DoJ Finds Microsoft Antitrust Compliance 'On Track' 110
eldavojohn writes "Despite demand for more oversight from the states, the Department of Justice has found that Microsoft's antitrust compliance plan is right on track. These specific investigations centered around Vista's compliance with Google's concerns surrounding search tools for the desktop. From the article: 'Preliminary testing shows the new version, which will let Vista users set a competing search program as their default and see it in the Windows Start menu, works as expected. The changes will be available in Service Pack 1, a package of upgrades and fixes expected in the first quarter of 2008, the department said. The department also said in its report that it is looking into differences between original technical documentation and rewritten versions from Microsoft, and that it is testing fixes Microsoft made to some software.'"
Which DOJ? (Score:2, Insightful)
The Bush administration and Microsoft Corporation are both rotten.
For some values of On Track? (Score:3, Insightful)
Joke (Score:5, Insightful)
Microsoft has been doing and continues to do exactly what monopolies are not supposed to be allowed to do: use its market position and control to actively suppress competition and innovation. The Justice Department is 1) inept, 2) blind, and/or 3) 0wned.
Re:Antitrust (Score:1, Insightful)
What about Net Neutrality? We demand that local cable monopolies not give preferred treatment to their own products. This is exactly like Microsoft giving preferred treatment to its own search engine, media player, web browser, etc.
What about calls for open access in the cell phone airwaves? We want those who control the airwaves to let consumers choose to use whatever phone they want. Again, this is just like requiring Microsoft to let users plug in whatever browser they want.
Debate the value of a level playing field all you want, but don't for a moment think that Microsoft is being singled out.
Re:Which DOJ? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Joke (Score:2, Insightful)
The browser has not become the operating system, Java is primarily used to create applications for mobile phones, there are multiple free open source browsers, and multiple bundled or for-pay drop-in browsers.
You're right. I don't care to be bothered with the details of the technology. I don't care that Windows bundles the TCP/IP stack, compressible files, zip-format archiving, or any of a number of other previously seperate and commercial functionalities that somehow were sold at 1/3 of the cost of the OS each despite the fact that they added a minor utilitarian feature.
You can lob insults until you have a stress induced heart attack, but antitrust legislation was introduced to benefit society, and if the majority of society sees this behavior as being beneficial, at least for the time being, then grin and bear it, because you're SOL.
Re:Antitrust (Score:4, Insightful)
I think the OP is confusing a monopoly, something that is totally legal and is actually something that true open markets lead to, with antitrust (abuse of that monopoly) which is something that is illegal. To add to the confusion, there are several forms of monopoly that are protected in law (copyright, patent, trademark, trade secret). It is little wonder that such a complex concept is beyond the modern citizen especially since the very things that are being challenged are also protected by those laws.
Microsoft has been convicted of abuse of its monopoly position. The settlement would have worked somewhat had not only the DOJ but the court's oversight body been doing their job. The fact that Vista was allowed to be released without the "features" they are just now putting into SP1 is proof that there is no oversight of the settlement. The rigging of votes in standards bodies and lack of released documentation for their APIs and document formats is another.
Many here are speculating that the EU will be tougher, and that may be the case, but in the end it will have no effect on Microsoft's abuse of monopoly anywhere else outside of Europe. Microsoft will ship a neutered version of their product to Europe and point fingers at the EU saying, "Blame them for the lack of features (or a broken OS more likely since media DRM is so tied into Vista) that others around the globe have. Can't play that DVD you just bought? Blame the EU Commission not us!"
Microsoft is walking a fine line (often crossing it with impunity it seems) between functionality and abuse of monopoly. Any new technology out of Redmond becomes suspect since they always seem to be pushing that technology onto vendors via their OS dominance. I don't think Microsoft will ever get out from under the cloud they have cast over themselves of being "evil". I also don't see things changing no matter who gains the White House hot seat simply because of the political clout such a large employer has.
The other thing that is in relation to what I just said is Microsoft is damned if they do and damned if they don't in many cases especially where security is concerned. Companies like Symantic and McAffee and the like have built a large business on the insecurities inherent in the Microsoft platform. When Microsoft announced Windows Defender these companies screamed "antitrust!" The same is happening for any features Microsoft adds be it media, search indexing, security, etc. These are things that Microsoft customers are screaming for but any attempt by Microsoft to address them gets a call for antitrust because they will always step on some provider's toes no matter what they do. Consider this, if Microsoft were to include into their OS all the things that a Linux distro does, the calls for antitrust would be so great you could hear it on Pluto without the need for a radio.
