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EU Launches Yet Another Antitrust Probe Into Microsoft
Posted by
ScuttleMonkey
on Mon Jan 14, 2008 03:17 PM
from the getting-probed-always-a-bummer dept.
from the getting-probed-always-a-bummer dept.
Connor writes "The EU has announced a new wide-ranging antitrust probe into Microsoft's practices of bundling software with Windows, as well as whether its products interoperate sufficiently with competitors' products. 'The first area of investigation will concern interoperability of some of Microsoft's products, including Office 2007, the .NET Framework, and some of Microsoft's server products.' The other prong of the investigation is a response to Opera's antitrust complaint, but will look at other products, too. 'The Commission will also look at desktop search and Windows Live as well in addition to other products. The EC says that its investigation will "focus on allegations that a range of products have been unlawfully tied to sales of Microsoft's dominant operating system."'"
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Opera Files EU Complaint Against Microsoft 455 comments
A number of readers have sent word about Opera Software ASA's antitrust complaint against Microsoft filed with the EU. Here is Opera's press release on the filing. The company wants the EU to "obligate Microsoft to unbundle Internet Explorer from Windows and/or carry alternative browsers pre-installed on the desktop" and to "require Microsoft to follow fundamental and open Web standards accepted by the Web-authoring communities." The latter request makes this a case to watch. Will the Commissioner take the Acid2 test using IE7?
Firehose:EU launches new antitrust probe into Microsoft by Anonymous Coward
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Another one? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Another one? (Score:5, Informative)
They paid about 500 million euro in 2004, while they were still appealing the decision. Their last appeal was turned down last year.
Also, they made available the specs for the SMB protocol, which the Samba team bought (for about $14k).
Re:Another one? (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Sure, they've been forced to hand over cash in fines - but fines aren't terribly effective against companies that can make more money in 3 hours than they are likely to be fined in 3 years.
As far as I can tell, every antitrust suit (i
Andrew Tridgell certainly can (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Another one? (Score:5, Informative)
I disagree.
No they prosecute MS because MS constantly breaks the law and other companies complain to them, knowing the US courts have been paid off.
Sure it is, but "bundling" isn't illegal in and of itself. Leveraging a monopoly in one market into another market is illegal and if you have a monopoly, bundling is one way to do it. Apple doesn't even compete in the desktop OS market, since they refuse to sell OS X to Dell or any other OEM. Apple does compete in the "desktop computer system" market against Dell and HP and Sony, but they certainly don't have a monopoly there, so there is no way such bundling can be illegal.
That shows what you know. The EU does have an ongoing probe against Apple, not for their OS since it is not a monopoly, but with regards to their iPod line, which at 70% is close to being a monopoly on portable digital music players. If they decide Apple has enough influence, they will charge Apple for bundling the iTunes software with iPods and for tying it to the iTunes store.
The EU investigates lots of companies for antitrust abuse. If you her about MS being charged more often their are two reasons, one it is more likely to be reported in the news sites you read, and two, MS has built their entire business model on breaking antitrust law and hoping the fines are smaller than the money it makes them.
Shudder... (Score:5, Funny)
It ties back to making a profit (Score:4, Interesting)
I do rather wish, though, that it was the QC department rather than the legal department that got all the funding for these ventures; the strategy of 'sue everyone and who cares about the product' didn't seem to work too well for SCO, and with the rather notable--especially in Europe--rejection of Vista, M$ would do well to take note of the problems with their product. Legal muscle and dominance of the marketplace will take you far, but such things are no excuse for honest innovation (or, if you can't do it honestly, buying it or stealing it from someone else--anyone heard of any actual production plans for those nifty tabletop computers from a few months back yet?)
Waiting for the diplomats. (Score:5, Informative)
Diplomats? Don't hold your breath! (Score:3, Interesting)
Besides, I haven't seen any signs recently that the EU is at all impressed by the US opinion in this matter since it demonstrably operates well wit
A New Reality For Microsoft (Score:5, Interesting)
There is a certain, and strange, Microsoft fanbase that is roughly of the mindset of "Microsoft is always teh winner". They might not even like Microsoft products but somehow identify with the company as somehow being badass and that "Bill Gates will just buy his way out of this with pocketchange LOL!" type sentiments.
Tough times ahead for that crowd. Look for much crying about how life isn't fair from them.
Good EU! (Score:5, Interesting)
No, this dont mean that Microsoft could not sell them or develope those. Just that those users who dont need a Microsoft own webbrowser or a WMP. Can remove them. OEM manufactures can install Opera or Firefox or OTHER webbrowser instead IE and VLC or any other mediaplayer instead of WMP.
