Microsoft Hatred FAQ

[David Schwartz]

"Steven D'Aprano" <steve at REMOVETHIScyber.com.au> wrote in message 
news:pan.2005.10.22.09.12.53.825745 at REMOVETHIScyber.com.au...

> On Fri, 21 Oct 2005 21:47:27 -0700, David Schwartz wrote:

>>> That's basic economics. Something which can be allowed or ignored or 
>>> even
>>> encouraged when done by small businesses in a competitive market can
>>> easily become harmful and bad for the economy when done by a monopolist 
>>> or
>>> duopolist in an uncompetitive market.

>>     Microsoft goal is and should be their own success, not the success of
>> the economy or the market in general.

> Neither I, nor you, nor the government of any nation, should care a
> monkey's toss specifically for Microsoft's success. Microsoft is one
> special interest, out of a potentially unbounded number of possible
> players in the economy of a country and the world.

    No, not at all. It is the gravest act of self-contradiction to maintain 
that one should be allowed to pursue one's own interest while denying that 
same right to others.

> Unless you or I are specifically shareholders in Microsoft, we should not
> care about their specific success; and the government should be entirely
> agnostic about who are the winners and losers in an economy.

    We should certainly care that Microsoft be allowed to pursue their own 
success. The government should be agnostic about who the winners and losers 
are, but must respect each entity's right to attempt to be that winner.

> The
> government's role should be to ensure a level playing field, and minimum
> levels of health, safety and environmental standards. There is no place
> for government giving special-interests like Microsoft favours.

    The problem is, people complain when the playing field is in fact level. 
For example, Microsoft's "exclusionary" Windows agreements didn't ask for 
more than Windows was worth (or nobody would have agreed to them). Yet they 
are considered examples of the playing field not being level.

> Society regulates where and how we park our cars: for instance, none of us
> are allowed to park our car in the middle of busy road. and if we try, our
> car is likely to be impounded. This is not because there is anything in
> and of itself *wrong* with parking at such-and-such a place, but because
> of the effect it has on others.

    Umm, no. It's because the government owns the roads and operates them 
for the benefit of all. This analogy applies *only* to government property.

> A sensible government cares for smooth
> flowing traffic on the roads, with the minimum of delays and the maximum
> flow practical.

    You could replace "government" with "road owner" and the analogy would 
then be correct. Governments don't give a damn if traffic flows smoothly on 
private roads.

> Perhaps Walmart or Safeway might find it convenient to
> park their trucks on public roads for any number of reasons. Too bad for
> them: the benefit to them does not outweigh the loss to everyone else,
> even if they don't specifically block access to their competitors.

    And this is what any road owner would do.

> Microsoft's behaviour over-all has been just as anti-social,
> anti-competitive and harmful to the over-all running of the economy as a
> hypothetical Walmart or Safeway that regularly parked their trucks in the
> middle of the main road for a few hours while they unloaded.

    The problem is, the government does not own the economy. So it does not 
get to manage it the way it gets to manage the roads it in fact owns.

> Maybe, just maybe, if Mom & Pop's Corner Store tried it once or twice, we
> could afford to turn a blind eye, especially if the disruption caused by
> towing their delivery van was greater than the disruption caused by their
> double-parking. Thousands of people break the law by double-parking for a
> few minutes, and society doesn't collapse. But something that we can
> afford to ignore when done by M&P's Corner Store becomes a serious problem
> if done by somebody with the economic power of Walmart, with their
> thousands of deliveries by 18-wheelers every day across the country.

    Again, the analogy fails. You are comparing the government's right to 
manage its own property with the government's "right" to interfere with 
other people's right to manage their property.

>> Microsoft's status of a "monopolist"
>> is only meaningful if you define the market as "desktop operating systems
>> for 32-bit x86 computers".

> That is *precisely* the market we're talking about. Not "any item that
> runs off electricity", not "orange juice", not "pork bellies", not "all
> computing devices", but desktop PCs. What did you think the Justice
> Department's investigation was about? Motor vehicles?

    I thought it was about operating systems, actually. And I thought that 
both OSX and Linux competed with it.

>> There is no way Microsoft could have expected the
>> market to be defined in this way and no way to argue that Microsoft had 
>> any
>> reason to believe their conduct was illegal.

> Microsoft have lawyers. Microsoft destroyed emails and at least one senior
> manager perjured himself in court. Microsoft created a fake video
> demonstration which they then gave as evidence. Do you really believe that
> Microsoft's executives are so incompetent that they don't get legal advice
> before writing up contracts? Or that nobody in authority at Microsoft
> realised that destroying evidence and lying to a judge are crimes?

    When a criminal willing to use force points a gun at your head, you lie 
to him.

> In any case, even if you are right that Microsoft had no ideas... so what?
> Ignorance of the law never has been an excuse for criminal behaviour. It
> has always been every individual's responsibility to make sure that they
> do not act illegally, and that goes for companies as well.

    I am not saying Microsoft did not know the law. I am saying that no 
rational person could have expected the law to be applied to Microsoft that 
way it was. The law *must* put a person on notice of precisely what conduct 
it prohibits. However, in this case, the law's applicability was conditioned 
on an abritrary and irrational choice of what the relevant market was.

    DS