European Union fines Microsoft 1.3billion$/900million euros for charging too much
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iapetus said:
Derail discussion? What discussion would there be if people bobbleheaded along or conversely, rejected or dismissed something outright / out of hand? In news / politics / business / economics / world events, things happen, decisions are made, and then individual people agree or disagree with them and they talk about it. I obviously disagree with this one, and when I do that sort of thing, I state my logic.
I'm actually not sure what the equivalent would be in the gaming forum, but I'm eager to hear what you'd think it would be.
Well, from looking at the final judgement, there is no such terminology used, though I will logically have to concede that obviously if a settlement was reached, the government at that time still felt that Microsoft had done something wrong and needed to make amends for it.
industrian
will gently cradle you as time slowly ticks away.
JayDubya said:
If Sony had been fined $1.3 billion, the internet would have crashed under the weight of fanboys worldwide saying that Sony would be going bankrupt, pull out of the console industry, etc. But since it's Microsoft then it's just some poor American corporation being unfairly targeted by those socialist Europeans.
TheFightingFish
Member
Honestly the stupidity of this ruling makes my teeth ache. Especially how some people seem to think that past Microsoft indiscretions or judgements have anything at all to do with this particular case and fee. This current ruling has nothing at all to do with the case of Microsoft vs. United States. The fact that Microsoft has previously been convicted of monopoly practices in the EU also has nothing to do with this ruling.
This ruling concerns only the fact that in the 2004 ruling the EU stated that Microsoft needed to reveal specific interop information and charge a reasonable price for this information. From that time until October 2007 (see link below) when Microsoft was found to be in full compliance with the ruling Microsoft revealed interop information and cut rates to access it in several different stages.
http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=MEMO/07/420&format=HTML&aged=0&language=EN&guiLanguage=en
The current ruling is a fine only concerned with the length of time for Microsoft to get into full compliance with the EUs original 2004 ruling. It is a make-up fine to charge Microsoft for the time taken to get into full compliance.
All of which sounds ok until you get into the meat of the EUs original ruling and how Microsoft has attempted to comply. The text of the original EU ruling is as follows:
The Decision ordered Microsoft to disclose, within 120 days, complete and accurate interface information which would allow rival vendors to interoperate with Windows, and to make that information available on reasonable terms.
Do you see the issue with the statement above? Perhaps the lack of definition? Or any clue as to what reasonable terms are? Since 2004 Microsoft has drastically cut royalty rates (from 5% to less then 1%) and revealed the interop code as requested by the EU. But since the EU never specified reasonable terms they can come back (like in this current ruling) and continue to fine Microsoft. After all, how can you ever prove that you are meeting reasonable terms? Without defined numbers Microsoft was forced to try to get to compliance by many stages of reducing the price to access this information. Go ahead and look at the reasoning for the current ruling:
The Commission has based its conclusions as to the unreasonableness of Microsoft's royalties prior to 22 October 2007 on the lack of innovation in a very large proportion of the unpatented interoperability information and a comparison with the pricing of similar interoperability technology.
This ruling essentially says two things, first off that the information revealed didnt have enough innovation to justify its price (something that is totally a judgement call, unless the EU has a hidden innovation meter that they break out on special occasions) and secondly that similar interoperability technology cost less to access. But considering that Microsoft windows is in a pretty unique market position (and that the nearest competitor is open source Linux) exactly what are they using as a comparison for similar interoperability technology? The summary of the situation is that the EU is saying You are charging too much, were not going to tell you how much so go ahead and guess, but if we think you dont reduce prices enough we are going to backcharge you from the original date.
I dont have an issue with the original ruling (Im a free market guy, but the EU is allowed to make and enforce what laws it pleases) but I do have a very big issue with how this latest fine played out. It is a blatant cashgrab that is aimed at an easy target. The EU knows how much Microsoft profits from EU sales and will continue to shake them down, knowing that Microsoft will continue to pay the fines up until they are not making a profit from EU territories anymore.
This ruling concerns only the fact that in the 2004 ruling the EU stated that Microsoft needed to reveal specific interop information and charge a reasonable price for this information. From that time until October 2007 (see link below) when Microsoft was found to be in full compliance with the ruling Microsoft revealed interop information and cut rates to access it in several different stages.
http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=MEMO/07/420&format=HTML&aged=0&language=EN&guiLanguage=en
The current ruling is a fine only concerned with the length of time for Microsoft to get into full compliance with the EUs original 2004 ruling. It is a make-up fine to charge Microsoft for the time taken to get into full compliance.
