Microsoft Yields to EU Antitrust Ruling

[DCranon21]

Did Bill just give up :laugh:

Click here for full article

Microsoft early this morning dropped its decade-long antitrust battle with European regulators by agreeing not to appeal a landmark Sept. 17 court ruling.

The European Commission's ruling, which upheld a 2004 decision by a lower court, requires the company to cut the royalty fees it charges to competitors for access to information that allows them to create software for Windows, the world's biggest PC operating system. Microsoft has already paid nearly 1 billion euros, or $1.43 billion, in fines to the commission, which will decide by the end of the year whether Microsoft must pay an additional 1.6 billion euros.

"Now that Microsoft has agreed to comply with the 2004 decision, the company can no longer use the market power derived from its 95 percent share of the PC operating system market and 80 percent profit margin to harm consumers by killing competition on any market it wishes," EU Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes said in a statement to reporters in Belgium.

[JMS]

Did Bill just give up :laugh:

Click here for full article

Microsoft early this morning dropped its decade-long antitrust battle with European regulators by agreeing not to appeal a landmark Sept. 17 court ruling.

The European Commission's ruling, which upheld a 2004 decision by a lower court, requires the company to cut the royalty fees it charges to competitors for access to information that allows them to create software for Windows, the world's biggest PC operating system. Microsoft has already paid nearly 1 billion euros, or $1.43 billion, in fines to the commission, which will decide by the end of the year whether Microsoft must pay an additional 1.6 billion euros.

"Now that Microsoft has agreed to comply with the 2004 decision, the company can no longer use the market power derived from its 95 percent share of the PC operating system market and 80 percent profit margin to harm consumers by killing competition on any market it wishes," EU Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes said in a statement to reporters in Belgium.

:doh: Microsoft is a preditory monopoly. They stiffle competition and they use all facets of their monopoly not only in the OS niche but also in the Word Processing/Spread Sheat/Browser/Presentation niches to their advantage. The EU consession is just the openning shots in this battle. Look for Microsoft to withhold some "proprietary" information. Look for microsoft not to release all their code. Look for them to use any number of mechanism to frusterate the intentions of the EU to protect competition.

After all that's what Monopolies do..

[Sarge]

THey should have told them to **** off and pulled all Microsoft products out of Europe

[Larry]

THey should have told them to **** off and pulled all Microsoft products out of Europe

1) Yeah, how dare they act like their laws are more important than the corporation that's been breaking them for decades? (And continues to do so.)

2) Uh, a lot of Europe is already doing that. (Migrating away from Microsoft.)

A lot of governments are passing laws requiring government offices to produce information in a format that the public can read without having to pay someone else for permission to read it.

(I assume that part of their reason is that Microsoft is an American company, but still.)

[ACW]

Boo to the EU.

From the Cato Institute:

[The] ruling illustrates how poorly the glacial decision-making process of antitrust law fits the fast-paced technology industry. Since the European Competition Commission made its initial ruling in March 2004, Apple has come to dominate the online music market and YouTube has become the king of online video. If Microsoft was trying to monopolize the market for online media software, it obviously failed, and it's not clear why the EU needed to get involved in a market that plainly has plenty of competition.

It's Microsoft's product, they have the right to sell it however they wish.

THIS

piece demolishes the EU argument.

[Corcaigh]

This isn't hard to understand.

Microsoft has used their de-facto monopoly in PC OS to crush competition in other sectors. This is what is illegal.

[Larry]

It's Microsoft's product, they have the right to sell it however they wish.

Yeah, who cares about those pesky anti-trust laws, anyway?

And I must have missed that part in the Constitution that says that the right of a corporation to sell however they wish, even if foreign countries, is somehow guaranteed.

[ACW]

Yeah, who cares about those pesky anti-trust laws, anyway?

And I must have missed that part in the Constitution that says that the right of a corporation to sell however they wish, even if foreign countries, is somehow guaranteed.

:doh: Where in it does it say they can't? THAT'S the question. And BTW, antitrust has been mainly used thru history by competitors who couldn't COMPETE WITH the newer firms.

[Larry]

:doh: Where in it does it say they can't? THAT'S the question. And BTW, antitrust has been mainly used thru history by competitors who couldn't COMPETE WITH the newer firms.

1) It says they can't in the EU's anti-trust laws. (It says it in the US anti-trust laws, too. That's why they were convicted here, too.)

2) I'll freely grant that I'm not a lawyer, let alone one specializing in anti-trust. But from here, something smells like doodoo. Just to clue me in, could you please provide me some examples of successful use of anti-trust law against new companies. In fact, could you name three successful anti-trust cases? (I got the impression that they were very tough to prove. That convicting Microsoft was something of an historical event.)

To start with, I was under the impression that "newer" firms are immune to anti-trust, because in order to be subject to it, you have to have a monopoly. (And be using that monopoly to attempt to gain another one.)

[ImmortalDragon]

So I'm the only one who finds it odd when an operating system can cost more than a PC?

[jbooma]

This just means Europe will fall even further behind the US in computers :laugh: :laugh:

[PokerPacker]

This just means Europe will fall even further behind the US in computers :laugh: :laugh:

or they'll all become linux geeks and surpass us.

[JMS]

Boo to the EU.

From the Cato Institute:

It's Microsoft's product, they have the right to sell it however they wish. THIS piece demolishes the EU argument.

