define the "market" to anything they please, they can make anyone look like a monopoly.
So your argument is that almost every economist on the planet and all the courts have arbitrarily defined MS's market in a giant conspiracy against them, instead of you being clueless as to what their market is?
The only thing Microsoft has a monopoly on is a platform for running Windows applications, and there's no way any rational person would claim *that* is reasonable grounds for being considered a monopoly.
If you were made CEO of Dell tomorrow what OS would you buy to pre-install that would not get you removed from your position in a matter of days? All major OEMs that don't develop their own OS ship with Windows. Since in house OS's are, by definition, not part of the market MS... owns it. That means they are legally obligated to let Dell choose if they want Windows + Adobe Acrobat or Windows + MS XPS generator with no incentives towards the latter which are made possible by the fact that they are the ones selling Windows.
Right. So you're basically saying Microsoft can no longer compete by giving their product features that their customers want and their competitors have and will have to source that functionality either from third party tools or by migrating to the competing platforms.
They can make any functionality they want. They can sell any functionality they want. They just can't force their customers to buy one set of functions if they buy their monopolized set. Dell can sell Windows with all the functions OS X has all purchased just from MS. MS just can't force them to do so, if some other company has a better product and they'd rather use that.
Picture it this way. You sell bread. You make the best and cheapest bread of anyone and work hard to make it so. The electric company decided that since they have a local monopoly on electrical distribution, they're going to bundle a free loaf of bread a week with everyone's electrical service, and raise their rates. Everyone already has bread, because they have to buy electricity because there is only one monopoly provider. You go out of business, despite the fact that you make the best product for the cheapest price. How is this fair? It isn't and it hurt both you and the consumer. You went out of business despite being superior and consumers get an inferior product.
Now suppose instead of bread, you make portable document creation tools. You make the best tools at the cheapest price. MS decided they are going to take over your market by bundling portable document creation tools with their OS. You go out of business and consumer gets an inferior product. It is the same thing and it is illegal for the same reason.
How does the consumer benefit here, again ?
The consumer gets the cheapest, best product as determined by the market, not whatever MS gives them.
Yes they do, otherwise they are meaningless. An analogy or example that portrays a highly unlike scenario as "inevitable" is, at best, useless and, at worst, deliberately misleading.
Hold your horses, you just added a completely new element here. No one said anything about examples or analogies that were wrong in that they portray an unlikely event as inevitable. That is completely new. Obviously a flawed analogy will improperly show a concept. That is not what we're talking about. We're talking about examples and analogies that correctly illustrate a concept. If you can demonstrate the analogy is incorrect (untrue) or that the analogy does not match up to the situation for which it is analogous then obviously it is a poor argument. You can't however, assume all analogies are wrong or to not apply. You have to show how they are wrong conceptually or how they do not map.
You assert Microsoft will enter $SOFTWARE market with a limited-functionality, bundled tool and because of that, $ESTABLISHED_PLAYERS with comprehensively more functional tools will disappear from that market (unlikely scenario #1).
They don't have to disappear, they just have to lose share in the market, despite being a better choice. That does not mean they cease to exist.
Further, you then imply that *all* competitors in $SOFTWARE will disappear, leaving Microsoft as the sole provider of $SOFTWARE functionality (unlikely scenario #2).
You may have inferred that, but I did not imply it.
Finally, you claim that despite demand for $NEW_FUNCTIONALITY, Microsoft will not implement it, (unlikely scenario #2) nor will $NEW_COMPETITOR appear to meet the needs of those demanding it (unlikely scenario #4).
This is what generally happens. MS has no motivation to add any functionality if they own the majority of the market and by owning it they can introduce lock-in factors (proprietary formats, etc.) It is possible a new player will enter the market and provide that functionality, but usually no one is that stupid, since MS can then add the same functionality and put them out of business with their monopoly again. No one wants to
o, they don't. You cannot (legally) use OS X without Apple hardware.
That does not matter. If someone sells shovels with a license prohibiting you from using them for anything other than decoration, they are still in the shovel market. It is sales that matter. But who cares, their boxed sales are too small to consider. They are irrelevant to this discussion.
e: "Windows is a monopoly because nothing else runs Windows applications". The rationale there is breathtakingly anti-innovation (essentially saying "if you come up with some cool new product, you have to let everyone else know how to make copies of it, or you're a monopoly"), but it's certainly see how somewhere like the EU, with such strong socialist leanings, would come up with it.
Umm, we're talking available software, not Windows software. In any case, the US is the one who ruled on the applications and I don't think anyone would argue the US is very socialist compared to most of the world.
Apple do not make x86 OSes, they make Macintoshes. You cannot buy a Mac without OS X.
Apple makes and sells an x86 OS without a mac. You can buy it at the Apple store. For the most part, however, you're right they're in the computer system market with Dell, not the OS market.
Which is even more ludicrous, considering Macs have *always* been a viable alternative to Windows, in addition to the other platforms that have come and gone over the years.
Look a monopoly is a economic entity and dominates a market. Products don't matter, just markets. MS is the only one selling desktop OS's and making a profit. Apple sells computer systems. That is a separate market.
Which is a very handy definition to use when you're a lawyer chasing after a big evil company...
It is the legal definition and always has been and with good reason. Monopolies are banned from abusing their market position. If you don't define them in terms of those markets, it is impossible to tell if anyone is violating the law or breaking capitalism.
(Question: If Microsoft bought, say, Dell, Compaq/HP's PC business, Lenovo, etc - basically the big name PC manufacturers and stopped licensing Windows to whitebox resellers, would you still consider them a monopoly ?)
If you fire a handgun have you committed murder? It would depend entirely on their effect upon the market. Anything with more than about 70% of sales in a market is subject to investigation. Assuming Microsoft has less than 70% of the PC market, they'd be in the clear. If they had more, it would depend upon how they effected that market.
On the contrary, I'm *acutely* aware of the markets involved, which is why I argue the market definitions used were ridiculous and unrealistic, and specifically crafted to ensure that *only* Microsoft would fit them (in the timeframe of the case), despite their relevance to actual consumer purchasing habits being sketchy at best.
I see. Would you care to inform all us what market MS is in and who their competitors are? Who sells the same thing as MS?
If you could buy a Mac without OS X, or run OS X on non-Apple hardware, you'd have a very good point [0]. Dell, et al *would* be comparable to Apple as just plain old computer resellers bundling together hardware and software.
You have it backwards. Because each of these retailers is selling a bundle, the individual components do not matter. For example, say there is a car manufacturer, that goes away from the norm and starts to use electric engines. Does that mean they are no longer in the car market? No, because they are functionally equivalent and are still competing with other car manufacturers. The OS is one component of a computer system, just like an engine is one component of a car. Since they sell cars and very few people just buy engines (just as very few people buy their OS separate from their computer) the market is defined in those terms. There is a separate market for engines, but assuming a company makes their own engines instead of buying them elsewhere, they are not in the engine market (no sales = no market entry).
Ah, but they *do* have a choice, as do their customers, which is the whole point. It's not Microsoft's fault if no-one is interested in buying Dell PCs running Linux, because Linux isn't as good a desktop OS as Windows.