All of which sounds ok until you get into the meat of the EUs original ruling and how Microsoft has attempted to comply. The text of the original EU ruling is as follows:
The Decision ordered Microsoft to disclose, within 120 days, complete and accurate interface information which would allow rival vendors to interoperate with Windows, and to make that information available on reasonable terms.
Do you see the issue with the statement above? Perhaps the lack of definition? Or any clue as to what reasonable terms are? Since 2004 Microsoft has drastically cut royalty rates (from 5% to less then 1%) and revealed the interop code as requested by the EU. But since the EU never specified reasonable terms they can come back (like in this current ruling) and continue to fine Microsoft. After all, how can you ever prove that you are meeting reasonable terms? Without defined numbers Microsoft was forced to try to get to compliance by many stages of reducing the price to access this information. Go ahead and look at the reasoning for the current ruling:
The Commission has based its conclusions as to the unreasonableness of Microsoft's royalties prior to 22 October 2007 on the lack of innovation in a very large proportion of the unpatented interoperability information and a comparison with the pricing of similar interoperability technology.
This ruling essentially says two things, first off that the information revealed didnt have enough innovation to justify its price (something that is totally a judgement call, unless the EU has a hidden innovation meter that they break out on special occasions) and secondly that similar interoperability technology cost less to access. But considering that Microsoft windows is in a pretty unique market position (and that the nearest competitor is open source Linux) exactly what are they using as a comparison for similar interoperability technology? The summary of the situation is that the EU is saying You are charging too much, were not going to tell you how much so go ahead and guess, but if we think you dont reduce prices enough we are going to backcharge you from the original date.
I dont have an issue with the original ruling (Im a free market guy, but the EU is allowed to make and enforce what laws it pleases) but I do have a very big issue with how this latest fine played out. It is a blatant cashgrab that is aimed at an easy target. The EU knows how much Microsoft profits from EU sales and will continue to shake them down, knowing that Microsoft will continue to pay the fines up until they are not making a profit from EU territories anymore.
TheFightingFish
Member
msv said:
In addition to the press releases the EU provides full text online. I've searched and seached (and checked the searches of others) but to no avail. If you look at Microsoft's rate cuts you would see that they dropped rates quite quickly to attempt to comply and that as early as 2004 / 2005 they had terms fairly close to the terms finally accepted by the EU. Do you really think that Microsoft would take such huge fines if they had the option of knowing that they were so close to terms that the EU would accept?
A common complaint of the appeal letters that Microsoft has sent has been the lack of clarity about the EU's demands.
""We do not believe that any fine, let alone a fine of this magnitude, is appropriate given the lack of clarity in the Commission's original decision," said Brad Smith, the company's top lawyer, in a conference call.
But he said that Microsoft remains totally committed to full compliance with the Commission's 2004 decision.
Kroes called the original order "crystal clear." It required interoperability information on reasonable and non-discriminatory terms."
iapetus said:
So if one disagrees with the EU's definition of a monopoly, or their actions taken upon that definition, they must create a separate thread? Who cares if a user has an obvious political sway? I didn't know there was a limit to how often one can express a political opinion that a mod may disagree with, even if it is on topic.
JayDubya said:
What I don't like is the EU always going after Microsoft with a really huge bat but Apple have more programs as standard on their operating system. Also, before intel macs and boot camp apple OS' where the only one's you could have on your mac so surely that's more of an anti-competitive issue?
I know the Scandinavians are really pissed about itunes so apple should be getting whacked soon.
RamzaIsCool
The Amiga Brotherhood
I have a good idea where the money will go!
Read an article today which was about an internal investigation, concerning a EU member of parliament, who hired a family member as his/ her assistant for 16.000/month.
"Members of parliament are suspect of screwing around with taxes and insurance premium."
"There are examples where the members assistant salary is sent to the accounts of the members themselves."
"there was one case where an assistant received a x-mas bonus 20 times their monthly income."
A rough translation quoted from a Danish dude in a dutch newspaper named Jens-Peter Bonde.