A real anti-trust ruling... (Score:3, Insightful)
A real anti-trust ruling would be something along the following lines:
a)Microsoft are forced to offer the same price for OEM licenses to all retailers ( and disclose its magnitude ).
b)Retailers are forced to offer systems without an OEM license, should the customer ask for it, with the cost reduced in accordance with the price of the license ( which Microsoft must disclose )
c)Microsoft is banned from charging more for their retail version than the OEM license.
Now THAT would actually cause them to shit themselves.
Oh, and before somebody starts claiming this is unfair and Microsoft having the right to charge whatever and whatnot... NO! They lost that right because they abused their market position. We give them those rights with the intention to stimulate development that benefits society, if Microsoft abuses those rights in a way that is detrimental to the market, we are perfectly justified in taking them away again.
Re:Of course it does... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Of course it does... (Score:3, Insightful)
I'd suspect that while certainly the Justice Department has no interest in completely dismantling a major US company, the decisions that got people like Assistant Attorney General Thomas O. Barnett into the JD originally had a lot more to do with lobbying and campaign dollars than it did with any particular interest in sustaining the Microsoft monopoly on a global scale. Similarly I doubt the DMCA has as much to do with any Senator trying to protect some global US monopoly as it does with the RIAA and MPAA spending huge amounts of money on lobbying efforts.
Re:laughable and criable. (Score:3, Insightful)
If you call this "on-track" then you're not worried about the pesky laws.
Just like Safari with OS X and Konqueror in Gnome...?
Re:Antitrust (Score:2, Insightful)
Additionally while you may make the other tires your default the car will continue to use the Microsoft tires for some functions.
In that scenario it is more costly to opt for anything other than MS tires. Both for the consumer and the dealer.
As well by ensuring all microsoft cars have microsoft tires stores that sell plug kits will stock primarily those designed for ms tires as everyone has them. In the computer world of course the real impact is that anyone serving media content knows 95% of the market are running win media player and to ensure that they can reach that 95% they use win media server. They're now leveraging their desktop o/s monopoly into ensuring the back end server side picks up steam. It's exactly one of the types of activities that antitrust laws are intended to protect the consumer from.
It's not the bundling per se that causes the problem. It's the product tying that requires the media player/browser/etc to be there. Additionally it's their use of marketing money (profits from operating system and office sales) to subsidize it's entry into the media player and media server business.
Re:Agriculture (Score:3, Insightful)
During WWII it was possible only because the US was capable of being entirely self-sufficient. Modern stealth technology require exotic minerals which can only be mined in two places in the world; one in a "protected" area in one of the US's deserts (it's a wildlife preservation and cannot be mined) and in china. Unfortunately on the talk radio discussion I didn't catch what the compound in question is.
Modern weaponly also requires sophisticated microprocessors and circuits -- with our domestic chip fabs having been closed down and nearly all production shifted overseas, our domestic facilities are woefully out of date and cannot be modernized in a matter of days or weeks.
Likewise, tooling facilities and steel and titanium production in this country have been shut down, are old, run down, and not practical to convert to producing ships, aircraft, and missiles on short order. This has resulted in American workers having experience in the service industry, not manufacturing, and
Also, in this country, to sneeze you need to grease the palms of politicians to obtain permits, and have an environmental impact study conducted before building or even upgrading chemicals processing, manufacturing, and similar plants, or to even simply pave a large parking lot for a light industrial facility.
Lastly, chemicals are tightly controlled in this country; this has been stifling grassroots innovation. If today's regulations were in place back during WWI-WWII, we'd never have making missiles/rockets practical, never would have succeeded in perfecting turbine technology, and munitions? They would not have become as effective as they are now were it not for engineers independently researching and developing
When I was about 18 I wanted to get into amateur rocket building - I wanted to buy saltpeter, activated charcoal, and other chemicals for a really small homemade rocket, and no one I contacted was willing to help. If I were to try that now, I'd be reported to homeland security and be investigated for simply having interest in a new hobby.
What we have done in this country has crippled ourselves, AND we have modernized our enemies, AND are currently giving them money hand over fist for products we SHOULD be producing domestically.
What we had during WWII was factories which could be rapidly retooled to build ANYTHING, skilled machinists who could build anything by hand, domestic chemicals and metal production plants which could supply any steel or titanium or chemicals required, and there was little obstruction to getting what one needed for development and production. Grassroots innovation was encouraged and invited, and our technology advanced rapidly. The end result of this was a massive explosion in domestic production capability and skills which were capitalized on in the 1950s and 1960s, where we had tremendous trade surpluses with practically every trading partner, and if the US _had_ to be totally isolationist and self-sufficient, it was entirely possible.
No, the situation is totally different now. We're fucked. If the world were a game of chess, either Russia or China would have us in checkmate in one move.