If Microsoft bundles it, go download your favourite Linux distro. That's roughly equivalent in complexity to downloading and installing Koffice, or at least I keep being told it is.
It is not the availability that is illegal. It is the bundling of a monopoly and non monopoly product. For better or worse, people can't download a Linux distro until they have another computer and most people can't even find a computer for sale that does not include Windows with it. If you don't have Windows all your existing Windows software is useless and the courts ruled that is too large of a barrier between the Linux and Windows markets. MS does wield monopoly power in the market and any economist will tell you that. The courts in numerous countries have ruled this and MS does not even dispute it. Before you try to argue against this, please read up on monopolies and how they are defined. It is by the market, not the product.
However, Microsoft is not a monopoly. There is fantastic choice in computer operating systems.
You're completely mistaking what a monopoly is. Monopolies are economic entities that have a certain effect upon the market in which they operate. MS demonstrably has that effect. For example, DTE may be the only company that can distribute power over the power lines in your geographical region. They are a monopoly. Does that mean you can't install a generator or fuel cell or photovoltaic cells? No. You can get energy other ways. That does not make DTE any less of a monopoly and it does not mean it is okay for them to raise your bill $10 and start bundling a free loaf of bread every month. The reason for this is because it may be the most efficient option for you to use DTE and throw away the bread than it is for you to go with alternate energy. In market terms, because DTE is a electric distribution monopolist, they can destroy the bread market. People acting in their own best interests are buying an overpriced, poor quality product. Capitalism has failed to provide the lowest price best product, which is the only real advantage to capitalism.
IE is a piece of crap. It costs more to develop and has more security holes and fewer features than other browsers. It dominates the market because it is bundled. Capitalism has failed. That is how you know they are a monopoly and how you know capitalism is failing.
The danger of allowing the government the power to dictate software engineering decisions, is much greater than the potential abuse of the market Microsoft can do.
You're mistaken. This is not the government picking on one company. This is a law that applies equally to all. No one can bundle a monopoly and non-monopoly product. It is the same as a law that says no one can sell poison labeled as food or no one can dump pollution in the ocean. The government is not dictating anything except adherence to the law, a law that almost every country has, since it quickly becomes necessary if you want more than one company in your economy.
What if the government decided that all OSs need to keep logs of every action you take in an OS, in case law enforcement needs to investigate you?
That is not the same thing at all, because this law does not apply just to software. You can't bundle bread with electrical service if you're a monopoly electrical service. It applies to everything. Your argument is analogous to saying because someone built a robot with a gun on it that went around shooting people and they were arrested for murder, the government is dictating what software that person can make. Anyone can make any software they want, that does not violate a general, criminal law. If they do write software and sell it in a way that violates that law, they have no room to complain. MS certainly knew and knows what they are doing is illegal and they have built their business model upon the idea that breaking the law in this way will make them more money than they will lose. So far they have been right. I hope it does not turn out they are right in the end.
And what about the fact that there is not even any law about this thing?
The Sherman Antitrust Act was written in the 1800s and companies have had to abide by it ever since. It applies to space ships and computers and lasers and all sorts of things that did not exist at that time. It does not matter, because the law applies to markets in the economy and those markets are the same. MS is not doing anything new here.
So if I don't want to give the government total arbitrary power to fight terrorism, can you understand how I would be just as sceptical to give the government total arbitrary power to fight Microsoft?
What you're missing is that this is not arbitrary action against Microsoft. This same law was applied against Standard Oil and IBM and thousands of other companies. Everyone has to abide by it. Apple computer is being investigated right now because they are coming c
Not only are you flat out wrong (IBM did, in fact, sell PCs with OS/2, with little success), but your timeline is *way* off (Microsoft was already fat from DOS sales to both IBM and cloners before OS/2 even appeared).
You've completely misinterpreted what I wrote. When IBM introduced OS2, they did not make it so Windows would not run. They easily could have. They also could have taken action against the cloners when they first appeared, but were prohibited by antitrust law. Go ahead and read up on it, there are several books.
XPS is exactly as "proprietary" as PDF, but it sometimes produces smaller files...
The last I heard, MS was planning on licensing XPS in some "open" way. They have not yet done so and the license will probably not be truly open, just like their "OpenXML" license with dozens of hidden traps in it.
XPS is patented by MS. PDF is patented by Adobe.
Adobe has provided a perpetual license to PDF with only one stipulation, you follow the spec. This basically means, you have patent protection for any PDF, but can't use the patents in your own, new format. Hundreds of companies and groups have implemented it, including both GPL and proprietary programs with no legal problems. MS has not yet provided any license for their patents that I've seen. This unreleased license is untested and I really doubt it will be truly open.
The whole point of laws like these is to promote innovation. Is creating a new format, making it available for FREE, and incluing tools for using it with their product a bad thing?
Nothing is free. Let me repeat that. Especially in the eyes of economists and lawyers, nothing is free. Do the developers of XPS generation software work for free? Nope, they get paid. That money comes from you, when you buy Windows. This is called bundling, not free. Bundling a product from a healthy market with one from a monopoly is an anti-competative action and is illegal precisely because it stifles innovation and allows companies that do not innovate or create cheaper or better products to over a market anyway. By this mechanism, monopolies have often produced underperforming, overpriced products that take over a market and turn it into a second monopoly. MS has done this. There is a reason it is illegal in almost every country in the world.
ead your own link, fanboy; XPS is an open standard, freely licenced, and although it is patented, its specificaltions are available to all
Okay, it reads, "Microsoft intends to release XPS under a royalty-free patent license..." XPS is not open or licensed at all right now and is completely closed and proprietary. MS claims they will make it "open" in the future, but that probably means something very different tot he company that produces "OpenXML" which specifically prevents GPL programs from implementing it in the licensing and which technically removes all rights to publish any tools using any version other than whichever MS has named the most current, making backwards compatibility illegal.
PDF is also proprietary and patented...
I don't know who keeps editing the wikipedia page but I wish they'd stop. PDF is a published standard with a perpetual license open to all with no restrictions and with patent protection for anyone following the spec. It has numerous open implementations and proprietary implementations including GPL creators and proprietary ones like Apple's OS X. There has never been any conflicts of any kind or any attempts by Adobe to try to claim the license is void or anything. It is about as open as anything can be and I dare you to show me some way it is not open.
MS made the right move here, amazing though that may be.
Since MS has not licensed XPS at all yet, let alone submitted that license to review, I'd say that is more than a little bit optimistic.
Sorry, but you do NOT understand the issue at hand.
I think I do.
PDF creation is not, and never was, a feature of Vista.
Actually, my understanding is that it was a feature, but was pulled and is not supposed to be a separate download.
Vista DOES support a new standard called XPS, like PDF but better for certain types of documents. It is an open format, just like PDF.
True, (except perhaps the open standard part) but that is a PDF competitor. That is to say, it is trying to take over the same market as PDF, portable documents for print. Whether the product makes PDFs or something that serves the same function makes no difference to whether or not it is monopoly abuse.
MS makes no money off it.
