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Pastimes : Kosovo -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Neocon who wrote (13925)	8/5/1999 5:17:00 AM
From: MNI	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 17770

Some commodities are so basic that they cannot be replaced or circumvened, or not easily enough to outplay an already existent major in that commodity in due time. Even if monopolies or quasi-monopolies were always temporary, as Derek assumed, I do not agree that it means that the state can afford a 'laissez faire' attitude in such cases. Even in the informational age there are some cases in which a quasi-monopoly to key commodities was persistent enough to open the question whether the company was still answerable to the state or whether both were entering a competing structures situation, similar to the relation of state and church in continental Europe 800-1400 AD. The state itself vitally needs computer technology, after all. A quasi-monopoly like MS's is already a result of state interaction, because it is laws like the copyrighting, anti-plagiarism, anti-reengeneering regulations etc. that keep the company alive. The stock market versus consumer interest double fronted fighting field however seems an effective means of trust power control, at least as long as no monopoly holder is able to dominate the stock market. MS is btw, in my opinion in a harvesting phase and should be assumed to loose the quasi-monopoly on the OS market. But maybe this isn't so important, as other partial markets of software or content providing may take over the key technology role. my half cent MNI.