How many remembers what is definition of Operating System?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operating_system [wikipedia.org]
"An operating system (OS) is the software that manages the sharing of the resources of a computer and provides programmers with an interface used to access those resources. An operating system processes system data and user input, and responds by allocating and managing tasks and internal system resources as a service to users and programs of the system. At the foundation of all system software, an operating system performs basic tasks such as controlling and allocating memory, prioritizing system requests, controlling input and output devices, facilitating networking and managing file systems. Most operating systems come with an application that provides a user interface for managing the operating system, such as a command line interpreter or graphical user interface. The operating system forms a platform for other system software and for application software."
And what we have left if we remove all applications what dosn't remove any of these definition parts? Just pure OS.
It would be much better if a Microsoft would become as two corporation, other to build and sell basic OS and other to sell all other software like WMP, IE, Office, Games, Outlook etc etc. Together user could get windows as it is now and every one would be happy.
And those who needs just windows OS, would get Operating System and nothing more. They could install just their games to it or software what are needed and use computer happily.
Whats wrong with including apps anyways? (Score:4, Interesting)
(warning car analogy ahead)
It is kind of like telling auto manufacturers that they cannot include built in AC, CD player, or any other ameneties with their cars because it kills the third party market even though these are things that consumers expect to come with their cars.
Re:Whats wrong with including apps anyways? (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
By offering them as free downloads and by convincing OEMs that your product is the best so they should install it for their users... you know the same as every other software vendor on the planet that doesn't have a monopoly to abuse.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Good EU! (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
They offer you the chance to send them $2 in exchange for mailing you a CDs with their release on it. This is "selling it".
Furthermore, they would be within the scope of the license to package and charge you to download their distribution (as long as yo
It's a Monopoly (Score:5, Insightful)
I just saved the EU a lot of money. Now, if they skip the probe and start barring monopolies like Microsoft at least from doing business with the EU governments, they might actually save the EU's people some money, and get some better products out of a more actually competitive environment.
Ironic (Score:3, Insightful)
I wonder if/when governments are going to start going after Apple. OS X is 10x "worse" than Windows when it comes to bundled software. I use "worse" lightly, of course, because I actually want bundled software.
-matthew
Prepare to take your neuroinhibitors! (Score:3, Funny)
European commissioner Neelie Kroes has expressed deep anger at smart people's obvious monopolization of the job market and abuse of that monopoly to keep the mentally challenged from being hired. She has vowed to investigate and take whatever action is necessary to reduce smart people's stranglehold on competition, including both fines and the prescription of neuroinhibitors to put them on an equal footing with the mentally challenged. She then said that success would be when less than 50% of the world's employees had IQ's greater than 100.
While I am sure nobody at Microsoft thinks so... (Score:3, Interesting)
Microsoft can no longer do anything without the specture of Anti-trust law looming. I think its caused them a great deal of uncertainty in terms of product roadmap and generally taken away from their focus. The only products of theirs that seem to be improving are Exchange and Windows Server itself which are becoming functionally more like the Unix and VMS systems that inspired them in the first place. They are certainly not doin anything new; because their ain't much new to do, and skipping logical points of intergation to avoid stepping on toes that might go crying to the DOA.
Don't get me wrong I hate what Microsoft has done to the industry as much as the next Slashdoter. I also think two or three Microsofts would more then likely suck all the oxygen out room just as much as the one monolith does; but at least we might see some real progress.
Over the last six to eight years we have gotten just about exactly nothing from Microsoft of real value. Oh and don't say DotNet was inovative. It took Microsoft two years to figure out what DotNet was themselves and its not new either. Sandboxed byte code interpreters existed already; JAVA as well as others. Ok so Microsoft made some more compilers for other languagues targeting their byte code. Big deal its was an obvious move, anyone wanting to invest the man hours could have done the same thing with Java; and if nobody had well CPUs have gotten fast. Pure interpreters would have filled the space.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Oh, No, Not again! (Score:5, Insightful)
This is a ridiculous statement. Cars used to be separate from air conditioning too; people used to have to add a window evaporative cooler to their coupe back in the forties. Just try convincing the majority of people that cars don't need air conditioning! (If you go back even farther, cars used to regularly come without heaters, too, so we can do this all day...
EVERYONE uses a web browser as an OS component today. No, really! Sun has been doing HTML documentation for a long, long time; they used to bundle Netscape 2 for the purpose of reading it (and websurfing.) Microsoft, of course, has been doing it since they integrated Aieee! Apple, naturally, uses HTML fairly liberally.
