Microsoft gets € 280.500.000 fine
-
> I've never thought about how many legal papers against Microsoft have been, and are, written in MS Word. I've always been told that lawyer offices were still WordPerfect's niche, for some reason...
I have ran into one of these bugs[^] myself in Word2003. Very annoying. Of course, not as annoying as not being able to figure out how to easily edit Index entries.
-
Jeremy Falcon wrote:
If you're looking for beers with flavor, you're coming to the wrong place
:laugh:
Jeremy Falcon wrote:
Other than that it's pretty cool here.
What part of the US are you in? Anywhere near Seattle? Regards, Brian Dela :-) Blog^ Co-author of The Outlook Answer Book... Go on, order^ it today!
Brian Delahunty wrote:
What part of the US are you in? Anywhere near Seattle?
Not at all. :sigh: I'm in New Orleans, Louisiana. Jeremy Falcon
-
I think that at this moment i get reasonable good products for a reasonable price when i buy software from Microsoft so i don't think i'm a victim of Microsoft's market position, i think their pricing policy is quit fair for most products.;) With friendly greetings, Eric Goedhart Skype: eric-goedhart Deep in the fundamental heart of mind and Universe there is a reason. -Slartibartfast
you are kidding me :doh:
-
Your dream is to make the next killer product and becoming a dominant force in the world market. Your nightmare is being sued by idiot governments claiming that you're now a monopoly, squashing competition, and then they sue your butt in pointless retribution (probably using your products in the process). Ah, ain't life grand. Marc Pensieve Some people believe what the bible says. Literally. At least [with Wikipedia] you have the chance to correct the wiki -- Jörgen Sigvardsson
But isn't it nice to see our democratically elected governments trying to rule the world for a change. Rather than letting global monopolies piss all over us ;)
-
As one who spent a lonnnnggggg time in the trenches fighting a company with a monopoly and a stellar marketing team who could nicespeak they're way around the fact they where ripping us all off, I applaud the European Commission's decision. Do I believe Microsoft offers good products ... of course they do, the best. Do I believe offer their products at a reasonable cost ... yeap again, I believe they do. Do I believe that they would continue to be benevolent without the EU watchdogs, no way in a million years. Microsoft is predatory even with the watch dog, they would only get worse without it. The free-market is not the free market when monolopies abuse their power. Regards Ray "Je Suis Mort De Rire" Blogging @ Keratoconus Watch -- modified at 8:57 Wednesday 12th July, 2006
Exactomundo :)
-
ihoecken wrote:
The amount or a fine generally? Well the amount will depend on Microsoft. When you think that a fine is not justified at all, then you must think that Microsoft violated anti-cartel rules. If somebody does that in other countries (US for example) he has to pay, too. Laws can't be broken - even when it's Microsoft.
There is violation and violation. For example if you drive 88MPH on road, you're speeding, there is no ambiguity. Now in the case of Microsoft there is ambiguity. For exemple they had to provide some documentation. Generally speaking I think that Microsoft documentation are the best! (only the FreeBSD handbook[^] could compare) Mh... well perhap the Java tutorial + HTML doc are not too bad as well.. Anyway I strongly doubt that many EU argument are valid. Not to mention EU (not Microsoft) don't want public hearing, don't want to disclose its exact demand, etc... If you ask me the EU comission looks suspicious. :~
There is no ambiguity. They where required to hand over (among other things) the server protocols. Instead they handed over the source code and basically said work them out for yourself :wtf: If you honestly believe that they didn't document the protocols then I can't help you understand their behaviour
-
There is no ambiguity. They where required to hand over (among other things) the server protocols. Instead they handed over the source code and basically said work them out for yourself :wtf: If you honestly believe that they didn't document the protocols then I can't help you understand their behaviour
As far as my understanding goes they: 1. provided a documentation 2. it was said this documentation was not enough 3. then they provided the source code: it was again said it was not enough Now I honnestly believe they provide all material they had, otherwise they wouldn't need 300 developer working full time on writing new documentation.... And I would be curious to see this 'insufficient documentation'
-
I have to disagree Ray (and nothing to do with the fact that I am joining MS soon). MS were given a huge fine back in 2004 (almost €500,000,000) and then told to provide x-y-z so competitors could easily interoperate with MS products. Apparently, the commission did not specify exactly what x-y-z was and MS did their best to accommodate it (with over 10 large companies stating that MS did provide enough info for anyone to interoperate - most of the companies being from the ECMA standards group). The commission has, since then, clarified what they need and MS are delivering that before the July 24th deadline - so the EU fine them before the deadline. The EU has been cash-strapped for years and it's simply a way for them to fill up their coffers. Over €1,000,000,000 in fines against Microsoft so far yet they don't touch smaller companies abusing monopolies and fine them, for example, Apple - iTunes + iPod with over 90% share of the market and completely lock out competing music players. MS are an easy target with lots of money for the EU to get their hands on. Simple. Sure, they broke some rules, they were fined half a billion euro and told to provide info by a date - the date hasn't come and they are still fined. Seems pretty obvious to me. Regards, Brian Dela :-) Blog^ Co-author of The Outlook Answer Book... Go on, order^ it today! -- modified at 4:11 Thursday 13th July, 2006
Yes it's pretty clear that they have calculated that for every year they delay potential competitors in the server market they can make more than €1,000,000,000 :laugh: :doh::((
-
Just like some cities fund their municipalities by employing speed traps and writing lots of speeding tickets, it looks like the EU funds itself with so called anti-trust fines. :| Steve Miller
Don't be so absolutely ridiculous :laugh:
-
I have ran into one of these bugs[^] myself in Word2003. Very annoying. Of course, not as annoying as not being able to figure out how to easily edit Index entries.
