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Technology Stocks : MSFT Internet Explorer vs. NSCP Navigator
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To: Thure Meyer who wrote (19421)5/19/1998 1:47:00 PM
From: Reginald Middleton  Read Replies (2) of 24154
 
Look at it from teh WSJ's point of view

Regulating Prices

But the giveaways might someday come under sharper scrutiny. It's known that one scenario contemplated inside the Justice Department -- if it wins the lawsuit -- is to seek a court order that allows it to regulate Microsoft's software prices. That's an end-game that would go even further in making the software giant a de facto public utility.

Sources close to the agency said it is considering an arrangement in which the court or the agency itself defines the "separate products" that PC makers can't be forced to accept as part of an operating system. Then it would impose a formula for determining "commercially reasonable" prices for those features.

Such a regime could indeed slow Microsoft's penetration of new markets, but it would be enormously controversial. It would have the appearance of forcing consumers to pay more, an oddity considering that antitrust laws are supposed to protect them against artificially high prices.

And it would require continuing supervision of Microsoft that might prove more intrusive than any previous antitrust oversight. One knotty problem for those would-be regulators: Many other software companies give away some of their products to sell others -- including Netscape, whose browser is now free as well.
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