The problem is that you have come across words that you are not familiar with, which automatically makes them "buzzwords that hide more than they reveal."
To help you out: hypergrowth - growing faster than the rate applied to the cost of capital. Supernormal profits - profits that are above that of your industry's peer group.
Barring you knowing everything, if every time you came across a term you didn't understand they became "buzzwords that hide more than they reveal," then we would have some seriosu problems, wont' we.
<For example-- there's plenty of software legislation out there already.>
Okay, name plenty of software legislation.
<Software is covered under copyright law, for example. Some software is covered under patent law as well.>
Copyright law is not software specific, it is more akin to intellectual property law if I ma not mistaken. Also, if I am not suffering from faulty memory, patent law only covers software as part of a complete system which must include proprietary hardware desings as well. Therefore as far as I can see, your assertions are totally incorrect. An valid example of industry specific regulation would be the Glass-Steagal Act which separated commercial and investment banking (as well as limiting the underwriting of insurable risks).
<If I interpret 'legislation' to mean "controlling when and what software is released by major companies," then you may have a point. But nobody is trying to do that at this point, of course.>
It appears that is exactly what the DOJ is trying to do. They are trying to tell MSFT what they can and cannot include include in Win 95/98 and they are states are threatening injunctions to limit when it can be released. Aren't you following the news?
<Suppose the Feds enacted legislation saying that any operating system manufacturer must publish all API's 6 months before the operating system comes to market. Would that destroy our software industry?>
It would destroy the protections currently afforded by our extant intellectual property and trade secret laws; thereby limiting the competitive advantages our most powerful software companies currently enjoy over their competitors. That is the reason the API's are secret to begin with.
<What if the Feds enacted legislation stating that a large company can't undercut a small company's products by selling at a loss, "cutting off their air supply" so to speak? Oops, they already enacted that. I think it's called the Sherman Act or something.>
Before we go further, define the word loss. As I see it MSFT is not incurring an economic loss on any of the products they are competing with NSCP on. |
