EU Deadline Approaching for Microsoft 356
doga writes "As reported by various publications, Microsoft is facing its deadline tonight at midnight central European time. The commissioner has then to decide whether it implemented correctly the measures (windows without media player and interop documentation) or if it should be fined up to 5% of its daily sales." From the article: "European antitrust regulators, who have been at odds with Microsoft over its efforts to comply with its order, hope to make a decision by July 20 as to whether Microsoft has submitted an acceptable proposal for compliance, said Jonathan Todd, a spokesman for the European Union. That date is the last meeting of the European Commission before its summer recess."
25 minutes to go! (Score:2)
Re:25 minutes to go! (Score:5, Interesting)
20 days from now means something like $100,000,000 in retroactive fines even *if* Microsoft then immediately handed in an acceptable new proposal on the same day.
And I'm still not sure if they've actually paid the ~500 million Euro fine that was imposed originally.
Re:25 minutes to go! (Score:2)
It would be kool if they were to give that to the FOSS community, that would buy a lot of bounties
Perhaps with that money almost overnight FOSS could slay Microsoft.
Re:25 minutes to go! -- now 0 minutes to go (Score:2)
Meanwhile at the Microsoft headquarters... (Score:5, Funny)
(ok, shamelessly stolen from The Simpsons)
Re:Meanwhile at the Microsoft headquarters... (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Meanwhile at the Microsoft headquarters... (Score:3, Funny)
For once ... (Score:3, Funny)
So the timeline is really: (Score:2, Insightful)
Then, it will take a few weeks to decide on a punishment (if any).
Then a few more weeks to decide if the decision is the right one.
Then another month to decide if the decision of the decision was a good one.
Then submit it for a committee vote.
Wait - who had the decision?
I thought you had it? Where did it go?
What were we deciding upon?
I don't know. Let's hold a meeting and see if we can decide on it.
What's for lunch?
I don't know you - you decide.
Re:So the timeline is really: (Score:5, Informative)
The punishment has already been decided
It will take until the 20th to decide if Microsoft's proposal is crappy enough to deserve the fine.
Then they either fine them or they don't.
They've already told Microsoft to piss off when they asked for an extension to this deadline - hell, they've had 6 months to come up with a proposal, now they're just stalling for time.
Re:So the timeline is really: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:So the timeline is really: (Score:2)
Re:So the timeline is really: (Score:2)
Had to post this (Score:5, Funny)
Anti-trust (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Anti-trust (Score:4, Insightful)
The problem with Microsoft is that you don't have these choices. There is no WinXP without IE or Windows Media Player. This is what harms competition the most. This is the reason for an anti-trust case.
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
Other vendors do the same thing. Apple's dashboard is a bunch of javascript and html on top of their safari engine. Remove safari libra
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
What, you don't want to have IE bundled with Windows XP? Then don't buy it. The seller decides under what terms they will sell their product, and you, the buyer, decide whether to buy based on those terms. You don't decide to get the f*cking government installed. You move on, to something that suits your needs.
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
Linux and MacOS are not monopolies, but if they were they would have to abide by the same rules which MS are being made to obey now.
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
Bullshit (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2, Insightful)
And because the tight OS intergration MS is able to make thier browser and media player appear to be better products. Then when people try out other systems products (Firefox, Quicktime, whatever) on their Windows machine, they appear inferior to IE/WMP because they do not have the OS advantage.
Average User then thinks "Well, WMP seems to run better then Quicktime, IE starts up faster then Firefox, I'm going to stick with Windows"
If IE and WMP had
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
This might help your understanding. [usdoj.gov]
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
Hah!
The point is that there actually is a voluminous, appellate-level validated, court document called a "Finding of Facts" that detail, with pain-staking specifics, that the "arguments about a browser monopoly" were (and still are) anything but foolish.
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
MS was not found guilty because it has bundled various software with the OS - the problem is, that this bundled stuff could not be removed: while technically it was possible, MS used - illegally - its market power against those who tried (e.g.: "So, you want to sell your computers with RealPlayer instead of WMP? Well, then Windows will cost four times for you").
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
As I can replace Firefox with Opera, and everything still operates that depends on having a www-browser.
Re:Anti-trust (Score:5, Insightful)
I am no fan of Microsoft, but I think that they have been unfairly treated in these "anti-trust" cases in Europe and the US. Though I prefer Netscape/Mozilla to IE, I thought the arguments about a browser monopoly were quite foolish.
