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To: Daniel Schuh who wrote (19241)	5/18/1998 8:41:00 AM
From: investz	Respond to of 24154

geocities.com

To: Daniel Schuh who wrote (19241)	5/18/1998 8:50:00 AM
From: Daniel Schuh	Respond to of 24154

Justice Department Expected to Sue Microsoft nytimes.com The NYT continues to provide the best coverage I've seen. I'm biased, of course, but this story of the breakdown makes a lot more sense than the Microspun stories that flooded the trades Saturday. But, in fact, the negotiations did not break down. By all accounts, they never really started. They coasted to a close with little drama shortly after Jeffrey Blattner, special counsel for information technology in the Justice Department's antitrust division, finished a phone call to his boss, Joel Klein, assistant attorney general in charge of the Justice Department's antitrust division. Blattner walked into the conference room of Microsoft's Washington law firm, and told William Neukom, the company's senior vice president for legal affairs, "I guess we're going to have to go our separate ways," people involved with the talks recalled. . . . Little more than an hour after the Friday talks began, the two sides encountered a major obstacle, which indicated that a negotiated settlement was out of reach. . . . When the settlement talks began Friday, the government was expecting to negotiate over freeing up the main screen. In antitrust terms, the government regards the issue as vital because the main screen can be seen as a gateway to the Internet -- a potential chokehold on the new but fast-growing markets for Internet commerce, news and entertainment. . . . But shortly after the Friday talks began, Microsoft said it was not going to allow substantive changes to its main screen, government officials involved in the talks said. "Did they lie to us before?" said one government official. "Not necessarily. But they certainly changed their position between Thursday morning and Friday." "That's what it broke down over," the government official added. Sounds reasonable and straightforward to me. However, Microsoft has always resisted allowing others to modify Windows to the extent of offering substitute main screens from which other software applications can be started up, technically sidestepping the Windows desktop. "That would be tantamount to undermining our franchise by making Windows some bit of software plumbing that no one sees," one Microsoft executive said. Well, "some bit of software plumbing that no one sees" is a better definition of an OS than most of the Microsoftese definitions I've seen floated. Nobody particularly wants to see an OS, especially at the user level. People want to run their applications. Programmers got to deal with the OS, that's why the technoweenie set gets cranky about them. Of course, by turning the OS into the browser, Microsoft is doing its best to turn the OS into an application, or something. Curious in the language usage sense, but totally understandable in the business plan sense. Embrace and Demolish, as they say. In any case, by the time the first day's talks concluded Friday, the Justice Department and state representatives were doubtful that any progress could be made. Blumenthal, the Connecticut attorney general, was discouraged enough that he returned home and did not attend the talks Saturday. Neither did Klein. . . . The two sides left with their opposing positions hardened, ready to do battle in court. "It was certainly an illuminating experience," one government official recalled thinking. To recycle as usual, standard Microsoft business practice vs. the long arm of the law. The only thing you got to wonder about is what Microsoft was trying to pull at this stage. Another PR "coup"? Did JB get ahold of Bill and tell him to expose the government shills for the enemies of progress and freedom they most obviously are? Stay tuned, the saga is just beginning. Cheers, Dan.