Date: Tue, 3 Jul 2001 04:04:14 -0700
From: "Ted Mittelstaedt" <tedm@toybox.placo.com>
To: <jgrosch@mooseriver.com>
Cc: "Shannon Hendrix" <shannon@widomaker.com>, <freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG>
Subject: RE: Lets not bash Windows or M$ at every opportunity {was: FreeBSD and Microsoft}
Message-ID: <004201c103af$e50d51a0$1401a8c0@tedm.placo.com>
In-Reply-To: <20010703031342.A3641@mooseriver.com>
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>-----Original Message-----
>From: Josef Grosch [mailto:jgrosch@mooseriver.com]
>Sent: Tuesday, July 03, 2001 3:14 AM
>To: Ted Mittelstaedt
>Cc: Shannon Hendrix; freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG
>Subject: Re: Lets not bash Windows or M$ at every opportunity {was:
>FreeBSD and Microsoft}
>
>
>On Tue, Jul 03, 2001 at 02:46:55AM -0700, Ted Mittelstaedt wrote:
>
>[ DELETED ]
>
>> They won't die in the sense that the company will go bankrupt, I don't
>> think.
>> What will die is their MO of doing business. If they get hauled
>into trust
>> court again I think we will see the court become so exasperated that not
>> only will they issue tremendous fines but they will split the
>company 6 ways
>> to Sunday and bar
>> Bill Gates, and Steve Ballmer, and the rest of the upper exec staff from
>> even owning stock in any of the divested portfolios. In short, Microsoft
>> will become a
>> shadow of their former self. As it is right now, we still have
>all the rats
>> in one trap, which actually gives some advantages to the
>regulators as it's
>> easier to keep an eye on what they are doing.
>
>
>I disagree. If microsoft ever get dragged back into court on anti-trust
>charges they will do the same as they did this time and IBM did before
>them. Just stall & delay in court and pour money into the election
>campaign of the party, There is only one, and wait till a more business
>friendly administration comes to power. Then they will plea bargain the
>charges down to being rude in public and walk away scot free. The money
>they spent on lawyers will be written off on their taxes and they will
>continue on their merry way. Bottom line; the chance to nail microsoft has
>slipped away. There is no way the Bush administration is going to press
>forward with this.
>
I don't think that the Bush administration is in any position to either
press forward or press against anything right now. Don't forget that they
have a Democratic Senate against them, they didn't win the popular
vote, and final analysis of the Florida vote indicates that who won is
entirely dependent on what you consider a valid vote to be. Not only that
but Bush
stupidly kept all the campaign people that were involved with the vote in
Florida on his staff, which simply reinforces the image (justified or not)
that he
engineered a theft of the election. It's a pretty toothless cat up there in
the house.
Senators aren't elected by the Electoral College. Although, actually,
this makes it worse because government bureaucrats typically do nothing
if they sense a power vacuum at the top.
As far as IBM goes, I think that they are hardly an example to cite of a
successful monopoly. Not many people call a business successful that had
to write off a billion dollars of losses.
Also, don't forget that AT&T was broken up on George Bush Senior's boss's
watch, a man who was far more pro business than any Republican we've ever
had in recent years. And, there was considerable popular opinion _against_
the AT&T breakup to boot, and the results of the breakup haven't delivered
on the promise of competitive local dialtone, either. (and it was obvious
this wouldn't happen to a blind monkey) They proceeded with that one when
there was no obvious
benefit to doing it, doing it was also unpopular, and there didn't appear to
be anything broken to start with. With Microsoft, there's plenty of obvious
benefits, it's about as popular as your going to see support for a breakup
among the plebians, and it's obvious to a blind monkey what the problem is.
Ted Mittelstaedt tedm@toybox.placo.com
Author of: The FreeBSD Corporate Networker's Guide
Book website: http://www.freebsd-corp-net-guide.com
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