Have you noticed that the state-of-the-art as far as web pages and web applications are concerned has basically not changed for the last 5 years? Have you ever wondered why all of a sudden the advancement of this field ground to a complete halt? Oh yes, wasn't it just about the time that MS dominated the web browser market by using their OS monopoly to fund development, made IE impossible to uninstall, and incorporated code in the OS to specifically break competitors software. Oh and there was that little something about shipping a default browser to 95% of the planet while intentionally breaking the published standard that they had agreed to adhere to and even helped write.
Since that time the whole field has basically ground to a halt. Developers waste billions of dollars a year coding to standards and then working around all of IE's failures to conform and bugs that they intentionally use to be incompatible. Every web developer I know has cursed Microsoft for their evil behavior and for ruining an entire field all in order to milk a little more money out of everyone.
Antitrust laws exist for several reasons. Mostly it is because a capitalist model fails to work as soon as someone becomes a monopoly. When they do, they can get money without giving customers what they want, have motivation to not only not innovate, but to hold back innovation, and basically just suck money, while doing nothing. The EU is not run by idiots and they are doing the right thing here. The U.S. should have done it long ago but MS was contributing an insane amount of money to both the Democratic and Republican parties. Guess where that money comes from, ultimately from you any time you buy any computer with or without Windows.
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
Yeah that's exactly the situation with standard oil.
Re:Point Taken (Score:2)
it prevents them from repeating that series of events with media players and codecs so that they can control the
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
Surely that depends on what functionality you don't get in modern browsers versus one that stopped five years ago? The answer is, not much. It's all client side improvements, the server side isn't really driven much by the browser - they just deliver content. As far as I'm aware there haven't been major revisions to any of the internet protocols in the last five years?
The client side impro
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
Look at the US anti-trust case. Microsoft had completely ignored the internet. This allowed competitors to come into the market. When Microsoft discovered their mistake Netscape had over 90% of a big and growing market. Microsoft then created their (in the first versions horrible) browser. They used their big money tank to give away their browser for free to kill the competition, and leveraged their near-monopoly in operating systems to stronghand PC manufacturers into only installing the Microsoft
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
> I am no fan of Microsoft, but I think that
> they have been unfairly treated in these
> "anti-trust" cases in Europe and the US.
Here goes your opinion without stating *why*.
> Though I prefer Netscape/Mozilla to IE, I
> thought the arguments about a browser
> monopoly were quite foolish.
Because they were not about browser monopoly - during browser wars MS had no monopoly on browser market. They u
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
1. Microsoft have the PC operating system market more-or-less sewn up. Yes I know you've got Apple and Linux. How many systems in PC World/Dixons, Time or advertised in the media do you see running OS X or Linux?
2. A market opens up for a new application on Windows. An application which the majority of people are likely to want, and which a company can somehow make money out of. In 1997/8, it was the web browser. Today it'
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
Is this based on the notion of "double jeopardy"? Being tried for the same thing twice is unfair?
If this is the case then, while well intentioned, you're wrong. The only way to eliminate this situation is to federate authority to some higher power. Does that appeal to you? Frankly, I'd rather Microsoft "suffer" with EU politics than Chirac have a vote over the US economy in some
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
What they should've done was say, "You have two options. One: remove IE and WMP from Windows and make them easily removeable. Two: keep them bundled and release full specifications for the file formats and IE internals. Those are your options, or Windows may no longer be sold in the EU."
And then fine them.
There's no point in taking a fine over something that's already happened.
Re:Anti-trust (Score:2)
Try "microsoft monopoly" in google, it's the first link.
Re:Microsoft's take on the matter (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Microsoft's take on the matter (Score:2)
It may not be far from realistic that Bill wakes up one morning and lifts the universal sign of defiance (aka The Bird) in Europe's general direction. Definately an extreme measure, but one of EU's rocket-scientist p
Re:Microsoft's take on the matter (Score:4, Interesting)
More disastrous for MS in the long run (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Microsoft's take on the matter (Score:2)
The American is now telling us about how the economy sucks elsewhere. Great material man. Keep it up, you'll have your own show on Fox in no time.
Re:Microsoft's take on the matter (Score:2)
I don't buy that. EU is a huge economy with a lot of OS and office suite buyers. If Microsoft would pull out, someone else would take their place -- and then Microsoft would no longer have 90% of the office
Re:Microsoft's take on the matter (Score:2)
Also, the fines and other remedies seem to be quite reasonable - and you have to see that it's not the money that really hurts MS but the requirement to open up the APIs and - to a lesser extent - to provide Windows sans WMP. If the allegiations were unfounded complying with these requirements would n
Re:Microsoft's take on the matter (Score:5, Interesting)
Meanwhile, the bottom would drop out of MSFT stock, as every single product line has it's potential sales slashed by the the number of sales they would have had in Europe. Profits would turn to losses. And the end result of that could only be company directors losing their jobs. Bye bye Ballmer.