Read an article today which was about an internal investigation, concerning a EU member of parliament, who hired a family member as his/ her assistant for 16.000/month.
"Members of parliament are suspect of screwing around with taxes and insurance premium."
"There are examples where the members assistant salary is sent to the accounts of the members themselves."
"there was one case where an assistant received a x-mas bonus 20 times their monthly income."
A rough translation quoted from a Danish dude in a dutch newspaper named Jens-Peter Bonde.
DreamMachine
Member
it'd be awesome if MS just said, fine EU you don't want our products we won't sell our products here and bails out of EU.
EU would be in a much much worse position.
in my oppinion they need MS products alot more then MS needs them.
EU would be in a much much worse position.
in my oppinion they need MS products alot more then MS needs them.
I dont really care whos in the right here because I dont lose any sleep over how a monopoly is effectively paying for being a monopoly. Fair deal in my opinion, all Windows and Office are grossly over priced. All the money goes to EU funds which are then distributed to all members for various infrastructure projects.
Apple would be in trouble if Apple were a monopoly. iPod is near a monopoly but the ECC don't care about that specific aspect of Apple's music business. The French began the complaints about different DRM schemes preventing transfer of downloaded songs to other players. First target was Apple's FairPlay. The fact that the Big Four have gone DRM-less should ease the possible interventions hardware and software makers face for making non-transferable downloads.
SupahBlah said:
Apple would be in trouble if Apple were a monopoly. iPod is near a monopoly but the ECC don't care about that specific aspect of Apple's music business. The French began the complaints about different DRM schemes preventing transfer of downloaded songs to other players. First target was Apple's FairPlay. The fact that the Big Four have gone DRM-less should ease the possible interventions hardware and software makers face for making non-transferable downloads.
DreamMachine said:
Haha... Are you serious?
They are buying the products out of conviniency. If they couldn't buy a microsoft product they would just buy the next best thing or hell.. just go open source like for example France have done to a certain ammount.
None is losing out on that deal in the long run except.. Microsoft
Freshmaker
I am Korean.
That'd be the types who glibly accept anything a gaming company does because "It's business. They make money by pissing people off. Exclusively. Suck it down please."JayDubya said:
Atrus said:
Never seen the term "virtual monopoly" being used as a technical term... You probably want "asymmetric oligopoly". :lol
I genuinely believe MS is an example of a natural monopoly given how vital it is for so many people to have one standard OS. I'm not some uber neo-liberal who thinks NatMons should get a free ride from regulators [like Richard Posner], and I do believe that they should be held to a higher standard of service provision... but nearly everything the CC does is targetted at MS either offering services integrated with their product [to the benefit of consumers, because who the fuck intentionally bought the version of windows sans WMP?] or not being too willing to share their private research. If the CC want to push for legislation to force all corporations with large market capture to share their private research then whatever... but elsewise I think they're taking liberties and screwing with that delicate balance between free market and socialist econmics that we Europeans [should rightly] cherish.
EDIT: Also, FUCK Virgin Media. My internet went down at 16:00 when I wrote this and I've just now been able to post at 20:14. Fifth time this week, and the blokes in Mumbai are useless.
Xisiqomelir
Member
harSon said:
Apple has a good thing going, why would they willingly switch from the fat sacks of cash market to the famine-victim thin profit margin market?
Nah, I'm morally opposed to Rupert Murdoch. :lolavaya said:
Also, I really love cable far over ADSL - low ping, high speed. I'm just pissed off that the service has been shit lately and I'm almost 99% sure it's because of the digging going on down the street. But damn, like they bother looking that up when I call them.
Kroole said:
That doesn't sound like much of a monopoly to me.
The only argument that I've heard for MS still being considered a monopoly is that they have a large marketshare, and it would be expensive for businesses to switch systems. Can anyone perhaps enlighten me as to how the numerous other OS and server options out there are somehow not viable, other than "It costs money to switch to them"?
I should also say that I'm not really trying to defend MS here. Don't read between my lines. I'm just asking for some info.
SupahBlah said:Noes, Virgin Media > Sky, especially in the old Telewest areas. They're just converting a lot of the old shitty NTL lines up to old Telewest quality.
Plus I'm getting my speed upgraded for free again soon.