The Cato institute is showing how out of touch they are on this subject. They're argument by sound bite is without merrit. Microsoft has been found to be an anti compeditive monopoly in US and European courts. CATO's claim otherwise based upon empirical evidence is comical. Microsoft has crushed Billion dollar corporations not through competition but simply by there control of the micro computer niche. The power to thus crush competition remain in tact in Microsoft's porfoleo. Companies many times Microsofts revenue size such as IBM have been subject to Microsoft's power and folded. Companies almost as large as Microsoft such as INTEL have likewise folded when faced with Microsoft's rath. Inivative multi billion dollar corparations have seen their entire products swallowed by Microsoft (Borland, Netscape) where the consumer literally had no choice but to use Microsoft. Inovation didn't help them, once they were identified as a profitble niche, Microsoft just turned them off.

Quite frankly CATO institutes problem with the EU isn't as they represent, that anti trust laws are insuficient to deal with modern monopolies, or even that Microsoft isn't a monopoly; which is now a statement of fact. The CATO's institues actual position is Monopolies aren't bad. Laise Fair economics. They are redicoulous.

[JMS]

This just means Europe will fall even further behind the US in computers :laugh: :laugh:

Actually the US isn't in the computer industry any longer except for CPU chips. In the 1980's we exported our lead in manufacturing RAM chips to Taiwan, Japan, and Korea. In the 1990's we exported the manufacturing of entire computers to Asia; IBM even sold their entire PC manufacturing division to the Red Chinese.

In the last decade we've exported most of our software industry in this country. We used to be by far and away the largest software market in the world. With the advent of the H1B visa's where folks come here for a few years to learn, then go home with their jobs, India and China are now both ahead of us in software jobs. Used to be Silicon Valley, Boston and DC were the largest software markets in this country, in that order. Today DC is #1 in software largely because the only software developemnt which isn't being exported abroad is cleared government work.

But I digress off the subject..

[JMS]

So I'm the only one who finds it odd when an operating system can cost more than a PC?

It depends who you are, and that is at the root of one anti trust case where Microsoft was found to be a monopoly. If you are IBM for example and were about to release OS/2 a compeditor to Microsofts Windows, Microsoft charged you 50$ more per copy than your compeditors for their software; putting you at an effective disadvantage in one of your main businesses because you dared to compete against Microsoft.

If you were DELL or Compact, who were thinking of putting AOL software on your machines Microsoft likewise would choose to sell them more expensive softwre liscenses.

Play nice and don't help any of Microsofts compeditors and their software became much more affordable.

[JMS]

:doh: Where in it does it say they can't? THAT'S the question. And BTW, antitrust has been mainly used thru history by competitors who couldn't COMPETE WITH the newer firms.

That's not true. The facts are in history, the Sherman act, was used to protect competition, not to styfle it. The facts are by definition Monopolies don't compete, they dictate.

Banking trusts, Steel trusts, and Railroad trusts were all effectively dismantled by use of the Sherman antitrust laws. A role for government in the marketplace is to protect it from anti compeditive practices.

[sacase]

That's not true. The facts are in history, the Sherman act, was used by to protect competition, not to styfle it. The facts are by definition Monopolies don't compete, they dictate.

Banking trusts, Steel trusts, and Railroad trusts were all effectively dismantled by use of the Sherman antitrust laws. The role of government in the marketplace is to protect it from anti compeditive practices.

Personally I would rather the Govt break up Comcast rather than Microsoft. I have never had a problem with MS or their products.

[JMS]

Personally I would rather the Govt break up Comcast rather than Microsoft. I have never had a problem with MS or their products.

Comcast is being broken up. Comcast was granted a 10 year window where they would have a monopoly on the coper network that they created in order to build the network. That 10 year window is expiring now and Comcast is required by their agreements with different counties now to allow other companies to offer service on their networks; much like you have the choice of local and long distance carriers on your teliphone network.

That's one reason why verizon is building out an optical network, cause the laws governing coper networks like Comcasts; do not apply to fiber. Thus when verizon wires your home for fiber connectivity they rip out all of your coper wires. If you have fiber you won't in the future be given a choice of which cable, teliphone, or data company you wish to use.

As for you not having a problem with Microsoft it's rathr irrelivent. Fact is Microsoft has been convicted of being a preditory monopoly in American and European courts. Perhaps to the casual observer it doesn't make a difference. But in the Marketplace; Microsoft has been a net negative for decades.

[Prosperity]

let's nuke Europe and give massive subsidies to Microsoft

it's the American way

[Prosperity]

let's nuke Europe and give massive subsidies to Microsoft

it's the American way

[Predicto]

Personally I would rather the Govt break up Comcast rather than Microsoft. I have never had a problem with MS or their products.

The products are fine. It is the business practices that are at issue.

[Predicto]

Personally I would rather the Govt break up Comcast rather than Microsoft. I have never had a problem with MS or their products.

The products are fine. It is the business practices that are at issue.

[zoony]

Most people's problem with Microsoft is that it is an American company. Which is a shame.

.....

[zoony]

Most people's problem with Microsoft is that it is an American company. Which is a shame.

.....

[mjah]

Most people's problem with Microsoft is that it is an American company. Which is a shame.

That certainly isn't my impression. I think most people's problem with Microsoft is two-fold:

1) Microsoft's reputation for bloated, clunky software, which has nothing to do with where Microsoft is located; and

2) Microsoft's very well deserved reputation for highly anti-competitive business practices, which effectively prevent others from entering key software markets.

I don't think either issue has anything to do with Microsoft being American. Particularly on the quality front, people seem willing to differentiate between American software and, say, American cars.

But I have to agree that our nation's recent reputation as a smug, dimwitted bully surely doesn't help things. I don't know if American companies were ever the beneficiaries of friendly goodwill in the past due simply to being American -- but they sure aren't getting any goodwill today.

And LOL at the idea that Microsoft should just pull out of the European market. The potential software market in the EU is as big as the AMERICAN market!