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

To: mozek who wrote (44778)	5/13/2000 3:13:00 PM
From: JC Jaros	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 74651

Mozek, you're such a brilliant conversationalist. Thanks for the chat. --- Microsoft's future growth depends on the Government twisting the arm of China and every other sovereign nation not under the (extended - borderline unconstitutional) rule of law which is our Copyright law. MSFT is depending on the Government to help collect it's revenue in order to participate in the same type of global growth as it's competitors. -JCJ

To: mozek who wrote (44778)	5/13/2000 3:52:00 PM
From: Russ	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 74651

Have you been to Hong Kong recently? Microsoft software, and most all popular software titles are still available in pirated forms for free or close to it. For the first 50 years of its existence, the US was a haven for piracy, similar to what is going on in Hong Kong now. There was no copyright protection at all. Dickens books were reprinted by many publishers here, and often reshipped to England, and Dickens received no royalties. I don't think that Gates would like doing business in that environment, even though there were no antitrust laws. Copyright law is much less debatable than Jackson's interpretation of the Microsoft case. I don't think anyone is claiming that our government's copyright enforcement is misinterpretation of the law. No, but the ideas behind how to interpret copyrights on software have undergone significant shifts in the last 20 years, and Microsoft has been one of the main beneficiaries of the changes. I remember when the generally accepted notion was that you could treat a piece of software like a book. You could load a piece of software on computer A, run it there, take it to computer B, and run it on B as long as no one was running it on A. You could also resell it to someone else (as long as you didn't retain a copy), or loan it to someone. Gates was the first person to use the term "software piracy" and has been one of the driving forces behind expanding author's software rights at the expense of consumer's rights. MSFT changed their license terms about 3 years ago, so if someone used Office at work and at home, they needed 2 copies, even though they would never both be running at the same time. There has been a tremendous spread in the scope of copyright laws, with corporations being the beneficiaries. Disney is a big winner (the original movies were about to have their copyright expire, but it got extended), and MSFT is also a big winner. The copyright laws here in the US are not the same as worldwide, but the US government is working to change that. If Microsoft feels that the antitrust laws do not apply to them, I say Congress should pass a law specifically exempting Microsoft from both antitrust and copyright laws. We've got to keep the government out of the software industry completely, right? -Russ