I'm sure MS employees like to talk the talk, but the company certainly can't walk the walk. Not on this one.
Re:Microsoft's take on the matter (Score:2)
What Microsoft would be looking at is the cost of compliance vs the cost of not doing business in Europe. When the cost of not doing business in Europe is cheaper than the cost of compliance, that will be the route they take. When you're getting fined 1.4B/year, and your unit only makes a profit of 1.1B/year worldwide, you're going to pull out of Europe.
In my op
Re:Microsoft's take on the matter (Score:2)
I thought most the design decisions were made by markering and legal, not engineering? Integrating IE was marketing (kill netscape) and legal (avoid antitrust). Engineering thought it was a terrible idea (and rightly so, look at all the problems it has caused).
"line their (the EU's) coffers with cash."
Yup...... Microsoft is going to finance the EU. Hate to break it to you, but those fines are a few orders of magnitude too low to do that.
Re:Microsoft's take on the matter (Score:2)
Now, if I stopped distributing the software I've made, would those who are currently using it notice?
Answer: eventually, but not right now, and not all at once. The only way they would would be if I suddenly did a big media blitz saying that their software is now unsupported.
MS pulling out is not going to make the millions of copies of Windows 2000 and Office 97 suddenly vanish -- only the products that have tie-ins to the mothershi
Re:Microsoft's take on the matter (Score:2)
Re:Microsoft's take on the matter (Score:2)
how about Linux? (Score:3, Insightful)
1. Any other OS does not have a monopoly - different rules apply (or, to be precise - antimonopolistic rules don't apply).
2. All that extra stuff in Linux is not integrated with OS (for example AFAIR you can't uninstall IE).
What do you think? Has this problem been mentioned/discussed somewhere?
Re:how about Linux? (Score:2)
Basically, bundle all you want. But forcing a bundle of seperate vertical market platforms all from the same vendor that has an economic interest in using a loss-leader approach to securing monopolies, and you've lost my sympathy.
I don't know why this is so confusing. Using predetory pricing reduces competition. Reduced
Re:how about Linux? (Score:2)
You mean like refusing to license fairplay to competitors to lock iPod customers into iTunes for online music.
Re:how about Linux? (Score:2)
When you set up your distro, you are given a choice of what to install (KDE, Gnome, etc.). When you install WinXP, you are required to install IE 6, WMP 9, etc. This requirement shuts out 3rd-party vendors while keeping MS market share. That is what is illegal -- using one's monopoly in one area to increase market share in another.
Re:how about Linux? (Score:2)
It's not "really" about choice, it's about the bundled software working better than any third party software ever could because of its use of hidden APIs built into the operating system that no competitor can use or work around. Choice is still there. I can still buy and install some third party media player/browser or even one of the free one's, but when's the last time you've seen any that load and respond and just plain interact with the rest of the system as snap
It's a small fine (Score:3, Insightful)
IE would have stopped talking to Apache and slowly broke the web. This was their strategy.
IE talking to IIS servers on WinOS only, think of the insane liscensing costs of even a small server farm.
The Web is worth nillions, 5% of M$ daily sales is chump change considering the loss to Commerce Worldwide.
Now of course Governments shouldn't stick their noses in, but the courts should and did when a monopoly behaves illegally just like for any other crime - it is a legal matter and was pursued as such.
This is why Netscape went Open Source, because Microsoft was buying the web and Netscape realised its server business, where the money was, would be over when IE had blanket coverage and Netscape couldn't afford the developers to fight back.
Microsoft commited a crime, they broke the law and they still are, they should be punished and the punishment should fit the crime - it is pretty small ion fact, as evidenced by Microsoft completely ignoring it.
If only America had the balls to follow suit they might be brought to heel, if not break 'em up, just like Ma Bell.
Massive monopolies do not a healthy market economy make.
Re:It's a small fine (Score:3, Insightful)
You see, Netscape was making servers, messaging software
IE doesnt talk to IIS in any way it doesnt talk to Apache, and
Re:It's a small fine (Score:3, Insightful)
even then ASP.net only renders 'equivelent' HTML representations of application objects based on user-agent
That, unfortunately, is not true by default, unless things have changed in the last year. I spent quite a while trying to figure out how the pages I'd carefully crafted statically to be standards-compliant and work well cross-browser suddently went to hell in Firefox when I started serving the pieces up through ASP.NET. I thought I had screwed up while breaknig the page apart until I found that wh
abuse of monopoly is a crime, that's why (Score:3, Insightful)
Linux and Apple do not hold monopolies on their markets, so even if they wanted to, they can't break the relevant laws. The findings in the US and Europe were that M$ has broken those laws, and even a casual familiarity with their business practices would hardly leave anyone in doubt!
