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Technology Stocks : MSFT Internet Explorer vs. NSCP Navigator
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To: Daniel Schuh who wrote (13663)10/24/1997 8:57:00 PM
From: Gerald R. Lampton  Read Replies (1) of 24154
 
>I'm confused. If Microsoft threatened Compaq with loss of license for actually
>removing IE, the program, it would violate the consent decree, but threatening them
>with loss of license for removing the desktop icon is OK? This sounds like positively
>Microsoftian logic to me, but I'm not a lawyer, and in-house counsel doesn't want to
>talk to me about this stuff anymore.

You don't need to be a lawyer -- your opinion may be better than a lawyer's since you know more about software. Just go back and read the relevant provision of the Consent Decree:

"Microsoft shall not enter into any License Agreement in which the terms of that agreement are expressly or impliedly conditioned upon:

(i) the licensing of any other Covered Product, Operating System Software product or other product (provided, however, that this provision in and of itself shall not be construed to prohibit Microsoft from developing integrated products)"

It talks about the conditioning of a licensing agreement upon the licensing of any other product. I assume for purposes of this Decree that an Icon on a desktop is not considered a separate "product." Maybe it is in some circumstances -- just ask any seller of clip art -- but I don't think so in this case.

The icon is (from Microsoft's perspective -- I think it's trivial) a critical part of the IE "product," which, I gather from the evidence I've seen, is something Compaq never said it did not want (and maybe I'm wrong about that). Compaq having agreed to accept the IE "product" without being forced to or having Windows conditioned upon it, it seems to me that there is nothing in the Consent Decree which prohibits Microsoft from requiring Compaq to present the product to the consumer the way Microsoft wants it presented. And that includes presenting the icon as part of the (don't gag now) "Windows Experience."

I wonder if the same arguments could also be made with respect to Micron.

Here's some more "Microsoftian logic" for you to respond to.

wired.com
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