Personally, I'm not all that worried about the issue. At worst its going to mess up the internet for a few months to a year before the telcos realize thats they made a miztake.
By making content providers pay more they are eliminating much of the rich diversity that make the internet so usefull. In essence they are shooting themselves in the foot because they are taking their 'product' (Essentially the internet is their product) and making it less usefull. Guess whats toing to happen then? People are going to drop their high speed connections to the internet and go back to dial up because they don't need 3MBps to view an internet that is only coming to them at 1KBps. Nore do they really care to use it as much because most of what they went to use it for is pretty much gone.
The issue isn't about the opportunity cost in this instance, it is about the operation of the free market. MS is a monopoly. That means they wield a huge amount of power that can be used to bypass free market forces. Firefox with their very small market share is already fighting a monopoly action that bundles IE with Windows. They have a better product, but only a tiny amount of the market. Why has the market failed to make the best product the most popular? Why do consumers put up with an inferior product? The answer is by using their monopoly MS bypassed the free market action.
Best explaination I've heard yet.:)
Go to Google and search for maps.. There is one paid search result for maps on your phone and then both Yahoo and MapQuest come up BEFORE google. Now if google was putting its own maps on top... then I would call foul. They arn't leveraging their way into anything.
Explain to me how Google is using its search dominance to leverage its way into the local wireless provider market? Because I can't see how the two are connected...
They arn't using their position to enter any markets at all. They are ENTERING the markets on their own and doing well because they are good at what they do.
.. Most people don't know the difference between a good search engine and a bad one.
First off.. M$ isn't removing its competition from its product... Google wasn't there to begin with. Just thought I'd set that straight.
Second, M$ CANNOT do anything they want to with their OS. Didn't the Netscape and other antitrust laws convince you of that?
The antitrust laws are there for a reason. Its so monopolies like M$ can't try to use their market dominance in one area to push an inferior product into another area. Its to keep the market competetive in order to foster innovation and creativity.
If people use a search engine that doesn't work they will switch. Besides it's not that hard to make them switch either. Just a few TV ads (I'm sure google can buy a lot of air time for their commercials) to make people know about google and they will start using it.
Thats the whole point of this argument. Most of the world is almost completly computer illiterate. They know just the little bit they need to know in order to do what they want. Changing a default setting is NOT one of those thing they need to know. And even if they do know they arn't going to care.
What I meant by really not much of a choice is that most of the world either doesn't know how to switch to a different browser, doesn't know where are other options, doesn't know the difference, or simply doesn't care. This is also why Joe Sixpack is locked into using it and why its such a big deal. If they aren't at least told they have the option and given an easy option to change it they won't.
Basically most of the world is just going to use the default choice because its simply not worth it for them to go through the effort of becoming informed on which is better. Nor is it worth the occasional hassles that come with it (like some pages that only work properly in IE..)
;) Its called rational ignorance. The gains they could get (Or at least the gains they believe they would get) simply arn't worth the costs.
I do think this might be a little overblown.. MSN is already the default home page for IE. So pretty much MSN is probably already the default search page for most users. (Though most everyone I know goes to google first.) But when the search bar is already up there alot of people are just going to go straight to it. That search bar is one of the key reasons people download google toobar. Once M$ already has one up there alot of that will stop.
The Default. The typical default when users install IE7 on their Windows XP machines will most likely be their usual search engine. Despite claims from some people around the web, MSN is not "The Default." The search box in IE7 uses IE6's AutoSearch setting because we think this setting is the best indication IE has of the user's preference. I do web searches every day to find feedback about IE7, and have read some positive feedback to date on this. IE6's AutoSearch setting today reflects the other software (e.g. Yahoo, Google, or Windows Live toolbar) that the user has installed. Of course, if you buy a new machine from an OEM after we release the final IE7, that OEM can (and will probably) choose a search engine for you.
Has anyone every actually had IE use a search engine other than MSN? I don't know about you, but every time I mistype a web page into IE it ALWAYS gives me an MSN search page.
No.. The lawsuit is mainly because M$ is pretty much a monopoly. Part of the claim is that this "limits consumer choice and is reminiscent of the tactics that got Microsoft into antitrust trouble in the late 1990s"
If someone wants to use FireFox they have to go out and download it. If mozilla wanted to use thier own search engine thats fine.. they arn't a market leader and arn't already the default choice. Someone CHOSE to use Firefox and that means they already wanted Mozilla products.. When it comes to M$ there really isn't much of a choice for 90% or so of the world.
Essentially by using MSN as the default for IE M$ is making it the default (search engine) of the default (web browser) of the default (Operating System). Googles lawsuit claims this is antitrust, and judging by the outcome of the other M$ antitrust lawsuits it will be.
I don't actually use the searchbox in FF(just type google in the address bar) but there is a really obvious reason for the makers of FF to have neglected to include MSN as a search option. Its almost completely useless.