If M$ won't respect the law, they should be penalised. Of course, I'd rather see them penalised by a total market boycott, but that probably assumes an unrealistic level of common sense from their customers and potential customers...
I am a little confused (Score:2)
Re:I am a little confused (Score:2)
I know 8 people who have already recieved Ipods and I haven't gotten a single spam on the address I gave the freeipods.com people. You sign up for ONE free trial for something or other and refer 5 people who do the same and they send you a free Ipod.
They are paid by the people running the free trials and come out ahead because most never stick it out to get
Say what? (Score:2)
And $5 million a day is chump change for Microsoft. Anyone who thinks otherwise needs to start looking at Microsoft's financial statements.
I bet they spend more than that on toilet paper for company restrooms.
Re:Say what? (Score:2)
Microsoft will give in. If not totally, enough to get EU off its back.
Re:Say what? (Score:2)
Re:Say what? (Score:2)
Re:Yawn. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Yawn. (Score:2)
Re:Yawn. (Score:2)
Then I'll use my laptop to write up my resume and save it in the industry standard document format. I'll then apply for a position at all the companies whose websites are accessible with a standards compliant browser.
Send your resume to Amazon [amazon.com], where we use linux based crap all over. Then celebrate your personal victory by getting out of the damn house and enjoying the wonderful greenery that results from all the rain we get.
Re:Yawn. (Score:2)
1) Microsoft had nothing to do with pressuring laptop manufacturers to only install Windows
2) Microsoft hasn't attempted to make their document formats noncompliant with any standard (and furthermore, as difficult to reverse-engineer as they can)
3) Microsoft hasn't attempted to pollute web standards and encourage invalid code that breaks other browsers
4) The status of Linux gaming hasn't suffered as a consequence of Microsoft's tactics garnering it a
Re:Yawn. (Score:3, Insightful)
Linux gaming? You might have a valid point with the other ideas but this one is like saying nintendo is making mac gaming impossible... It's not that fact that MS is trying to monopolize desktop gaming, it's the fact that linux isn't really much of a gaming OS and doesn't have much of a desktop presence. It's market share and not MS that keeps Linux from having many games.
Re:Yawn. (Score:2)
Which is what I said, although I could have worded it better (by continuing on with "...on the desktop market).
Re:Yawn. (Score:2)
Re:Yawn. (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Yawn. (Score:2)
These things are about Microsoft's market position and business practices. No, they aren't pointing guns, because they aren't armored criminals, but they are using certain business practices some organizations don't like.
Let the free-market decide.
The problem is that the market is less free to choose when one company is by far dominating the software market, and in addition to this trying to ensure others hav
Re:Yawn. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Yawn. (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm guessing you don't believe that a company that is sufficiently large can ask the government to hold the gun? See oil companies/clothing companies in many countries.
> Last I check Microsoft was not pointing a gun at your head, and telling you to buy their crap.
No, but they are pointing market dominance at PC manufacturers' heads, thus limiting my freedom to select my hardware supplier and OS supplier seperately.
If the invisible hand really worked that well, it'd probably be making sure monopolies didn't exist, not giving uneducated folks like you handjobs in return for drooling praise.
Not a troll, he has a point (Score:2)
Commies don't matter BTW, don't you understand your own liberal free market argument?
Re:Not a troll, he has a point (Score:2)
Oh yeah, to that other company that makes x86 consumer level operating systems.
You know, like IBM, who makes OS2/Wa
Well, okay, at least to beOS
Sorry, which OS do you suggest I use as an alternative on x86?
(Just to mitigate the legions of *nix replies, I run FreeBSD at home. I don't consider it to be a viable mainstream option until it is marketed and supported on a large scale commercial level such as OSX, etc
The point is, MS has (arguably, natch) c
Re:Not a troll, he has a point (Score:2)
Why ix86? PowerPC, ARM, MIPS etc are also alternatives. As they gouged their customers, and they *would* have gouged their customers other solutions become financially attractive.
Government intervention really is counter productive. Just leave them to it.
Re:Not a troll, he has a point (Score:2)
x86 isn't the be all and end all of computer hardware. It's like saying Apple has a monopoly on OS's for MAc's.
Re:Yawn. (Score:5, Insightful)
There are plenty of people and companies today who really want to switch away from microsoft for very legitimate and understandable reasons, like the constant barrage of security holes, increasingly agressive licensing policies, etc., but they can't because they are locked in by the formats on the documents which they have invested so much time and effort into.
