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

To: Alan Buckley who wrote (10755)	9/12/1998 2:44:00 PM
From: Daniel Schuh	Respond to of 74651

This, I believe, is why MSFT is presenting evidence that their contracts and practices are typical in the industry. My, that discovery process is cruising along, Alan. That fishing expedition came up with some whoppers, eh? And quickly. What evidence is Microsoft going to present? From the WSJ via your previous post, 10675: "The subpoenas disclosed by Microsoft Wednesday target Netscape Communications Corp. and what Microsoft called a "gang of four" aligned against it -- Sun Microsystems Inc., Novell Inc., Oracle and International Business Machines Corp. The subpoenas show that Microsoft is seeking evidence that these rivals tried to divide the market for Unix software among themselves -- a charge that echoes one alleged by the government in its pending suit against Microsoft -- or other evidence of collusion among these companies against Microsoft. Unix is an operating system that competes with Microsoft's Windows NT, which is aimed at businesses.". That whole story is a bit confused. How does Novell fit in here? They held AT&T's bungled Unix inheritance for a while, bungling it even further, how were they supposed to strongarm anyone? Sun, IBM, sold Unix systems with their own bundled Unix versions, what Unix market were they "dividing among themselves", aside from in the conventional competitive sense? Neither sold much in the way of application software, did they? IBM and Oracle had competing products, I suppose, with IBM's DB2, but again I'm confused, Larry Ellison strongarmed IBM? Cool, what a guy. What does this refer to vis. Microsoft anyway? "Dividing the market" was allegedly the "offer you can't refuse" in the '95 meeting with Netscape, but that's a lie right? Bill said so, they just wanted to tell Netscape about these "cool features" coming up in Windows 95. Or is this about killing other company's projects, ala Andy Grove and the DEC NC? Whose projects were killed by whom, among the group formerly derided as NOISE by Microsoft? Now the gang of four, appropriate I guess given Bill's communist and Chinese leanings these days. Cheers, Dan.

To: Alan Buckley who wrote (10755)	9/13/1998 12:58:00 AM
From: nommedeguerre	Respond to of 74651

Alan, >>The DOJ is trying to apply laws written with slow moving "physical" industries in mind to a modern fast moving "intellectual" industry. This will require new judicial interpretation Volatile yes, but fast-moving industry? In the three years between the Windows95 and Windows98 releases, Lockheed would have designed, built, tested and sold the SR-71 -- a technical feat far more encompassing then a windowing server upgrade. It is entirely possible that the anti-trust action will proceed faster than Windows NT development. >>This, I believe, is why MSFT is presenting evidence that their contracts and practices are typical in the industry. The practice of forming "secret partnerships", "trustee agreements", or trade pools is exactly why there are anti-trust laws. Microsoft is only justifying the investigations by bringing forth evidence that such practices are common amongst itself and its peer corporations. Maybe Bill wants to take everyone with him when he goes down. Cheers, Norm