Ahh NTL, quality like no other :lol
Telewest were awesome though.
industrian said:If Sony had been fined $1.3 billion, the internet would have crashed under the weight of fanboys worldwide saying that Sony would be going bankrupt, pull out of the console industry, etc. But since it's Microsoft then it's just some poor American corporation being unfairly targeted by those socialist Europeans.
Xisiqomelir said:
I'm not holding it against them. A big part of Microsoft's OS monopoly is the complete lack of an alternative. Apple's OS is tied to proprietary hardware and Linux is hardly user friendly enough to be mainstream. How about fining other monopolies? Google perhaps?
Actually, I have Ubuntu on my machine (I've had various version, now I'm on an alpha of 8.04. Don't actually know which one >.> )medrew said:
The reason why Linux can't be considered user friendly is the nature of its error reporting. Ie, if you remember all of your recent errors, how many times were they detailed in a way such that you could fix them yourself.
Or, how many times have you had to edit configuration files?
zoku88 said:
Only time I had to edit any config files on my parents computer is when I put in a new monitor and the ATi card was bugging out on it due to its drivers and X11 not getting on. They find it easier to use than XP which is 'hard'.
But if you're talking in general terms about errors, how many people know how to fix their windows machines? Just look at all the money that sits on the table out there for 'repairs' for even the most basic fix.
They are getting in trouble for anti-competitive behavior.
The same thing they got in trouble for in the US.
BTW, editing config files is no big deal.
It's a heck of a lot more transparent than repairing something in the windows registry.
Many people don't even try this.
They buy some 'black magic' registry cleaner and hope it does the right thing.
The same thing they got in trouble for in the US.
BTW, editing config files is no big deal.
It's a heck of a lot more transparent than repairing something in the windows registry.
Many people don't even try this.
They buy some 'black magic' registry cleaner and hope it does the right thing.
Il Piccolo Fiammiferaio
Member
JayDubya said:Wait... what?
You want me to start one thread where I respond to every news article thread people post, rather than posting in the thread itself?
* * *
Also, how is that "End of Story?" Governments and political movements do retarded things all the time, not the least of which is manipulating language:
In the AA thread we see people talking about equality policies as "formal equality" because it's not as good a version they favor (which is, ironically, inequitable).
In the news you hear people using the label of economic recession when the standards for such have not been met.
And yes, along those lines, calling Microsoft a monopoly is not objectively true unless you redefine the word.
Saying, "oh, well it's not literally a monopoly, but it's a monopoly" is like saying that I am not literally a cat, but I nevertheless am. Words have meanings.
* * *
Also, while my memory of (and indeed, the events themselves) the fed's attack on Microsoft during the Clinton era are kind of fuzzy, I don't seem to recall the label of monopoly being used by anyone other than political talking heads and prosecutors, and I also believe the case was settled without any sort of ruling, and that the terms of that settlement are now no longer in effect in 2008.
I do recall that the case in question dealt predominantly with people being grumpypants about Microsoft Internet Explorer being bundled to Microsoft Windows. Which is still as idiotic a notion as it was then. Opera and Firefox and others exist and many people are happy with them. Hell, at the time, AOL was huge and it had its own browser. There's no sin in Microsoft giving a browser that is available for free anyway along with the purchase of one of their products.
Yep you are right.
All freaking judges of Europe were wrong for years and you are right.
Obviously you don't know a thing about EU laws, but still you persist in talking about things you ignore.
How do you call this strange phenomenon in engRish?
Honestly, I felt the same way.
Around the time vista was being released, my XP computer crashed and I couldn't find my original disk. I was willing to buy a new copy of xp to get it to work using the recovery feature. But when I went into the stores, no xp on the shelves.
When I asked, they went into the back, produced a copy, and quoted a price HIGHER than what I paid for it years before.
Ridiculous.
I eventually fixed the problem by booting from a floppy and running some diagnostics.
But that experience kind of taught me how bad it is to rely on MS software completely.
My options to rescue my data were to buy and upgrade to an operating system my somewhat old computer almost certainly won't run well or pay way too much for software that is being phased out.
I had always played about with other operating systems but that's when I seriously began a transition.
I just kind of hit home that I'm always going to lose on the MS upgrade treadmill.
Other people's uses may differ (like PC gaming folks) but I don't see myself putting my most wanted data on a MS controlled system anymore.
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