Microsoft is a bully to everyone it deals with, and it's time that the bully is dealt with by those who have the power to do it.
--
podz
Wrong (Score:2)
No, Microsoft is offereing them terms in a free market. It has nothing to do with physical coercion. Either party is free to walk away from the table.
"Microsoft is a bully to everyone it deals with, and it's time that the bully is dealt with by those who have the power to do it."
Now these people you
Re:Wrong (Score:2)
No, Microsoft is offereing them terms in a free market. It has nothing to do with physical coercion. Either party is free to walk away from the table.
You can play ball with us or go out of business. Not physical coercion, but coercion nonetheless.
Now these people you speak of have real guns, and are using them to deprive MS executives of real liberties. Who is the real bully?
MS. Perhaps you'd lke to return to the days of standard oil?
Re:Yawn. (Score:2)
Re:Yawn. (Score:2)
Keep up, dude, we're supposed to be hating terrorists this week.
Engsoc has always been at war with terrorists.
Re:Yawn. (Score:2)
Or more simply, because we can...
How... unilateral of you.
Please, do that.
Didn't the US rely on sovereign authority when it invaded part of the middle east, despite claims by its European rivals that it had no such authority? Sovereign authority is not lost on the US and it won't be federated away to Chirac anytim
Re:Yawn. (Score:2)
If you live in the USA, then your state's authority was federated away a couple of centuries ago.
Re:Yawn. (Score:2)
By "recent vote" you mean the EU constitution? I make no point about that. That's an internal EU matter; the US has no say, no relevance, as it should not. I refer to cases where France ("Chirac") Germany and other rivals claim UN authority trumps US sovereignty.
Re:Right to freedom and ownership (Score:2)
or fines in criminal court?
or judgements in civil court?
according to the EU courts ms broke the law. If they wan't to remain trading in the EU they have to accept the courts judgements.
ofc it could come down to a game of chicken and a case of does the EU need MS more than MS needs the EU.
Re:IANAL, but would like to know (Score:2)
Re:IANAL, but would like to know (Score:2)
Secondly, the EU could just as easily say "Is that so? Well, in that case, your EULAs which state "one installation per license" aren't enforceable in a european court."
Re:IANAL, but would like to know (Score:2)
EULAs are close to meaningless in several european countries and do not count as valid contract.
In several cases judges have ruled against EULAs enforcing in Italy, Germany, and other countries.
MS and the other vendors still write long and complex EULAs that nobody reads nor can understand fully because well... they hope the customer will *believe* such a complex document resembling a contract actually IS a contract.
Re:What if the situation were reversed? (Score:2)
That and this case wouldn't arise under Linux. You aren't "forced" to use XMMS, you're even given a selection to install when installing your distro. You can't remove WMP, you can't remove IE.
Re:What if the situation were reversed? (Score:2)
What the hell are you talking about? That's like saying "don't blame a murderer, blame the murder." Linux isn't the one doing stuff illegal here.
Re:Don't Europeans like Monopolies? (Score:2)
(it's also normally highly inefficent, though)
A PRIVATE monopoly is just wrong, especially if you consider yourself a capitalist (what do they teach in economics courses in high school in your parts??)
and btw: which one has a medical/healthcare assistance average status only slightly better than developing coun
Re:Don't Europeans like Monopolies? (Score:2)
It can be good, unless your a doctor. Then your stuck with whatever the govt. decides your worth paying.
"and btw: which one has a medical/healthcare assistance average status only slightly better than developing counties? Non-monopolistic USA or EU countries? Dont't be silly..."
Making doctors govt slaves is
Re:This will have repercussions... (Score:3, Interesting)
You sir, have no idea how right you are. Basically, whenever a tax is levvied, the supply curve (how much product a producer produces) shifts up and left the tax amount. (See first few diagrams on this page [applet-magic.com])
When you have a monopoly position (like MS does), that demand curve (the "\" curve) gets more and more verticval because you kinda need MS prods to survive. Thus that "Deadweight Loss" to consumers, not to MS, is much higer than
Re:Isn't the EU now neutered, in any case? (Score:3, Insightful)
They'll probably have to drop the more pompous bits of the constitution, but considering most countries will have backed it - they'll go ahead with it regardless.
France will either re-vote on the the same or amended constitution, with "opt outs" negotiated/agred by the govt. Failing that - the French govt. will allow most of the constitution stuff to happen at EU level regardless.
The same goes for the other countries who vote no - except the UK - which will require insane dancing and