To: Rusty Johnson who wrote (23933 ) 5/3/2000 8:12:00 PM From: Daniel Schuh Read Replies (1) | Respond to
Rusty, the "chinese wall" takes me back to the article noted in my profile, sitting there lo these many years. The "Chinese wall" was amended to "flying in formation" by Ballmer long ago. I suppose there might have been some attempt to resurect the "chinese wall" line at trial, somewhat like the revisionist history on Microsoft inventing the browser and Bill being on top of the internet all along, like I said I don't follow this stuff quite the way I used to. Anyway, some history on the "chinese wall", from around.com The flow of inside information will remain a critical issue for the antitrust investigators. In the 1980's, Microsoft executives often spoke of a "Chinese wall" between the systems group, responsible for DOS and Windows, and the applications group, responsible for the programs that ran in those operating environments. Ballmer himself once said there was "a very clean separation" -- "It's like the separation of church and state." Competitors were dubious, knowing that all neurons at Microsoft led to Bill Gates; these days Microsoft executives take a different tack. They deny that the concept of a Chinese wall ever existed. They admit that their own developers sometimes get an edge in knowing how to take advantage of new Windows features before the knowledge spreads to competitors, but they insist that the knowledge does spread sooner or later?because it is in their interest to make sure that everyone writes for Windows?and they say that's as level as the playing field needs to be.
