States and DoJ Divided On Microsoft Antitrust Success 123
Rob writes "Computer Business Review is reporting that the US Department of Justice and five States
have declared themselves satisfied with the antitrust enforcement efforts taken against
Microsoft despite a further seven States maintaining they have had 'little or no
discernible impact in the marketplace.' While the US DoJ and five States — New York,
Louisiana, Maryland, Ohio, and Wisconsin (The New York Group) — reported that the final
judgments have succeeded in increasing competition to the benefit of consumers, seven
States making up the California
Group are not convinced."
Re:The question is simple (Score:5, Informative)
It's documented that Microsoft has entered into restrictive contracts with OEMs so they pay per PC sold, whether or not it includes Windows. Also that Microsoft has threatened vendors (e.g. IBM) with an increase in the price they pay for Windows and used this as a tool to stop vendors from including competitors' software they don't like. Some of these restrictive deals were replaced with similar ones that look better on paper but are much the same in practice (e.g. paying a Microsoft tax on each PC of a certain 'model' that was sold, so if a vendor wants to exclude Windows they must print new name badges and manuals). A simple injunctive remedy IHMO would be to require that Microsoft sell Windows licences at the same price to all vendors, and that the licence be paid for only if Windows is included with the PC.
You are quite right about the bundling of products etc. That is another example of monopoly power. It doesn't make the complaint about Microsoft preventing OEMs from offering Windows-free PCs any less valid.
Re:You were expecting...? (Score:3, Informative)
If you believe market share should be the only indicator of whether injunctions have worked, and you won't be satisfied until Microsoft has some percentage (let's say less than 50%), then it really won't matter what happens until Microsoft is less of a company than they are now.
Personally, I would've thought this kind of slap on the wrist might've been the impetus that gets Microsoft to write better software, but Vista has proven that not to be the case. I firmly believe the only reason that Microsoft still has dominance in the desktop OS market is because people are comfortable with the software that runs on their OS, and they stick with it. Unless you're up for government mandating that all citizens stop using MS Office, or playing games on their computers, I don't see Microsoft's market share changing very rapidly.
Re:Oddly enough... (Score:5, Informative)
I'll start.
- Claiming Linux violates 235 patents.
- Introduce OOXML to spike ODF, and stacking ISO
- Subverting Massachusetts to prevent adoption of ODF there.
- Novell-Microsoft agreement
- Preventing alternative desktop search engines.
- Introducing Silverlight to spike Flash
- Introducing XPS to spike PDF
- Refusing to open APIs and protocols despite EU decision.
- Breaking all of their own "12 tenets' before they even got started.
There's more, but that's a good start.Re:OEM Madness (Score:1, Informative)
It involves dumping the boot sector of the partition (with say, dd if=/dev/whatever of=bootsector bs=512 count=1), getting it to your NTFS partition, and specifying it in your boot.ini file.
Although since Vista re-organized the bootloader a lot, I'm not sure how to do this on Vista.
Even Simpler Re:The question is simple (Score:1, Informative)
Microsoft has locked out Linux from Retailer Shelves
Yes, the proliferation of broadband and WiFi hot spots that allow laptop users to download a CD-ROM in 30 minutes has made it easier for end users to install non-microsoft applications, by Microsoft still maintains total monopoly control over the OEM and retailer channel. When I shop at K-Mart, I can look at the games available for Sony PlayStation, Nintendo, and even X-Box, even test drive them, even see if the kids will like them. When I buy software for a PC there is NO facility to take a "Test Drive". On the other hand, Microsoft makes sure that their middleware, "applets" (bundled applications), and other anticompetitive products are fully loaded and ready to demonstrate.
Applications Barrier to Entry Still Exists
Remember, the whole premise of the Antitrust case was that Microsoft had created an "Applications Barrier to Entry", preventing the widespread marketing and adoption of applications capable of running on competitive platforms. Furthermore, it was ruled that Microsoft was illegally using it's existing monopoly to exclude competitors from the marketplace (IE Distribution Channels).
Monopoly or Collusion
There are two possibilities. One is that Microsoft has been arm-twisting and coercing the OEMs, through fraud (vaporware) extortion (buy more than you need or we will give you NO licenses), blackmail (if you sell machines without Windows, we will claim you are promoting piracy), and sabotage (want a patch that permanently damages your hardware - similar to the way we fried IBM's Cyrix chips with Windows NT 4.0 service pack 2?).
The other possibility is that the OEMs were willing co-conspirators in a collusion scheme designed to exclude competitors like Novell, Sun, and Apple from the marketplace. Could it be that the OEMs openly conspired to exclude Linux distributors, and other distributors of PC compatible operating systems such as Linux, Solaris, BSD, and OS/X from the marketplace, by refusing to allow them into the OEM distribution channel?
The evidence and actions of the OEMs indicate quite the opposite. Hewlett Packard designed all of their AMD-64 based laptop and desktop PCs to be fully compatible with Linux. They even announced that they would offer their PCs with Linux - for about 3 days. Then what happened? Did Microsoft "crack down"? Dell and Toshiba have also attempted similar "Linux PC" announcements - only to withdraw the offerings within 3-4 days. IBM's Sam Palmisano had publicly announced that IBM would be converting to Linux and OSS by the end of 2007. It seems that Microsoft made it so unpleasant for IBM, that IBM scuttled the PC division, and sold it to Lenovo. The only Desktops they still sell - are available with Linux as well as Windows.
Yet with all these attempts to announce and promote Linux based PCs, not a single Linux PC has made it to the shelves of a major national or international retail franchise. Wal-Mart has offered Linux PCs for almost 10 years now, but only on their web site, and only as pretty much a seasonal offering.
Desktop Virtualization has been thwarted
The technology is available to enable Linux and Windows to run on the same machine. Dual-boot, Desktop Virtualization, and multicore processors have made it possible to run both Linux and Windows on the same desk