You're one of those people who thinks "buy one get one free" actually means the cost of the first one is not twice what it needs to be right? Marketing crap aside, if you're buying a bundle of software that includes Windows and XPS creation, your money goes to the developers of both. The courts and economist don't care about whether marketing claims the second half is "free." You're paying for it every time you buy Windows.
It's past time there was some innovation in the market PDF currently occupies.
There has been competition. How many PDF creation tools are there? I've used dozens and companies I worked for have paid for 3 different ones I know of. Also there is postscript, which is widely used in some circles.
It is really backwards to claim monopoly abuse will drive innovation. It does the opposite. If MS sells portable document creation tools separately from Windows, they have motivation to innovate. If they bundle them, they can take over big parts of the market with an inferior product and have no motivation (financial) to innovate. If this is not stopped, in 5-10 years PDF will be like the Web and everyone will be running the outdated, insecure, IE of PDF creation tools. The product will be allowed to stagnate, just like IE has because their is no financial incentive to make it better.
Can you explain why your argument applies to a PDF creator, but doesn't apply to, say, the TCP/IP stack ? Or the GUI ? Or the CLI ? Or.NET ? Or Notepad ?
Yes. When MS bundled the TCP/IP stack they were not yet a monopoly. There was no existing market for GUIs, CLIs, or basic text editors when MS included them and there is not really one now, either. For it to be a monopolistic abuse, they have to be taking over an existing, healthy market and they have to be leveraging their monopoly to do it.
I can't believe how many people on Slashdot come up with ridiculously unrealistic examples and analogies to try get everyone else to help carry around the massive chip they have on their shoulder about Microsoft. Yet they do, every day.
Examples and analogies do not have to be realistic. They demonstrate or explain a principal so that a reader can comprehend the concept. Once that has happened, that concept can then be applied to more complex, real world situations and provide insight into the underlying mechanics, which are rarely as clear in the real world as in a simplified example. Your assertion that people are prejudiced against MS is an opinion, but a lot of people here have a lot of experience with MS. Having a negative opinion about someone is not prejudice if it is based upon experience. It is making a judgement, not prejudging. Sure some people here probably prejudge MS's actions, but I'm not sure you have enough information to know who.
If you'd like to address why my above explanation prejudged MS or why it is an unrealistic example, I'm all ears.
Last time I checked, the "relevent market" definition for Windows actually excluded Apple's products.
You're thinking of the US case, this is the EU. The relevant market in the EU case is "desktop Operating Systems." Technically, Apple does sell desktop OS's as well as bundled systems. The former is in the same market, although their share for boxed copies of OS X is tiny and the potential barriers have not been explored.
Of course the whole argument that OS X is a monopoly is pretty absurd for other reasons.
Legally, monopoly status is dependent on the effect upon the market, and laws in several countries do specify 70% market share as the point at which this possibility should be investigated.
Microsoft are not a monopoly in the "desktop OS market" (personally, I'd argue they aren't a monopoly in any market).
The courts around the world disagree with you. MS has been convicted of abusing a monopoly on desktop operating systems in the EU, where this investigation is happening. I'd argue, you don't have any idea how monopolies are defined and are more interested in finding justification for not acting against MS than in finding out.
Apple and Microsoft (at least according to the market Microsoft was determined to be a monopoly in) do not compete in the same market.
Ahh, but the previous poster claimed OS X, not Apple computers was the monopoly. OS X is a desktop OS. OS X could compete in the same market and the previous poster implied that it was.
So, basically, according to you any product that does more than one thing is "breaking" the "free market" ?
Nope. Bundles are fine for any products where the users have other options for both or all the products bundled. You can sell soap bundled with televisions. No one has a monopoly on either, so you're in the clear. What you can't do is bundle with a monopolized product, because then users can't choose to avoid your bundle and the market cannot make efficient decisions.
basically saying Microsoft aren't allowed to improve Windows, because that would be an antitrust violation
MS can improve Windows in any way that is not moving an existing market with an unfair advantage. Bundling IE is illegal. They can, however, sell IE separately and let OEMs bundle IE or Firefox or Opera as they choose. Alternately, they can bundle IE with Windows and also bundle every other browser that anyone asks for including Firefox and Opera. You'll note how neither of the legal options give users incentives to use an inferior product based upon the fact that they bought Windows?
I can't say I see any benefit for consumers, however.
Why do we have a capitalist market instead of a socialist one? What is the benefit? I mean in capitalism resources are wasted as multiple groups duplicate the same task. Why not just have one car manufacturer that combines all the best features from all the cars without duplicating plants and the like? The reason socialist economies fail is because they don't respond to customers. Right now, if Ford cars are unreliable, people buy Hondas. Ford loses money. The execs at Ford are motivated to make a better product and the better product is the one that dominates and makes money for investors. People are happy because they get innovation and what they want.
When a company has a monopoly, they have no incentive to give customers what they want. It doesn't make them any more money to improve the product and it costs money to develop new features. This is pretty much unavoidable. Companies will occasionally gain monopolies. The problem is when they illegally use the monopoly to gain a second monopoly. In the case of IE, MS bundled it with Windows. You'll have a hard time finding a customer who thinks IE is the best product out there, especially when you don't take into account the artificial barriers of MS only Websites and corrupted standards. So why does IE have most of the market? Because it was bundled, which gives it an unfair advantage. Consumers get an inferior product that the monopolist has no incentive to improve. IE still does not implement CSS and XHTML standards from the mid 90s that every other browser manufacturer had no problem throwing together. Why should MS add them? Everyone is going to use IE anyway as it came on their computer and they don't even know there are other options.
Is DRMed WMP a better format for ripping the average person's CDs than MP3? Nope. It makes it harder for the user to do things they want, like move the music to a portable player, or there stereo or their car. But it is the most popular format for new users to rip their music into. Why is that? Because it is bundled.
The advantage to the consumer of stopping MS from taking over market after market is choice and innovation. In a free market users or their agents can compare the available options and choose the best one and that is always getting better as companies compete to make the best product. If MS is allowed to abuse their monopoly, consumers are reduced to one choice that stagnates with no motivation for improvement. It is pretty much the same as Communist Russia was and we all know how well that worked.
It's hard to say what a user pays for vs. what is given free with the OS.
Monopolies are defined by markets, economics. Nothing is free. MS's developers are working and MS pays them. T/hat money comes from your Windows licensing costs. They may say "buy one get one free" but in legal terms you're buying both of them as a bundle for a set price. The rest is just marketing.
Is it that simple that any software they bundle, you're considered paying for?
No ass, they are not. This is the 4th time on this topic you have made that false statement, and I am the 4th person to correct you. MS tried to put Save as PDF into Office and was attacked by Adobe, so they removed it. Seriously, what did anyone expect would happen after that?
If you want people to take you seriously, you have to actually give some reference as to what the hell you're talking about. They are not? Who isn't. Why do I care they don't exist? What the hell are you talking about?
Microsoft were found guilty of being a monopoly in the market for "desktop OSes for x86 CPUs".
