Microsoft Chided Over Exclusive Music Idea 331
grumpyman writes "The federal judge overseeing Microsoft Corp.'s business practices scolded the company Wednesday over a proposal to force manufacturers to tether iPod-like devices to Microsoft's own music player software. Microsoft blamed the proposal on a newly hired, "lower-level business person" who did not understand the company's obligations under the antitrust settlement."
When are Mp3 player companies going to get it? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:When are Mp3 player companies going to get it? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Turnabout is FairPlay? (Score:3, Interesting)
The disputed plan, part of a marketing campaign known as "easy start," would have affected portable music devices that compete with Apple Computer Inc.'s popular iPod. It would have precluded makers of those devices from distributing to consumers music software other than Microsoft's own Windows Media Player, in exchange for Microsoft-supplied CDs.
is a violation of their punishment - much like if a person on parole can't hang out w/ convicted felons, but a regular person can
Culpability (Score:4, Interesting)
How many questionable actions have slipped through because the competitors have been strong-armed (due to business relations with MS) or bought off?
This happens to be an area where MS has valid competition who have a large interest in making sure MS doesn't leverage their OS dominance... what happens in areas where the competition doesn't have the legal resources to monitor MS & to file complaints?
Not to bash MS, but really now... Gates & co are making a good case for the idea that they need to be monitored past 2007, and that perhaps the previous settlement wasn't enough.
The fact of the matter is that whether it was Gates or Ballmer or some new lackey, they were acting in official capacity as an employee of MS. It is the responsibility of those in charge to make sure no one in the organization could take illegal action. And should the court take action (which the judge said she won't), the execs at MS should be held liable by their shareholders.
Re:Why the Music Idea (Score:4, Interesting)
Why not:
Anti-Virus
Anti-Spyware
Firewall
The typical statements are:
1) Anti-spware; there is just no clear leader in the market
2) Firewall; its not full fledge product
3) A/V not sure what the rational is here. There are market leaders and its going to be a full fledge product.
The fundamental problem is that Microsoft really has lost the ability to compete on merits of software. I think that many of their current policies may expose them to far more dangerous antitrust litigation in the future including all those you just mentioned. IANAL though.
I think that the changes in SP2 regarding better protection against ActiveX controls could have bit into the antispyware market, but that is quite defensible in terms of improving one's product. That seems to me to be clearly on the right side of the line. However, bundling antispyware solutions with Windows (via WIndows Update) seems to be questionable at best. Personal firewalls are another area where there is good question (though Microsoft's personal firewall isn't that great of a product).
In both of these cases, however, it could be argued (unsuccessfully, I think) that because most of this software is given away as a loss leader or integrated into antivirus software, that there is no such thing as a personal firewall or antispyware market. This might be sufficient to handle such complaints (remember that the appeals court found that the DoJ had not made a case that there was such a thing as a web browser market and hence overturned part of the judgement against Microsoft on these grounds). But I don't know. If there is a dispute about whether a market exists, I would expect that to be an issue of fact and a matter for a jury. If I were Microsoft, I would not want to allow for a jury trial in such a case.
None of these arguments work in the antivirus area. And it is quite possible that this is an area that Microsoft is going to get sucked into quite to their detriment.
Re:Turnabout is FairPlay? (Score:4, Interesting)
You're comparing apples to oranges. From the article:
A proper comparison would be to note that Apple requires Apple to bundle iTunes with sales of the iPod and other devices Apple sells. Which, I suppose, they do.... since it's all one company. But this is hardly your point.
Your confusion is over the content offered on iTunes. Note that this has absolutely nothing to do with content. Would you care to point out where content providers are required to enter an exclusive contract with Apple to make that content only available via iTunes? Or perhapse where the Judge found objections to the Windows Media format?
A Tale of Two Microsoft's (Score:5, Interesting)
Pretty much every thing you say is true. To a point. It is true that Microsoft is a place where one can generally have a lot of freedom on how you do your job and you only find out once a year that the management thinks several of your most important contributions were wastes of time (a more common complaint than you might think), and that in general, it was a fairly satisfying place to work. It is true that people take a lot of pride in their work, and that most of the people there, especially those in product development, are primarily interested in making quality software, though whether they succeed or not is another question.
The problem, however, is that there is also an odd sense of mean-spiritedness which exists as a hidden undercurrent at the company. It does not come out in every employee, and I think that the GM of my department through most of the time I was there was probably the least mean-spirited guy I have enver seen in any company, but it is a part of the corporate culture. You would not believe how many Microsoft employees might ordinarily vode democrat but voted to elect Sen. Gordon simply because Cantwell was coming from a competing company (Real Networks). Never mind the fact that she might actually understand the industry. One guy even told me that he could not in good conscience vote to elect an executive from a competitor to public office. And you would not beleive the flack I got because before I was hired, I had migrated my parents to a Linux desktop and did not want to bring them back into the fold of Microsoft software (yes they still run Linux, and no they are not nerds or techies).
Similarly, the level of mean-spiritedness I watched seemed to go up as one ascended the management chain though there were plenty of exceptions. I knew several people who ended up in GM positions who really were great people to work for and with, and were entirely procompetitive. Sadly I also saw many more people who were fundamentally meanspirited (even if they did not at first appear this way) who were promoted as well.
