If Microsoft is monopolistic, then what is Intel? news.com
I've posted my opinions on Microsoft vs. Intel on antitrust plenty of times in the past, of course. As usual, I rely on the press to make the case, here in a timely opinion piece from CNET. First, a pretty big excerpt, most of which I'd say is right on.
Both are charged with being bullies in the marketplace. The legal specifics vary, but government lawyers say neither Intel nor Microsoft plays fair. Both use their market dominance in a predatory fashion to hurt partner, customer, and competitor alike.
So why has the Microsoft case created a media feeding frenzy, while Intel's antitrust woes are arguably under-covered by the press? (This is the appropriate point to disclose that Intel is an investor in CNET: The Computer Network, parent of NEWS.COM. Microsoft isn't. Neither company had any input into this commentary.)
Is Microsoft a worse offender than Intel? (Don't think so.) Is Microsoft higher profile than Intel? (Yes.) Is Intel smarter than Microsoft in the legal and PR arena? (Unquestionably.)
Is Intel nicer than Microsoft? (Doubtful.) Does Intel have better public manners than Microsoft? (Absolutely.) Is Intel more insular? (Certainly.)
Finally, does Microsoft the monopolist produce more enmity within the industry than Intel the monopolist?
Definitely, but I'm not sure why. One theory: Microprocessors are an obscure technology, but software is easier to grasp, so Microsoft's thuggery is more obvious. Another theory: Intel's corner of the chip industry involves far fewer companies than those that rely on Microsoft's software to build their own products. So Microsoft can piss off many more people faster than Intel can.
Many technologists argue that Microsoft's basic product, Windows, is a piece of bloated junk. But few suggest that Intel's architecture, despite its limits, is inelegant or trashy. And Intel, unlike Microsoft, does have copycats that clone its chips--but Advanced Micro Devices, Cyrix, National Semi, and others can't seem to do it cheaper, faster, or better.
Big chunk there. Personally, I'd say the x86 architecture wasn't the best, maybe even inelegant and trashy. The worst thing was the original 8086, which managed to repeat the main mistake of the previous top 2 architectures, the IBM 360 and the DEC PDP-11 - limited address space and memory management. A mistake which was common knowledge in computer architecture circles, and admitted by the principals. Then, there was the 286, which made it worse. Since then Intel has shown great engineering in taking x86 as far as it has, making instruction set architecture (commonly, isa) almost irrelevant. To take everybody way back, in '81 or so when RISC was new wave, Justin Rattner was heading the disastrous 432 project at Intel. I heard him talk at the time, and his line was that the 432 was RISC at the core. The 432 had plenty of other problems, of course, but the same line holds for the current P6, only more so. Intel has managed to integrate most of the computer architecture advances of the last 20 years under the crufty x86 isa, and make it really fast, which is an impressive piece of work.
No comment on Windows, for once.
The somewhat circumspect conclusion:
Perhaps their legal philosophies mirror their products. Intel keeps making its processors smaller, faster, and more powerful. Windows grows bigger and flabbier with every version, like an undisciplined youngster. Intel wants lawsuits to be over; Microsoft tries to drag them out, hoping the ceaseless advance of innovation will make the antitrust litigation irrelevant.
If both companies were rival suitors for my daughter's hand in marriage, I wouldn't be very excited about either prospect. She could do better. But I sure think it'd be more fun to spend time male bonding with Intel.
Which speaks to the PR problem, not the legal case. But naive high school civics guy doesn't prejudge legal issues. Hearts and minds wise, I think Bill's still got a problem.
Cheers, Dan. |