I do think Google is at least partially wrong here though... I mean, what is M$ going to do? Default their search box to Google? That makes absolutly no sense at all. And M$ has been useing MSN as IEs default search tool for years now, why hasn't Google complained earlier?
M$ should at least have other options coded in to start with though and make it easy to change. It should also have the box show the last used search as well, like FF does.
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Personally, I'm not all that worried about the issue. At worst its going to mess up the internet for a few months to a year before the telcos realize thats they made a miztake.
By making content providers pay more they are eliminating much of the rich diversity that make the internet so usefull. In essence they are shooting themselves in the foot because they are taking their 'product' (Essentially the internet is their product) and making it less usefull. Guess whats toing to happen then? People are going to drop their high speed connections to the internet and go back to dial up because they don't need 3MBps to view an internet that is only coming to them at 1KBps. Nore do they really care to use it as much because most of what they went to use it for is pretty much gone.
The issue isn't about the opportunity cost in this instance, it is about the operation of the free market. MS is a monopoly. That means they wield a huge amount of power that can be used to bypass free market forces. Firefox with their very small market share is already fighting a monopoly action that bundles IE with Windows. They have a better product, but only a tiny amount of the market. Why has the market failed to make the best product the most popular? Why do consumers put up with an inferior product? The answer is by using their monopoly MS bypassed the free market action. Best explaination I've heard yet. :)
Go to Google and search for maps.. There is one paid search result for maps on your phone and then both Yahoo and MapQuest come up BEFORE google. Now if google was putting its own maps on top... then I would call foul. They arn't leveraging their way into anything.
Explain to me how Google is using its search dominance to leverage its way into the local wireless provider market? Because I can't see how the two are connected...
They arn't using their position to enter any markets at all. They are ENTERING the markets on their own and doing well because they are good at what they do.
.. Most people don't know the difference between a good search engine and a bad one.
First off.. M$ isn't removing its competition from its product... Google wasn't there to begin with. Just thought I'd set that straight.
Second, M$ CANNOT do anything they want to with their OS. Didn't the Netscape and other antitrust laws convince you of that? The antitrust laws are there for a reason. Its so monopolies like M$ can't try to use their market dominance in one area to push an inferior product into another area. Its to keep the market competetive in order to foster innovation and creativity.
If people use a search engine that doesn't work they will switch. Besides it's not that hard to make them switch either. Just a few TV ads (I'm sure google can buy a lot of air time for their commercials) to make people know about google and they will start using it.
Thats the whole point of this argument. Most of the world is almost completly computer illiterate. They know just the little bit they need to know in order to do what they want. Changing a default setting is NOT one of those thing they need to know. And even if they do know they arn't going to care.
I suppose I should restate that...
;) Its called rational ignorance. The gains they could get (Or at least the gains they believe they would get) simply arn't worth the costs.
What I meant by really not much of a choice is that most of the world either doesn't know how to switch to a different browser, doesn't know where are other options, doesn't know the difference, or simply doesn't care. This is also why Joe Sixpack is locked into using it and why its such a big deal. If they aren't at least told they have the option and given an easy option to change it they won't.
Basically most of the world is just going to use the default choice because its simply not worth it for them to go through the effort of becoming informed on which is better. Nor is it worth the occasional hassles that come with it (like some pages that only work properly in IE..)
I do think this might be a little overblown.. MSN is already the default home page for IE. So pretty much MSN is probably already the default search page for most users. (Though most everyone I know goes to google first.) But when the search bar is already up there alot of people are just going to go straight to it. That search bar is one of the key reasons people download google toobar. Once M$ already has one up there alot of that will stop.
No.. The lawsuit is mainly because M$ is pretty much a monopoly. Part of the claim is that this "limits consumer choice and is reminiscent of the tactics that got Microsoft into antitrust trouble in the late 1990s"
If someone wants to use FireFox they have to go out and download it. If mozilla wanted to use thier own search engine thats fine.. they arn't a market leader and arn't already the default choice. Someone CHOSE to use Firefox and that means they already wanted Mozilla products.. When it comes to M$ there really isn't much of a choice for 90% or so of the world.
Essentially by using MSN as the default for IE M$ is making it the default (search engine) of the default (web browser) of the default (Operating System). Googles lawsuit claims this is antitrust, and judging by the outcome of the other M$ antitrust lawsuits it will be.
I don't actually use the searchbox in FF(just type google in the address bar) but there is a really obvious reason for the makers of FF to have neglected to include MSN as a search option. Its almost completely useless. I do think Google is at least partially wrong here though... I mean, what is M$ going to do? Default their search box to Google? That makes absolutly no sense at all. And M$ has been useing MSN as IEs default search tool for years now, why hasn't Google complained earlier? M$ should at least have other options coded in to start with though and make it easy to change. It should also have the box show the last used search as well, like FF does.