If you read the explanation of the market given in the ruling you'd see it was an attempt to define application compatibility, a barrier between the markets. Also, Apple no longer makes PPC operating systems, they make x86 operating systems, but their share of the market is small enough so that it does not alter the fact that MS has monopoly power in the market. Finally, you'll note this case is in the EU, where they were found guilty of having a monopoly on "Desktop Operating Systems" not x86 operating systems.
...there has always been at least one alternative OS in it...
We're not talking about what you can get to run on your computer. Monopolies are about markets. Apple does not sell operating systems and make any money doing so. Sure they sell a few upgrades, but the money involved is so tiny compared to the total market as to be insignificant. Mostly they sell complete systems, the same as Dell, Lenovo, and Gateway. That is the market they are part of, not OS's.
it is extremely difficult to see how Apple could not also be considered a monopoly.
That is because you're missing the fact that monopolies are defined by markets, not products. Apple sells computer systems and makes money. If you don't want an Apple you can get a Dell or a Gateway and they compete with each other based upon price and quality. If, however, Dell wants to buy an operating system for their machines, how many choices do they have? They have pretty much 1, if they want to sell anything. As a result, MS has Dell by the balls and this gives them the ability to introduce artificial barriers to other products. It is even legal for them to do so, so long as they only introduce those barriers to their monopolized product, not other products they also sell.
In this analogy Apple is the supermarket and the Open Office team is the convenience store. They can bundle anything they want because they aren't a monopoly providing you a monopoly service. If Apple bundles PDF and you don't want it, buy a Dell or a Lenovo. If the Open Office team bundles PDF, buy Wordperfect or download Koffice. If MS bundles it, you're screwed, because most software only runs on Windows and it is not practical (economically) for most people to switch according to the ruling of the courts in the US and EU.
If I publish a recipe for cheese I expect people to do what they like with it unless my licence says otherwise. Find me the clause in the PDF spec licence which says it can't be integrated with an OS.
Show me the clause in the PDF license that says I can't save it to a CD-ROM and then stab people in the head with it over and over and over again until they are dead. It doesn't need to be in the PDF license it is encoded into criminal law in the Sherman Antitrust Act that you cannot tie a monopoly product and a product from another monopoly and there is 100 years of precedent that says bundling is a form of tying.
I have no idea why any commercial software company writes "general use" software for M$ platform computering.
Because people will pay for it.
I can list a whole bunch of software that has been killed by M$ versions.
I can list a whole bunch of companies that won big cash settlements against MS for illegally driving them out of business with anti-competitive tactics.
If I were president of ANY general purpose software company, I would not tie my income flow to anything that requires M$ anything.
If you don't make software for the Windows platform, you're probably missing most of the market, and your competitor probably won't.
In Fact, if I had enough capitol, I would design a whole new breed of computers, from the CPU up.
Maintaining an entire vertical supply chain is almost the only way to fight a monopoly, but it takes huge amounts of money and coordination to enter so many markets at once. Apple is the only one really successful at it so far.
Seconded. If you make a standard open (PDF) you should expect people to integrate it with other apps. Adobe have shot themselves in the foot with this.
If you publish a free recipe for cheese, you should expect the telephone company to start illegally bundling it with your phone service too, huh?
This isn't about open standards, this is about illegal, anti-competitive bundling to drive competitors out of a market, regardless of whether or not they have a better product. Which is better PDF or XPS? Which one will you be forced to pay for creation tools with every time you buy a machine bundled with Windows? This is a clear cut case of MS breaking the law.
Let me get this straight, do you mean that if in the time of Windows 3.0-3.1 Microsoft was declared a monopoly they should not be able to include TCP stack into Windows since this would have put out Trumpet Winsock out of business? Do I understand you correctly?
That is 100% correct. There was an existing market and MS would be forbidden from driving competitors out of business unless they could do so fairly with a better product. Mind you, nothing would stop anyone else from bundling Windows and their TCP/IP stack or Windows and the Trumpet stack and I'm sure most PC sellers would have done just that.
In related news, aftermarket car alarm manufacturers sue car makers for including car alarms with their cars and making them harder to disable.
You know, if there was only one company with a monopoly on cars, that action would be illegal, right?
Didn't it ever occur to Symantec that a business model that's based around fixing problems in someone else's product isn't sustainable?
Symantec bet on MS being unable to fix the security bugs in their OS, and so far they've been 100% right. MS, deciding to compete with them is just fine, so long as it is on fair ground. MS bundling or tying their security product to their monopoly OS is quite simply illegal and MS will lose if it goes to court. If, however, MS decided to fix the underlying flaws instead of bundling band-aids, there would be nothing Symantec could do.
Didn't it ever occur to Adobe that, by making their product a commodity, someone might do it cheaper and better?
Of course it did and they're ready to compete with anyone who sells or gives away PDF generation tools in compliance with the law. They cannot, however, compete with the illegal bundling action of a monopoly. That's the reason bundling was made illegal in the first place, because otherwise monopolies would constantly expand swallowing up new markets, with no motivation to provide innovative or better or cheaper products. Soon we'd be left with a very few, huge companies and no free trade. Heck, MS would not even exist if not for the bundling laws that make this illegal, since IBM would have tied their OS and PCs in the 70s killing both Windows and the PC clone business.
How it is installed will depend mostly on your distro and package manager.
I actually asked where it is installed, not how. Assuming that does not matter and I can select a KPart in my package manager lets move on.
Each KPart is responsible for defining its own user interface (menu items, toolbar buttins, etc.) and publishing that interface to container apps via a.desktop file, so how a KPart is used will depend on what specific KPart you are talking about.
I'm not sure I understand how this would work. Do you mean to say, for example, if I installed a translation KPart it could create an additional menu in the menu bar or contextual of all KDE based applications I use? Does this actually work? Do you know of any such KParts? Is there a list of them?
Also, it seems that Kopete already has a translator plugin, that is accessible from the Tools menu.
I'm looking for a way for me as a user, to add arbitrary functionality across all my apps. I'm still a little unclear if this will work (if I restrict myself to KDE apps), or how.
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I would submit that the EU relevent market is broader than "desktop operating systems" as it touched server functionality.
You have this backwards. The EU definition specifically excluded server OS's from the market definition. Otherwise, it would be legal for MS to tie their desktop and server OS's since it would be part of one monopoly. The EU recognized that Server OS's and desktop OS's were separate markets and took action to forbid MS from illegally tying the two and providing incentive for companies that used Windows on the desktop to also use Windows on the Server.
FWIW, defining a market so narrowly to exclude legitimate competitors is equally absurd IMO.
The problem is, most people can't understand that a product is not the same thing as a market. Windows is a product that is mostly sold to computer manufacturers as a component of the computer systems they sell. Very nearly every manufacturer that buys an OS to put in their computers buys Windows. MS has monopolized that market. Dell and HP and Lenovo and Apple all sell computer systems including an OS. This is not the same market. The product sold is different and the customer is different. No one has monopolized that market. "What about OS X?" you ask. Can Dell and Lenovo and HP buy it? Nope. Thus it is not in that market. "What about Linux?" you ask. Very few of these companies buy or trade for Linux and the number that pre-install it on desktops is insignificant to the market. "But, but, but I can just install Linux" you say. Fine, but you are not an OEM looking for an OS as a component of your system and the number of people who ever install a new OS is so small as to be insignificant to the market.
