Hi David, it doesn't require a leftist labor economist hack to show that the posted article is flawed. The key charge of the government is that MSFT is an anti-competitive monopoly. The article's counterpoint:
“The claim that Microsoft is an anti-consumer "monopoly" is incorrect. Although Microsoft enjoys a 90% market share in PC operating systems, it hardly qualifies as a "monopolist" or exploiter of "monopoly power" because it has not used its market position to restrict output and increase its prices and profits -- the generally accepted criterion of "monopoly behavior" used by economists.”
This "definition" is not THE generally accepted criterion used by economists; there are several. Whilst it suffices for the Standard Oil argument where S controlled the "spigot" to the extent of regulating supply in an illegal manner to drive up profits, anti-competitive behaviours have other manifestations. ATT was never choking off phone service to drive up price, for example. Instead, their "spigot" was such that no other entity could build a competitive infrastructure. Thus, they were ordered to allow access into the spigot by competitors.
In the same manner, the "OS spigot" accomplishes the similar effect for the PC browser market. With such an overwhelming control in this area, one could argue that distributing IE in this fashion is a pre-emptive strike into any browser developer's potential market. Detractors of this argument will say that Netscape and Opera can still deliver over the net which, while true, if 90% of the OS market suddenly already has a browser, the incentive for choice is taken away—particularly for the ever increasing "non-techie" mainstream who by nature simply observe "Hey, now I got me one of them browser dealies."
Additionally, the article states in favor of MSFT that both sides use the same strategy of giving their browser away to consumers. Curiously, they forgot the part where Netscape was forced into this position since MSFT actually started the practice. MSFT's near-limitless resources certainly enable them to give away a product which smaller competitors attempt to sell. Many are quick to complain when foreign competitors engage in "dumping" in our markets, yet fail to see a problem with MSFT "dumping" here at home.
-MrB
not a leftist labor economist—just a "middle-of-the-road" kinda guy. |
