Microsoft Hatred FAQ

[Peter T. Breuer]

In comp.os.linux.misc Antoon Pardon <apardon at forel.vub.ac.be> wrote:
>>     I think you need to look up "extortion" in a dictionary. I can walk up 
>> to you and say "if you want me to mow your lawn, you must pay me $1 every 
>> time you smoke a cigarette". So long as you can say "no" and all that 
>> happens is that I don't mow your lawn (which I have no obligation to do 
>> anyway), it isn't extortion.

> If you would happen to have a monopoly on the mowing business, which
> would make it very hard for me to have my lawn mowed unless I took
> your offer, it would be.

In this case the extortion is over smoking a cigarette (it doesn't seem
to me to necessitate a monopoly on mowing for the threat to have been
deemed to have been made, but perhaps for it to be deemed likely for you
to believe it to have teeth) - money is being demanded with menaces for
your continued smoking of cigarettes.  The threatened menace is that
your lawn will find itself not mown.

I can certainly also envisage circumstances in which that threat would
be very real by virtue of an effective monpoloy in the garden market.

Peter