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Technology Stocks : How high will Microsoft fly? -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: clochard who wrote (24681)	6/22/1999 8:10:00 PM
From: John F. Dowd	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 74651

Steve: The whole idea of business is to hurt the competition. Not a good reason for being called a monopolist. It appears if Jackson had his way WalMart would be the next corp. in the dock. I offer the following as a sample of Judge Jackson's thinking: Judge Compares Microsoft To Wal-Mart In Trial Updated 7:11 PM ET June 22, 1999 Current quotes (delayed 20 mins.) MSFT 86 1/2 -2 7/16 (-2.74%) AOL 109 1/2 -5 7/8 (-5.09%) By David Lawsky WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The judge in the Microsoft antitrust trial compared the software giant to a large Wal-Mart store in a small town Tuesday and wondered if it amounted to a "benevolent despot," or a "monopoly." The judge's comment came as he questioned Richard Schmalensee, dean of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Sloan School of Management and the expert economic witness for Microsoft Corp.,. Schmalensee has offered a vision of a free-wheeling, competitive software marketplace that contrasts with Justice Department's darker picture of a Microsoft that leaves little opportunity for competition. The Justice Department and 19 states contend that Microsoft holds monopoly power in the operating system for personal computers and has illegally used that power to keep would-be rivals at bay. But Schmalensee said that others are free to compete and likened the situation to a small town with one grocery store that begins to face competition. Schmalensee said others can compete if they build a store, hire clerks and stock the store. District Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson at first said the analogy did not help him, but then seized it to present a potential problem. "This is the whole Wal-Mart phenomena," said the judge, referring to the U.S. retail giant know for huge discount stores that offer an exceptionally wide variety of merchandise. "The issue of whether there is competition for Wal-Mart." Judge Jackson asked of a big Wal-Mart in a small town: "What if it means no new entrants will ever enter the market?" Schmalensee replied that in a very small town there "may not be the working of a competitive marketplace." But he said that if there is a mega-store with good merchandise and lower prices, others may simply be deterred from entering. Jackson said, "You may have a benevolent despot or monopoly." Schmalensee said the situation was better than that: "If a firm begins to think like a benevolent despot and is not protected by barriers to entry it will have a short reign." The guy is as whacked out as the DOJ's case is. JFD

To: clochard who wrote (24681)	6/23/1999 2:39:00 PM
From: DownSouth	Respond to of 74651

I think the government has a good case against Microsoft, although I think they hurt their competition more than consumers. So MSFT should be punished for hurting their competition? Boy, that sure changes the rules of commerce. Companies like DELL and Compaq are simply too scared to confront Microsoft directly, especially when the real victims are other software companies like Netscape and Novell. Dell and Compaq don't compete with MSFT. Why would they be victims? The victims are their competitors, but they are victims of competition, imo. In any case, I think shareholders have other things to worry about like the fact that Joe Six Pack doesn't really care what software runs on his sub $400 PC, and the fact that Microsoft's bottom line will suffer if they want to compete with Linux, which is identical to Windows to the untrained eye. You're a programmer? Must be COBOL '86.