JB, I will restrain myself for once from propagating the off-topic political debate and agree that Bill and Microsoft probably won't push the ideological battle to the limit. Offhand, I'd say Bill's about as interested in debates on political theology as he is in the other kind of theology, he just wants to win. You think he preaches Libertarianism when he's off doing his straight to the top lobbying with foreign heads of state? I imagine the "Asian values" guys would be quite amused by that.
As far as the law goes, it's properly in the realm of politics, as messy and unpleasant as that may be. Bill's at times shown some desire to assume the "Citizen Gates" mantle, but brilliant guy that he is, I'm sure he'd be as repelled by the mess and partisanship as, say, Colin Powell was.
As for government control suffocating the whole industry, all I can say is give me a break. So, every other ruthless and overpowering monopoly in software will have to operate under the same rules as Microsoft. Personally, I'll worry about that when the next such monopoly shows up, it's pretty hypothetical until then. Some might say that's only fair, given that IBM and Intel, among others, manage to live with those rules. But, fair's a funny word in the Microsoft context.
Cheers, Dan. |