> I have ran into one of these bugs[^] myself in Word2003. Very annoying. Interesting page. Having learned word processing myself on WordPerfect 4.2 in DOS (!!), I can definitely say that it gives you a lot more control than Word...even to this day, sometimes Word will just insist on doing something juuuuuust not quite the way you intended, and it can be rather infuriating...View Codes (?) was awesome. I can see why people whose job it is to constantly have a word processor running would prefer WP's approach. I thought I read a while back that MS caved in and added the same feature to Word--though I've never looked for it...
-
Rama Krishna Vavilala wrote:
Any more details?
I'm joining MS on 2nd of October as a Program Manager on the IIS team. Not sure when I'll relocate to the US yet but probably sometime mid-September. Btw, the ASP.NET cloud control is very :cool:. Regards, Brian Dela :-) Blog^ Co-author of The Outlook Answer Book... Go on, order^ it today!
Brian Delahunty wrote:
I'm joining MS on 2nd of October as a Program Manager on the IIS team
Hey. Congratulations. So when's the Party? :beer: --- :beer: Hakuna-Matada :beer: It means no worries for the rest of your days... It's our problem free, Philosophy :jig:
-
I have to disagree Ray (and nothing to do with the fact that I am joining MS soon). MS were given a huge fine back in 2004 (almost €500,000,000) and then told to provide x-y-z so competitors could easily interoperate with MS products. Apparently, the commission did not specify exactly what x-y-z was and MS did their best to accommodate it (with over 10 large companies stating that MS did provide enough info for anyone to interoperate - most of the companies being from the ECMA standards group). The commission has, since then, clarified what they need and MS are delivering that before the July 24th deadline - so the EU fine them before the deadline. The EU has been cash-strapped for years and it's simply a way for them to fill up their coffers. Over €1,000,000,000 in fines against Microsoft so far yet they don't touch smaller companies abusing monopolies and fine them, for example, Apple - iTunes + iPod with over 90% share of the market and completely lock out competing music players. MS are an easy target with lots of money for the EU to get their hands on. Simple. Sure, they broke some rules, they were fined half a billion euro and told to provide info by a date - the date hasn't come and they are still fined. Seems pretty obvious to me. Regards, Brian Dela :-) Blog^ Co-author of The Outlook Answer Book... Go on, order^ it today! -- modified at 4:11 Thursday 13th July, 2006
Brian Delahunty wrote:
and nothing to do with the fact that I am joining MS soon
Congratulations on the move, its was well earned.
Brian Delahunty wrote:
Over €1,000,000,000 in fines against Microsoft so far yet they don't touch smaller companies abusing monopolies and fine them, for example, Apple - iTunes + iPod with over 90% share of the market and completely lock out competing music players.
Well they are sorting out mobile phone roaming charges, I suppose you can't tackle every problem at once, I used to moan that they where obsessed with chasing Deutsche Telecom and ignoring Eircom. The provider of the dominant desktop platform would seem to me to be a pretty big fish to catch.
Brian Delahunty wrote:
The EU has been cash-strapped for years and it's simply a way for them to fill up their coffers.
The EU has always been cashed strapped entity, mores the pity, however arbitrarily fining companies to fill their coffers seems like a leap worthy of the tin foil hat brigade :laugh:. Seeking clarification is what companies say when they deliver software that hasn't met the customers requirements through their own incompetence, bit rich for Microsoft to be saying something like that, when they talk about maintaining a clear dialogue with their users, why didn't they do the same with the commission. Seems to me that Microsoft tried to get away with providing the bear minimum of information and failed. I didn't see the data but I understand that it was in-adequate for its intended purpose. I guess I am very cynical in way, I was burned so many times by corporate-speak, I don't believe anything uttered by a company anymore, perhaps I am wrong ... Regards Ray "Je Suis Mort De Rire" Blogging @ Keratoconus Watch -- modified at 5:18 Thursday 13th July, 2006
-
Brian Delahunty wrote:
What part of the US are you in? Anywhere near Seattle?
Not at all. :sigh: I'm in New Orleans, Louisiana. Jeremy Falcon
That's why you can't find good beers. ;) On the west coast we have a micro brew explosion that compares with European brews. In fact alot of the micro-brews around here were started by some european brewers. This statement is false.
-
You'll really understand that when you get here ;)
Tom Archer (blog) Program Manager - Windows SDK Headers, Libraries & Tools MICROSOFT
-
You'll really understand that when you get here ;)
Tom Archer (blog) Program Manager - Windows SDK Headers, Libraries & Tools MICROSOFT
:-)
Regards, Brian Dela :-)