Naturally, no one else uses it to the extent that Microsoft does, to the point where folder views contain HTML. But why should Microsoft not be permitted to do this?
Microsoft bundling IE wasn't the problem. Microsoft forbidding their customers (OEMs) to bundle other web browsers (and other competing products) was. Your statements make it clear that you do not understand the problem.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Your analogy (like most that will be presented in this article) is flawed because it does not include a monopoly for one of the markets. No one has a monopoly on cars or on air conditioners or people might feel very differently about it. As a result of t
Re:Oh, No, Not again! (Score:4, Informative)
Sigh, not again. How many bloody times do I have to explain it. Antitrust law makes bundling a monopolized product with a product in another market. The US, EU and several other jurisdictions have already convicted MS of abusing their monopoly in the desktop OS market, thus they legally have a monopoly in the desktop OS market. They bundled IE with that monopolized product. This is the same as someone with a monopoly in the car business bundling car accessories.
That's just exacerbating the abuse. MS has already been convicted of bundling IE, which is illegal all by itself.
Bundling is the very first example of tying listed in US antitrust law and is the most common form of antitrust abuse prosecuted. Please learn the facts rather than arguing what you wish was true.
MS sells a bundle which includes both Windows and IE. Some of that money goes to develop IE. Users don't have the option of buying just Windows for a price that is lower than the bundle. Thus, users are forced to buy IE, rather than saving that money and buying a competing offering.
No it is a violation of the Clayton act. MS has already been convicted by the US on this count, how can you claim it isn't illegal?
Wrong, direct sales are not the only way to cause financial harm. For example, Firefox is paid for directing users to Google. They are paid less because of MS's actions using their monopoly to push IE.
It doesn't matter because Netscape didn't have a monopoly and aren't relevant. This is about what MS is doing today to affect the market.
Sigh, you are the worst MS apologist ever. You'll take any farfetched claim and make it, regardless of the facts. Sad.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Not to defend microsoft, but to explain the stupid (Score:3, Interesting)
Taking your car analogy for a moment. Internet explorer is like the display engine for 80% of the in dash LCD systems, without it your car will run, but you won't be able to tell what your tac is doing, how much gas you have or ho
Re:Oh, No, Not again! (Score:5, Insightful)
This is NOT AT ALL the argument used against Microsoft, and I wish you would pay a little more attention. You are clearly an unreasoning Microsoft-hater. I am a reasoning Microsoft-hater, but I won't talk about why I hate them right now, only about why trying to claim that they should not be able to bundle IE is stupid.
First of all, your assertion that you can simply remove Firefox from Ubuntu Desktop is incorrect. Oh, you can remove it... but you must remove the package 'ubuntu-desktop', which depends on firefox! This will result in autoremoval of a lot of other packages (if you are doing autoremoval) and the failure to track some updates to ubuntu.
Second of all, Microsoft does not force you to use Internet Explorer for anything but HTML help and where it is embedded into applications. You can turn off web folder view. Of course, you still have to use IE to use Windows Update, but frankly, that is an entirely reasonable restriction.
Third, it is actually possible to embed gecko in the place of IE, although some applications will crap on it. The fact that they do not work the same in all situations is reason enough for Microsoft not to make it too easy to do that - they do not go out of their way to make it difficult.
Your main complaint seems to be that having IE on your system makes it potentially less secure. But making an insecure OS is not (yet?) a crime.
IT IS POSSIBLE TO REPLACE IE WITH ANOTHER BROWSER. It is possible to trap the loading of the embedded IE component and load embedded gecko instead. I have personally patched applications to do this (I don't know if the patcher is still around and/or still works, though) and had them work. However, that browser must behave just as IE does! Similarly, it is possible to replace any and all air conditioning components in any car with those from any other car, but if you expect them to work properly they must work the same way the originals did. This is no different from IE in windows! The car manufacturer does not tell you what you need to know in order to change compressors, either. They do not tell you what the bracket bolt pattern is, so that you can have another fabricated. They don't tell you what the belt thickness is. You have to figure these things out for yourself if you want to alter the system. They don't go out of their way to stop you, although they WILL void your warranty if you start tampering with things!