Now, I was not ill-informed as to the nature of this aspect of Microsoft corporate culture when I was hired. I had read essentially all of the court documents both regarding Caldera v. Microsoft and USDoJ v. Microsoft. And I largely accepted the employement at first due to the fact that I did not have another job lined up when my term came to an end. In other words, it was clear to me that a large percentage of senior execs (including Gates and Ballmer) were of this category of employees, and that this was a large part of what catylized this attitude in the company.
During my time at Microsoft, I worked tirelessly to improve Microsoft software and business practices. My contributions were nearly all procompetitive. Among ideas first floated by me:
1) One has to stop thinking of Exchange and Sendmail as competitors (as a result of this email, a POP3 server was added to Windows Server 2003).
2) If you are going to Linuxworld, at least take the one product (SFU) that Linux guys might find interesting.
3) SFU should ship with the operating system.
4) If you can't provide SSH, at least provide a telnet server which uses Kerberos to encrypt the session (don't know the status on this one, but I believe it may be forthcoming)
I don't know where my other suggestions so I will not mention them here. However, I will say that I had suggested a very aggressive competitive approach aimed at materially reducing the number of safe markets for Linux and FreeBSD. I would not be surprised if Microsoft continues to impliment other suggestions I made.
Re:"Microsoft regrets (Score:5, Interesting)
You are right. Having a monopoly isn't something the government can regulate; being a monopoly is not against the law. Companies can't just sue another company for being successful. It is only when Microsoft engages in unfair business practices where they use the advantages of their monopoly status that it becomes an issue of antitrust. But whether to sue them under antitrust laws is up to the government, specifically the attorney general (antitrust is a civil matter, not a criminal one).
That largely depends on the administration in office. Sure future antitrust violations will be dealt with more harshly. If they never get sued by the government, the only thing that'll happen is that they'll pay some large sum in fines to a bunch of small or already-dead companies and go about their merry way. And even if the DOJ does get involved, well Microsoft received a large fine the last time, setting the precedent to fine them even more (yes, it can be argued that fines aren't enough, but then again, that was argued for this case too and Microsoft was still largely fined). Anyhow, this administration is likely not going to act and we know little to nothing about the next one. Yet the settlement conveniently expires before then. By the time the next administration comes around to suing them again for unfair business practices, they'd have bought up all the so-called victims and the prosecution wouldn't have much of a leg to stand on except for Microsoft's history. And all Microsoft would need to ask then in defense is where the prosecution's witnesses are.
Once they're out from under the microscope, it doesn't give them free reign to do as they please, but it does loosen their chains considerably.
Already there are over 100 antitrust suits against them winding their way though a multidistrict panel
And there have been countless antitrust suits and unfair business practices suits before that. What really is litigation to Microsoft? Just part of the cost of doing business. Microsoft has been engaged in this business model for a very long time. Everyone sues Microsoft. Microsoft either settles with them for some amount of money, or loses, and is fined some amount of money. To Microsoft, these fines and suits are looked at like their utility bills.
Which is one reason I no longer work there.
I would work for Google too if given the choice. They get free food.
Corporate tool (Score:3, Interesting)
I still haven't seen anyone with an iPod, but I've had a Neuros and I know someone with an Archos. Unless you're being paid to publicize that one company's antiquated product (fuckin' A, it can't even play modern codecs like Vorbis), then there's no reason to shill for it.
Re:Turnabout is FairPlay? (Score:1, Interesting)
I call BS.
People get what they buy. I want it to play mp3s and i'm not interested in WMA. Similarly, my hard disk tv recorder plus DVD-RW, supports only a few formats, but doesn't support DIVX for instance. I still bought it, because i know what i want.
I bought an Xbox, and darn, it only plays Xbox games! What a closed system it is! As said, people get what they buy. And you may want to check up on why Microsoft got convicted for using its monopoly and then checking if this holds for OS X? Or for the iPod. And you quote for instance iMac thermal problems. Product recalls happen. Sony customers know about that (see for instance a recent
Re:Turnabout is FairPlay? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:In defense of MS (Score:4, Interesting)
Nice people do that all the time, they really do!
Corporate culture (Score:3, Interesting)
> practices scolded the company Wednesday over a proposal
> to force manufacturers to tether iPod-like devices to
> Microsoft's own music player software. Microsoft blamed
> the proposal on a newly hired, "lower-level business person"
> who did not understand the company's obligations under
> the antitrust settlement.
This points out well why Microsoft can't be trusted in these anti-trust settlements. Microsoft's view is that proposals like this are only a problem in that they violate the anti-trust settlement terms. In reality, they are a problem in that they violate the intent of the anti-trust laws.
MS expects its employees to work tirelessly to skirt the edge of the anti-trust laws, and build up its defacto monopoly. They can't accept into the corporate culture that attempting to force use of MS software through restrictive licensing agreements is not an acceptable business practice, -even if- you can do it without contravening the strict letter of the law.
Frm the referenced article: 'The judge said Microsoft's music-player proposal -- even though it was abandoned 10 days later -- "maybe indicates a chink in the compliance process."'
I would not describe it as a "chink"; I would describe it as a gap in which Microsoft is unwilling to comply with any settlement agreement to any greater degree than they can be compelled to by threat of force.
'"This is an issue that Microsoft is concerned showed up," Rule said. He added that Microsoft regrets the proposal ever was sent to music-player manufacturers and that the company was "looking at it to make sure this is a lesson learned."'
Unfortunately, from Microsoft's point of view, the lesson they seem to want to impress on the employees is, "thou shalt not get caught", where the court wants them to learn to alter their business practices to prohibit these kinds of restrictive agreements.