I think the market definition makes a hell of a lot of sense. Can you come up with a better one?
microsoft would have to pay to integrate pdf into office or the operating system (as apple does) and they (ms) appearently don't like the idea[1] (hint, hint, spyglass). so they seem to try to drive adobe out of this business.
Nope. MS cannot integrate PDF into Windows regardless what they pay because it is a violation of the Sherman Antitrust act. Also, Apple does not pay. They made their own implementation of the open PDF standard. There are GPL PDF generation tools that would not be possible if it was licensed in a way that put such a restriction on the format.
There is - and always has been - at least one alternative to a computer running Windows (or DOS). Macs, OS/2, Amigas, DRDOS, etc.
That's not the market MS sells into. MS does not sell "computers running some OS." They sell OS's. People who purchase OS's are primarily OEMs and they have no reasonable alternative that won't put them out of business.
Well, it's pretty hard to avoid being ruled a monopoly when the game is so stacked against you. When someone has the ability to arbitrarily define the "market" to anything they please, they can make anyone look like a monopoly.
So your argument is that almost every economist on the planet and all the courts have arbitrarily defined MS's market in a giant conspiracy against them, instead of you being clueless as to what their market is?
The only thing Microsoft has a monopoly on is a platform for running Windows applications, and there's no way any rational person would claim *that* is reasonable grounds for being considered a monopoly.
If you were made CEO of Dell tomorrow what OS would you buy to pre-install that would not get you removed from your position in a matter of days? All major OEMs that don't develop their own OS ship with Windows. Since in house OS's are, by definition, not part of the market MS... owns it. That means they are legally obligated to let Dell choose if they want Windows + Adobe Acrobat or Windows + MS XPS generator with no incentives towards the latter which are made possible by the fact that they are the ones selling Windows.
Right. So you're basically saying Microsoft can no longer compete by giving their product features that their customers want and their competitors have and will have to source that functionality either from third party tools or by migrating to the competing platforms.
They can make any functionality they want. They can sell any functionality they want. They just can't force their customers to buy one set of functions if they buy their monopolized set. Dell can sell Windows with all the functions OS X has all purchased just from MS. MS just can't force them to do so, if some other company has a better product and they'd rather use that.
Picture it this way. You sell bread. You make the best and cheapest bread of anyone and work hard to make it so. The electric company decided that since they have a local monopoly on electrical distribution, they're going to bundle a free loaf of bread a week with everyone's electrical service, and raise their rates. Everyone already has bread, because they have to buy electricity because there is only one monopoly provider. You go out of business, despite the fact that you make the best product for the cheapest price. How is this fair? It isn't and it hurt both you and the consumer. You went out of business despite being superior and consumers get an inferior product.
Now suppose instead of bread, you make portable document creation tools. You make the best tools at the cheapest price. MS decided they are going to take over your market by bundling portable document creation tools with their OS. You go out of business and consumer gets an inferior product. It is the same thing and it is illegal for the same reason.
How does the consumer benefit here, again ?
The consumer gets the cheapest, best product as determined by the market, not whatever MS gives them.
Yes they do, otherwise they are meaningless. An analogy or example that portrays a highly unlike scenario as "inevitable" is, at best, useless and, at worst, deliberately misleading.
Hold your horses, you just added a completely new element here. No one said anything about examples or analogies that were wrong in that they portray an unlikely event as inevitable. That is completely new. Obviously a flawed analogy will improperly show a concept. That is not what we're talking about. We're talking about examples and analogies that correctly illustrate a concept. If you can demonstrate the analogy is incorrect (untrue) or that the analogy does not match up to the situation for which it is analogous then obviously it is a poor argument. You can't however, assume all analogies are wrong or to not apply. You have to show how they are wrong conceptually or how they do not map.
You assert Microsoft will enter $SOFTWARE market with a limited-functionality, bundled tool and because of that, $ESTABLISHED_PLAYERS with comprehensively more functional tools will disappear from that market (unlikely scenario #1).
They don't have to disappear, they just have to lose share in the market, despite being a better choice. That does not mean they cease to exist.
Further, you then imply that *all* competitors in $SOFTWARE will disappear, leaving Microsoft as the sole provider of $SOFTWARE functionality (unlikely scenario #2).
You may have inferred that, but I did not imply it.
Finally, you claim that despite demand for $NEW_FUNCTIONALITY, Microsoft will not implement it, (unlikely scenario #2) nor will $NEW_COMPETITOR appear to meet the needs of those demanding it (unlikely scenario #4).
This is what generally happens. MS has no motivation to add any functionality if they own the majority of the market and by owning it they can introduce lock-in factors (proprietary formats, etc.) It is possible a new player will enter the market and provide that functionality, but usually no one is that stupid, since MS can then add the same functionality and put them out of business with their monopoly again. No one wants to
o, they don't. You cannot (legally) use OS X without Apple hardware.
That does not matter. If someone sells shovels with a license prohibiting you from using them for anything other than decoration, they are still in the shovel market. It is sales that matter. But who cares, their boxed sales are too small to consider. They are irrelevant to this discussion.
e: "Windows is a monopoly because nothing else runs Windows applications". The rationale there is breathtakingly anti-innovation (essentially saying "if you come up with some cool new product, you have to let everyone else know how to make copies of it, or you're a monopoly"), but it's certainly see how somewhere like the EU, with such strong socialist leanings, would come up with it.
Umm, we're talking available software, not Windows software. In any case, the US is the one who ruled on the applications and I don't think anyone would argue the US is very socialist compared to most of the world.
Apple do not make x86 OSes, they make Macintoshes. You cannot buy a Mac without OS X.
Apple makes and sells an x86 OS without a mac. You can buy it at the Apple store. For the most part, however, you're right they're in the computer system market with Dell, not the OS market.
Which is even more ludicrous, considering Macs have *always* been a viable alternative to Windows, in addition to the other platforms that have come and gone over the years.
Look a monopoly is a economic entity and dominates a market. Products don't matter, just markets. MS is the only one selling desktop OS's and making a profit. Apple sells computer systems. That is a separate market.
Which is a very handy definition to use when you're a lawyer chasing after a big evil company...
It is the legal definition and always has been and with good reason. Monopolies are banned from abusing their market position. If you don't define them in terms of those markets, it is impossible to tell if anyone is violating the law or breaking capitalism.
(Question: If Microsoft bought, say, Dell, Compaq/HP's PC business, Lenovo, etc - basically the big name PC manufacturers and stopped licensing Windows to whitebox resellers, would you still consider them a monopoly ?)
If you fire a handgun have you committed murder? It would depend entirely on their effect upon the market. Anything with more than about 70% of sales in a market is subject to investigation. Assuming Microsoft has less than 70% of the PC market, they'd be in the clear. If they had more, it would depend upon how they effected that market.
On the contrary, I'm *acutely* aware of the markets involved, which is why I argue the market definitions used were ridiculous and unrealistic, and specifically crafted to ensure that *only* Microsoft would fit them (in the timeframe of the case), despite their relevance to actual consumer purchasing habits being sketchy at best.