So basically, you have utterly failed to show any way in which Microsoft can reasonably be restricted from bundling their own software. Once again, the problem was never that they bundled their own software, but that they forbade OEMs to bundle ANOTHER web browser, remove any icons that their install process created, et cetera. THIS was the anticompetitive behavior. Part of the legal response against microsoft was to force them to unbundle certain applications, as a punitive measure. It was not because it was felt that bundling was wrong, but that it was felt that microsoft was not responsible enough to bundle. The truth was VERY different; the right that Microsoft cannot handle is having a monopoly position and being in a position to dicate terms to OEMs. If Microsoft was going to be prohibited from doing something, it should have been one of these things. The USDOJ should have broken Microsoft up into pieces when it had the chance, but as you probably know, the Bush administration effectively pardoned Microsoft by way of Ashcroft.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Oh, No, Not again! (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Not to mention their attempts to squeeze the life out of open formats like ODF.
Also, it shows the EU has
Re:enough? (Score:5, Insightful)
They have laws and they try to force everyone to obey those laws. Every time Microsoft has done something that would be illegal in most countries, it itself has said that it will obey the laws of the place where it operates. So Microsoft should be quite happy with this. EU is just helping them to obey the laws.
Microsoft has a lot of business and they might have broken several laws. Should rest of these crimes be forgotten simply because they were already judged?
I have no doubt that EU will handle the issues professionally and Microsoft will only get what it deserves. If they have done nothing wrong, they have nothing to worry about.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Poor Microsoft... (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:The World (Score:5, Interesting)
Economic strength is reason that the United States it the world super power; military is over-rated and a result of economic strength. American assets are priced in US dollars and as the dollar drops so does the value of the country. Additionally, a huge amount of America's debt is owed in foreign currency and as the dollar drops the debt's value increases proportionally; again making America poorer and therefore weaker. Also, as the dollar's value drops against world currencies (particularly the Euro) foreign reserves are switch from being dollar based to being Euro based; again diminishing the economic might and influence of the United States.
At this point in time the US is so dramically richer than any other state in the world that it doesn't really matter - how ever over the next decade we're likely to see the rise of two new super powers that rival the Unites States: European Union (the confused, sluggish super power) and China (the unified and aggressive super power).
The last time we saw the Unites States challenged it was by the USSR and Japan. The USSR was fundamentally flawed by actually being a totalitarian state which are inherently flawed over the long run. Japan wasn't as flawed, but it inflexible work force (worse than Europe's) has severely limited its ability to compete. In both cases the US system simply out spent and maneuvered them. I don't think the US will be able to do this again unless China's one-child laws begin to damage their economy with the upcoming population drop and Europe's reformist governments get voted out.
As for the article and topic on hand: good. M$ needs to be pushed to be competitive and not just handicapped by overly relying on their OS monopoly. Their censure by the EU will only work to improve the US economy (in the long run) and the EU consumer. Kudos to the EU for having the balls to do this and showing up the US government.
Re:The World (Score:5, Insightful)
Beeing European and living in the so called European capital: Brussels. I can assure you that the European Union won't become a super power anytime soon.
The European union is a bunch of independant states with strictly no common foreign policy and a real difficulty to define even the most basic common interest & strategy.Part of this mess are countries live with grandiose illusions (Uk, France), others with a difficulty to accept themselves (Germany), lost in domestic affairs (Italy, Belgium,Spain), eager to enjoy their hard won independance (Poland), focus on regional conflict (Greece), or simply not interested (Netherlands, Denmark, etc).
When I see the current trends, I don't see any European common foreign policy in a reasonnable future.
What would worry me if I was American would be: China and Russia in some ways...India in the long term, the rest (particularly Europe) is sleeping.
It's the monopoly stupid (Score:3, Insightful)
Microsoft's monopoly control makes it bad. With greater than 90% of the
Re:It's the monopoly stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
And last time I checked, Best Buy, Comcast, and those laptop manufacturers are seperate companies from Microsoft. They could just as easily sell all their computers without Windows.
Of course, the next step in that argument is that no one would buy them. Going along that line of thinking, who is at fault here; Microsoft, or the people and companies that continue to buy and use their products?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Number 1. Both of these are FREE PROGRAMS. You can download any version
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
1. DirectX was made to pull people away from OpenGL which makes games MUCH harder to port. To accomplish making p
RTFA (Score:4, Insightful)
The other half is that the web browser bundled with Windows does not follow "fundamental and open" standards for how web browsers render pages. Essentially, Microsoft is getting busted for trying to subvert the commonly accepted web standards and replace them with proprietary IE-style web standards.
Same goes for the Office file interoperability, although that seems to not be mentioned in the ars technia article, but is mentioned in this one. [smh.com.au]
Re:I don't get it... (Score:4, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
No, I doubt any browser is, but have you ever done any Web development? If you create pages based upon the standards and then test 99% of the time it will work just fine in every browser except IE, where it never works. MS doesn't even try and the leaked
Re:I don't get it... (Score:5, Interesting)