The Prosecution Almost Rests nytimes.com
Government Paints Microsoft as Monopolist and Bully
As do all the friends of Bill around here, when certain legal issues are not under discussion anyway. This article is a good summary of events so far.
As the last Government witness nears the end of his testimony, it is increasingly clear that the Government's antitrust case against Microsoft is an indictment not only of the business practices of the world's dominant software maker but also of its corporate character.
Couldn't happen to a nicer company.
Witness after witness -- an executive roll-call of companies that drive today's economy, including Intel, I.B.M., Netscape Communications, America Online, Sun Microsystems and Apple Computer -- has portrayed the Microsoft Corporation as a bullying monopolist. The Justice Department charges that Microsoft is guilty of a litany of misconduct, including illegally using its market muscle to impose restrictive contracts, to engage in predatory pricing and to attempt to divide markets.
Microsoft took each step, the Government contends, to stifle competition and thwart the challenge that Internet software posed to its monopoly product, the Windows operating system, the computing equivalent of the telephone dial tone.
I'd have to reach way back for when I brought that one up. It'd almost be ok, if Windows didn't suck so much. AT&T had its problems, but reliability was not one of them.
The Government's case, most antitrust experts agree, is a mixed bag of stronger and weaker claims -- all of which Microsoft will try to refute when it begins its defense next week.
The Justice Department, these experts say, seems to have done best in establishing that Microsoft has a monopoly in personal computer operating systems and has imposed restrictive contracts on computer makers and Internet service suppliers.
"The monopoly argument pretty much makes itself, and it certainly looks as if Microsoft has crossed the line in terms of exclusionary contracts," said Carl Shapiro, an economist at the University of California at Berkeley and a former senior official at the Justice Department.
Nah, everybody does it. Funny thing is, with the odd written direct testimony structure in this case, things may not get better for Microsoft as their witnesses come up. Being mostly senior executives with the dreaded email trail, I don't imagine Bois will be any more gentle with them than the Microsoft attorneys were with Barksdale. We'll see. Lucky for Bill that other Bill's problems are in the news too.
As Microsoft finished its cross-examination of the Government's final witness today, the two sides argued over the issues of bundling and free distribution of Microsoft's browser.
The questioning turned unusually testy as Michael Lacovara, a Microsoft lawyer, asked Franklin M. Fisher, an M.I.T. economist, about the costs associated with giving away the Internet Explorer. Fisher said that while it might be easier for computer makers and consumers, "this case is not about being easy."
"If Henry Ford had a monopoly, we'd all be driving black cars," he said, his voice slowly rising. "That's not what competition is about. That's not what helping consumers is about. If Microsoft forced upon the world one browser, that would be really simple."
"Now you seem agitated," Lacovara said.
"I am agitated," Fisher shot back. "I feel strongly on this point. We're going to live in a Microsoft world. It may be a nice world. But it's not a competitive world."
Yes. Free markets without competition is one of those postmodern economic things I never quite got a handle on.
Cheers, Dan. |