I see. Would you care to inform all us what market MS is in and who their competitors are? Who sells the same thing as MS?
If you could buy a Mac without OS X, or run OS X on non-Apple hardware, you'd have a very good point [0]. Dell, et al *would* be comparable to Apple as just plain old computer resellers bundling together hardware and software.
You have it backwards. Because each of these retailers is selling a bundle, the individual components do not matter. For example, say there is a car manufacturer, that goes away from the norm and starts to use electric engines. Does that mean they are no longer in the car market? No, because they are functionally equivalent and are still competing with other car manufacturers. The OS is one component of a computer system, just like an engine is one component of a car. Since they sell cars and very few people just buy engines (just as very few people buy their OS separate from their computer) the market is defined in those terms. There is a separate market for engines, but assuming a company makes their own engines instead of buying them elsewhere, they are not in the engine market (no sales = no market entry).
Ah, but they *do* have a choice, as do their customers, which is the whole point. It's not Microsoft's fault if no-one is interested in buying Dell PCs running Linux, because Linux isn't as good a desktop OS as Windows.
We're
If Microsoft bundles it, go download your favourite Linux distro. That's roughly equivalent in complexity to downloading and installing Koffice, or at least I keep being told it is.
It is not the availability that is illegal. It is the bundling of a monopoly and non monopoly product. For better or worse, people can't download a Linux distro until they have another computer and most people can't even find a computer for sale that does not include Windows with it. If you don't have Windows all your existing Windows software is useless and the courts ruled that is too large of a barrier between the Linux and Windows markets. MS does wield monopoly power in the market and any economist will tell you that. The courts in numerous countries have ruled this and MS does not even dispute it. Before you try to argue against this, please read up on monopolies and how they are defined. It is by the market, not the product.
However, Microsoft is not a monopoly. There is fantastic choice in computer operating systems.
You're completely mistaking what a monopoly is. Monopolies are economic entities that have a certain effect upon the market in which they operate. MS demonstrably has that effect. For example, DTE may be the only company that can distribute power over the power lines in your geographical region. They are a monopoly. Does that mean you can't install a generator or fuel cell or photovoltaic cells? No. You can get energy other ways. That does not make DTE any less of a monopoly and it does not mean it is okay for them to raise your bill $10 and start bundling a free loaf of bread every month. The reason for this is because it may be the most efficient option for you to use DTE and throw away the bread than it is for you to go with alternate energy. In market terms, because DTE is a electric distribution monopolist, they can destroy the bread market. People acting in their own best interests are buying an overpriced, poor quality product. Capitalism has failed to provide the lowest price best product, which is the only real advantage to capitalism.
IE is a piece of crap. It costs more to develop and has more security holes and fewer features than other browsers. It dominates the market because it is bundled. Capitalism has failed. That is how you know they are a monopoly and how you know capitalism is failing.
The danger of allowing the government the power to dictate software engineering decisions, is much greater than the potential abuse of the market Microsoft can do.
You're mistaken. This is not the government picking on one company. This is a law that applies equally to all. No one can bundle a monopoly and non-monopoly product. It is the same as a law that says no one can sell poison labeled as food or no one can dump pollution in the ocean. The government is not dictating anything except adherence to the law, a law that almost every country has, since it quickly becomes necessary if you want more than one company in your economy.
What if the government decided that all OSs need to keep logs of every action you take in an OS, in case law enforcement needs to investigate you?
That is not the same thing at all, because this law does not apply just to software. You can't bundle bread with electrical service if you're a monopoly electrical service. It applies to everything. Your argument is analogous to saying because someone built a robot with a gun on it that went around shooting people and they were arrested for murder, the government is dictating what software that person can make. Anyone can make any software they want, that does not violate a general, criminal law. If they do write software and sell it in a way that violates that law, they have no room to complain. MS certainly knew and knows what they are doing is illegal and they have built their business model upon the idea that breaking the law in this way will make them more money than they will lose. So far they have been right. I hope it does not turn out they are right in the end.
And what about the fact that there is not even any law about this thing?
The Sherman Antitrust Act was written in the 1800s and companies have had to abide by it ever since. It applies to space ships and computers and lasers and all sorts of things that did not exist at that time. It does not matter, because the law applies to markets in the economy and those markets are the same. MS is not doing anything new here.
So if I don't want to give the government total arbitrary power to fight terrorism, can you understand how I would be just as sceptical to give the government total arbitrary power to fight Microsoft?
What you're missing is that this is not arbitrary action against Microsoft. This same law was applied against Standard Oil and IBM and thousands of other companies. Everyone has to abide by it. Apple computer is being investigated right now because they are coming c
Not only are you flat out wrong (IBM did, in fact, sell PCs with OS/2, with little success), but your timeline is *way* off (Microsoft was already fat from DOS sales to both IBM and cloners before OS/2 even appeared).
You've completely misinterpreted what I wrote. When IBM introduced OS2, they did not make it so Windows would not run. They easily could have. They also could have taken action against the cloners when they first appeared, but were prohibited by antitrust law. Go ahead and read up on it, there are several books.
XPS is exactly as "proprietary" as PDF, but it sometimes produces smaller files...
The last I heard, MS was planning on licensing XPS in some "open" way. They have not yet done so and the license will probably not be truly open, just like their "OpenXML" license with dozens of hidden traps in it.
XPS is patented by MS. PDF is patented by Adobe.
Adobe has provided a perpetual license to PDF with only one stipulation, you follow the spec. This basically means, you have patent protection for any PDF, but can't use the patents in your own, new format. Hundreds of companies and groups have implemented it, including both GPL and proprietary programs with no legal problems. MS has not yet provided any license for their patents that I've seen. This unreleased license is untested and I really doubt it will be truly open.
The whole point of laws like these is to promote innovation. Is creating a new format, making it available for FREE, and incluing tools for using it with their product a bad thing?
Nothing is free. Let me repeat that. Especially in the eyes of economists and lawyers, nothing is free. Do the developers of XPS generation software work for free? Nope, they get paid. That money comes from you, when you buy Windows. This is called bundling, not free. Bundling a product from a healthy market with one from a monopoly is an anti-competative action and is illegal precisely because it stifles innovation and allows companies that do not innovate or create cheaper or better products to over a market anyway. By this mechanism, monopolies have often produced underperforming, overpriced products that take over a market and turn it into a second monopoly. MS has done this. There is a reason it is illegal in almost every country in the world.
ead your own link, fanboy; XPS is an open standard, freely licenced, and although it is patented, its specificaltions are available to all
Okay, it reads, "Microsoft intends to release XPS under a royalty-free patent license..." XPS is not open or licensed at all right now and is completely closed and proprietary. MS claims they will make it "open" in the future, but that probably means something very different tot he company that produces "OpenXML" which specifically prevents GPL programs from implementing it in the licensing and which technically removes all rights to publish any tools using any version other than whichever MS has named the most current, making backwards compatibility illegal.
PDF is also proprietary and patented...
