Well, James, Chaz beat me to the punch on this one, his understanding matches mind. Of course, if you accept the Microsoftese definition, that the OS is whatever they say it is, then nothing much matters. I did notice this quote, though, that caught my interest:
But in a 1995 agreement with the Justice Department, Microsoft tacitly acknowledged its operating systems' monopoly status and agreed to abide by some government-imposed conditions on how it could wield its power. Justice is now saying that Microsoft has broken the agreement by using its OS monopoly to promote a separate application -- specifically its Web browser, Internet Explorer 4.0, which is now provided with Windows 95.
Of course, it is well known that I have a reading comprehension problem, so I'll leave it to others to reconcile that with the statements from a local antitrust expert, which I quote in message 14166 here. I don't claim to be an expert on the law here. But other big, important companies, most recently AT&T and IBM, have had to deal with these matters, and I don't remember them whining far and wide about how unjust it all was. Oh, I forget, those two are part of that nefarious Gang of Five that the 2.5 million members of the ACSA have their undies in a bunch about.
As for me cheering Justice on, well, if you say so; mostly I'm entertained by the process. Even if Microsoft loses it's not likely to make any difference, if Microsoft ever gets around to shipping the operating system formerly known as Windows 97. All the OEM's will say that they really, really want to ship IE with Windows95 anyway. In fact, Bill's made sure that they've already put that on the record. It's just one battle. Now, excuse me while I retire to say my prayer again.
Cheers, Dan. |
