Date: Wed, 20 May 1998 13:33:11 -0700 (PDT) From: George William Herbert <gherbert@kithrup.com> To: freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Cc: jkh@time.cdrom.com, gherbert@crl.com Subject: Re: Why we should support Microsoft... Message-ID: <199805202033.NAA14440@kithrup.com> In-Reply-To: <20153.895680408.kithrup.freebsd.chat@time.cdrom.com> References: Your message of "Wed, 20 May 1998 00:11:06 PDT." <199805200711.AAA07314@rah.star-gate.com>
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Jordan writes: >> So what is your suggestion on how should the DOJ treat Microsoft business >> pratice? > >I recommend that the DOJ just leave Microsoft the hell alone. > >People have spent a lot of time whining about the fact that Microsoft >owns 80% of the desktops out there and that M$ is now the Big Bad Wolf >who is crushing innovation and all these other scarey things, but they >all conveniently ignore answering the biggest question of all: >How did we get to this state in the first place? [...] This argument is entirely irrelevant to why the DOJ and states filed the suit, which is not why most computer people don't like M$. It is not illegal to have or be a monopoly in American business. It *is* illegal to use such a monopoly to form a barrier to entry into the market, or to use it as leverage with other unfair business practices to gain other markets. M$ has a roughly 90% marketshare for computer operating systems. That's a monopoly. They have, in myriad ways, used that monopoly to dominate a number of applications markets, and are attempting to do so now to dominate the browser market. That is Against The Law. It's just as illegal for Microsoft as any of the other monopolies that have been hit under antitrust laws have been in the past. There is nothing magic about the computer software or the computer business that gives anyone involved in it exceptions to pre-existing laws regarding how businesses must be run. The M$ internal memo about having to leve3rage the dominance of Windows to push MSIE market share against Netscape is a smoking gun with fingerprints and matched ballistics for multiple violations of the Sherman act; the fact that M$ has any senior executives who have not been briefed well enough on the antitrust laws to actually have typed u and emailed something that blatant is indicative of gross idiocy. Unfair and illegal practices they're doing include: * Undocumented Windows API (except they're documented for M$ apps people) * Forcibly bundling *anything* for which commercial competition exists with the operating system, in particular to the required exclusion of the competing product. Yes, in all of this is the lingering feeling that most of us have of the Seattle Monstrosity having finally started to get its comeuppance for years of annoying the rest of the industry (us, at least), but leaving that aside completely it is more than past time that this action be taken from a purely legal standpoint. This is not commentary on computer industry practices; the computer industry has to follow the same laws as everyone else, Bill and company have not, and now they are beingcalled on it. -george william herbert gherbert@crl.com gherbert@randomotherplaces To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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