I don't know who keeps editing the wikipedia page but I wish they'd stop. PDF is a published standard with a perpetual license open to all with no restrictions and with patent protection for anyone following the spec. It has numerous open implementations and proprietary implementations including GPL creators and proprietary ones like Apple's OS X. There has never been any conflicts of any kind or any attempts by Adobe to try to claim the license is void or anything. It is about as open as anything can be and I dare you to show me some way it is not open.
MS made the right move here, amazing though that may be.
Since MS has not licensed XPS at all yet, let alone submitted that license to review, I'd say that is more than a little bit optimistic.
Sorry, but you do NOT understand the issue at hand.
I think I do.
PDF creation is not, and never was, a feature of Vista.
Actually, my understanding is that it was a feature, but was pulled and is not supposed to be a separate download.
Vista DOES support a new standard called XPS, like PDF but better for certain types of documents. It is an open format, just like PDF.
True, (except perhaps the open standard part) but that is a PDF competitor. That is to say, it is trying to take over the same market as PDF, portable documents for print. Whether the product makes PDFs or something that serves the same function makes no difference to whether or not it is monopoly abuse.
MS makes no money off it.
You're one of those people who thinks "buy one get one free" actually means the cost of the first one is not twice what it needs to be right? Marketing crap aside, if you're buying a bundle of software that includes Windows and XPS creation, your money goes to the developers of both. The courts and economist don't care about whether marketing claims the second half is "free." You're paying for it every time you buy Windows.
It's past time there was some innovation in the market PDF currently occupies.
There has been competition. How many PDF creation tools are there? I've used dozens and companies I worked for have paid for 3 different ones I know of. Also there is postscript, which is widely used in some circles.
It is really backwards to claim monopoly abuse will drive innovation. It does the opposite. If MS sells portable document creation tools separately from Windows, they have motivation to innovate. If they bundle them, they can take over big parts of the market with an inferior product and have no motivation (financial) to innovate. If this is not stopped, in 5-10 years PDF will be like the Web and everyone will be running the outdated, insecure, IE of PDF creation tools. The product will be allowed to stagnate, just like IE has because their is no financial incentive to make it better.
Can you explain why your argument applies to a PDF creator, but doesn't apply to, say, the TCP/IP stack ? Or the GUI ? Or the CLI ? Or .NET ? Or Notepad ?
Yes. When MS bundled the TCP/IP stack they were not yet a monopoly. There was no existing market for GUIs, CLIs, or basic text editors when MS included them and there is not really one now, either. For it to be a monopolistic abuse, they have to be taking over an existing, healthy market and they have to be leveraging their monopoly to do it.
I can't believe how many people on Slashdot come up with ridiculously unrealistic examples and analogies to try get everyone else to help carry around the massive chip they have on their shoulder about Microsoft. Yet they do, every day.
Examples and analogies do not have to be realistic. They demonstrate or explain a principal so that a reader can comprehend the concept. Once that has happened, that concept can then be applied to more complex, real world situations and provide insight into the underlying mechanics, which are rarely as clear in the real world as in a simplified example. Your assertion that people are prejudiced against MS is an opinion, but a lot of people here have a lot of experience with MS. Having a negative opinion about someone is not prejudice if it is based upon experience. It is making a judgement, not prejudging. Sure some people here probably prejudge MS's actions, but I'm not sure you have enough information to know who.
If you'd like to address why my above explanation prejudged MS or why it is an unrealistic example, I'm all ears.
Last time I checked, the "relevent market" definition for Windows actually excluded Apple's products.
You're thinking of the US case, this is the EU. The relevant market in the EU case is "desktop Operating Systems." Technically, Apple does sell desktop OS's as well as bundled systems. The former is in the same market, although their share for boxed copies of OS X is tiny and the potential barriers have not been explored.
Of course the whole argument that OS X is a monopoly is pretty absurd for other reasons.
Monopoly status is not dependent on marketshare.
Legally, monopoly status is dependent on the effect upon the market, and laws in several countries do specify 70% market share as the point at which this possibility should be investigated.
Microsoft are not a monopoly in the "desktop OS market" (personally, I'd argue they aren't a monopoly in any market).
The courts around the world disagree with you. MS has been convicted of abusing a monopoly on desktop operating systems in the EU, where this investigation is happening. I'd argue, you don't have any idea how monopolies are defined and are more interested in finding justification for not acting against MS than in finding out.
Apple and Microsoft (at least according to the market Microsoft was determined to be a monopoly in) do not compete in the same market.
Ahh, but the previous poster claimed OS X, not Apple computers was the monopoly. OS X is a desktop OS. OS X could compete in the same market and the previous poster implied that it was.
So, basically, according to you any product that does more than one thing is "breaking" the "free market" ?
Nope. Bundles are fine for any products where the users have other options for both or all the products bundled. You can sell soap bundled with televisions. No one has a monopoly on either, so you're in the clear. What you can't do is bundle with a monopolized product, because then users can't choose to avoid your bundle and the market cannot make efficient decisions.
basically saying Microsoft aren't allowed to improve Windows, because that would be an antitrust violation
MS can improve Windows in any way that is not moving an existing market with an unfair advantage. Bundling IE is illegal. They can, however, sell IE separately and let OEMs bundle IE or Firefox or Opera as they choose. Alternately, they can bundle IE with Windows and also bundle every other browser that anyone asks for including Firefox and Opera. You'll note how neither of the legal options give users incentives to use an inferior product based upon the fact that they bought Windows?
I can't say I see any benefit for consumers, however.
Why do we have a capitalist market instead of a socialist one? What is the benefit? I mean in capitalism resources are wasted as multiple groups duplicate the same task. Why not just have one car manufacturer that combines all the best features from all the cars without duplicating plants and the like? The reason socialist economies fail is because they don't respond to customers. Right now, if Ford cars are unreliable, people buy Hondas. Ford loses money. The execs at Ford are motivated to make a better product and the better product is the one that dominates and makes money for investors. People are happy because they get innovation and what they want.
When a company has a monopoly, they have no incentive to give customers what they want. It doesn't make them any more money to improve the product and it costs money to develop new features. This is pretty much unavoidable. Companies will occasionally gain monopolies. The problem is when they illegally use the monopoly to gain a second monopoly. In the case of IE, MS bundled it with Windows. You'll have a hard time finding a customer who thinks IE is the best product out there, especially when you don't take into account the artificial barriers of MS only Websites and corrupted standards. So why does IE have most of the market? Because it was bundled, which gives it an unfair advantage. Consumers get an inferior product that the monopolist has no incentive to improve. IE still does not implement CSS and XHTML standards from the mid 90s that every other browser manufacturer had no problem throwing together. Why should MS add them? Everyone is going to use IE anyway as it came on their computer and they don't even know there are other options.
Is DRMed WMP a better format for ripping the average person's CDs than MP3? Nope. It makes it harder for the user to do things they want, like move the music to a portable player, or there stereo or their car. But it is the most popular format for new users to rip their music into. Why is that? Because it is bundled.
The advantage to the consumer of stopping MS from taking over market after market is choice and innovation. In a free market users or their agents can compare the available options and choose the best one and that is always getting better as companies compete to make the best product. If MS is allowed to abuse their monopoly, consumers are reduced to one choice that stagnates with no motivation for improvement. It is pretty much the same as Communist Russia was and we all know how well that worked.
It's hard to say what a user pays for vs. what is given free with the OS.
Monopolies are defined by markets, economics. Nothing is free. MS's developers are working and MS pays them. T/hat money comes from your Windows licensing costs. They may say "buy one get one free" but in legal terms you're buying both of them as a bundle for a set price. The rest is just marketing.
Is it that simple that any software they bundle, you're considered paying for?
Yes. At least as far as the courts are concerned.
No ass, they are not. This is the 4th time on this topic you have made that false statement, and I am the 4th person to correct you. MS tried to put Save as PDF into Office and was attacked by Adobe, so they removed it. Seriously, what did anyone expect would happen after that?
If you want people to take you seriously, you have to actually give some reference as to what the hell you're talking about. They are not? Who isn't. Why do I care they don't exist? What the hell are you talking about?
Microsoft were found guilty of being a monopoly in the market for "desktop OSes for x86 CPUs".
If you read the explanation of the market given in the ruling you'd see it was an attempt to define application compatibility, a barrier between the markets. Also, Apple no longer makes PPC operating systems, they make x86 operating systems, but their share of the market is small enough so that it does not alter the fact that MS has monopoly power in the market. Finally, you'll note this case is in the EU, where they were found guilty of having a monopoly on "Desktop Operating Systems" not x86 operating systems.
We're not talking about what you can get to run on your computer. Monopolies are about markets. Apple does not sell operating systems and make any money doing so. Sure they sell a few upgrades, but the money involved is so tiny compared to the total market as to be insignificant. Mostly they sell complete systems, the same as Dell, Lenovo, and Gateway. That is the market they are part of, not OS's.
it is extremely difficult to see how Apple could not also be considered a monopoly.
That is because you're missing the fact that monopolies are defined by markets, not products. Apple sells computer systems and makes money. If you don't want an Apple you can get a Dell or a Gateway and they compete with each other based upon price and quality. If, however, Dell wants to buy an operating system for their machines, how many choices do they have? They have pretty much 1, if they want to sell anything. As a result, MS has Dell by the balls and this gives them the ability to introduce artificial barriers to other products. It is even legal for them to do so, so long as they only introduce those barriers to their monopolized product, not other products they also sell.
And OS X. Oh, and OpenOffice.org.
In this analogy Apple is the supermarket and the Open Office team is the convenience store. They can bundle anything they want because they aren't a monopoly providing you a monopoly service. If Apple bundles PDF and you don't want it, buy a Dell or a Lenovo. If the Open Office team bundles PDF, buy Wordperfect or download Koffice. If MS bundles it, you're screwed, because most software only runs on Windows and it is not practical (economically) for most people to switch according to the ruling of the courts in the US and EU.
If I publish a recipe for cheese I expect people to do what they like with it unless my licence says otherwise. Find me the clause in the PDF spec licence which says it can't be integrated with an OS.
Show me the clause in the PDF license that says I can't save it to a CD-ROM and then stab people in the head with it over and over and over again until they are dead. It doesn't need to be in the PDF license it is encoded into criminal law in the Sherman Antitrust Act that you cannot tie a monopoly product and a product from another monopoly and there is 100 years of precedent that says bundling is a form of tying.
I have no idea why any commercial software company writes "general use" software for M$ platform computering.
Because people will pay for it.
I can list a whole bunch of software that has been killed by M$ versions.
I can list a whole bunch of companies that won big cash settlements against MS for illegally driving them out of business with anti-competitive tactics.
If I were president of ANY general purpose software company, I would not tie my income flow to anything that requires M$ anything.
If you don't make software for the Windows platform, you're probably missing most of the market, and your competitor probably won't.
In Fact, if I had enough capitol, I would design a whole new breed of computers, from the CPU up.
Maintaining an entire vertical supply chain is almost the only way to fight a monopoly, but it takes huge amounts of money and coordination to enter so many markets at once. Apple is the only one really successful at it so far.
Seconded. If you make a standard open (PDF) you should expect people to integrate it with other apps. Adobe have shot themselves in the foot with this.
If you publish a free recipe for cheese, you should expect the telephone company to start illegally bundling it with your phone service too, huh?
This isn't about open standards, this is about illegal, anti-competitive bundling to drive competitors out of a market, regardless of whether or not they have a better product. Which is better PDF or XPS? Which one will you be forced to pay for creation tools with every time you buy a machine bundled with Windows? This is a clear cut case of MS breaking the law.
Let me get this straight, do you mean that if in the time of Windows 3.0-3.1 Microsoft was declared a monopoly they should not be able to include TCP stack into Windows since this would have put out Trumpet Winsock out of business? Do I understand you correctly?
That is 100% correct. There was an existing market and MS would be forbidden from driving competitors out of business unless they could do so fairly with a better product. Mind you, nothing would stop anyone else from bundling Windows and their TCP/IP stack or Windows and the Trumpet stack and I'm sure most PC sellers would have done just that.
In related news, aftermarket car alarm manufacturers sue car makers for including car alarms with their cars and making them harder to disable.
You know, if there was only one company with a monopoly on cars, that action would be illegal, right?
Didn't it ever occur to Symantec that a business model that's based around fixing problems in someone else's product isn't sustainable?
Symantec bet on MS being unable to fix the security bugs in their OS, and so far they've been 100% right. MS, deciding to compete with them is just fine, so long as it is on fair ground. MS bundling or tying their security product to their monopoly OS is quite simply illegal and MS will lose if it goes to court. If, however, MS decided to fix the underlying flaws instead of bundling band-aids, there would be nothing Symantec could do.
Didn't it ever occur to Adobe that, by making their product a commodity, someone might do it cheaper and better?
Of course it did and they're ready to compete with anyone who sells or gives away PDF generation tools in compliance with the law. They cannot, however, compete with the illegal bundling action of a monopoly. That's the reason bundling was made illegal in the first place, because otherwise monopolies would constantly expand swallowing up new markets, with no motivation to provide innovative or better or cheaper products. Soon we'd be left with a very few, huge companies and no free trade. Heck, MS would not even exist if not for the bundling laws that make this illegal, since IBM would have tied their OS and PCs in the 70s killing both Windows and the PC clone business.
How it is installed will depend mostly on your distro and package manager.
I actually asked where it is installed, not how. Assuming that does not matter and I can select a KPart in my package manager lets move on.
Each KPart is responsible for defining its own user interface (menu items, toolbar buttins, etc.) and publishing that interface to container apps via a .desktop file, so how a KPart is used will depend on what specific KPart you are talking about.
I'm not sure I understand how this would work. Do you mean to say, for example, if I installed a translation KPart it could create an additional menu in the menu bar or contextual of all KDE based applications I use? Does this actually work? Do you know of any such KParts? Is there a list of them?
Also, it seems that Kopete already has a translator plugin, that is accessible from the Tools menu.
I'm looking for a way for me as a user, to add arbitrary functionality across all my apps. I'm still a little unclear if this will work (if I restrict myself to KDE apps), or how.