EU Rules Against Microsoft

[Agathon]

What's the start button on regular Greek editions of XP? "Ἀρχε"? "Ἐρχου"?

[Blake]

Is there any competition for iTunes on mac?

[Mr. Nice Guy]

Originally posted by Blake
Is there any competition for iTunes on mac?

I think so. I believe that Real's, Napster's and Microsoft's music services are all available on the Mac, but I'm too lazy to double check.

[Proteus_MST]

As for the "Trade secrets" which should be given to competitors:

This also seems to be nothing which could pose any danger to MS.
AFAIK the Rulings just say that MS should release all the informations which Programmers of Servers need to assure that their Servers work flawless within a Windows Environment.
This would rather be Documentations about Programming Interfaces and the like and not things which could be seen as real Trade Secrets, such as Sourcecodes.

Sounds like a reasonable thing to force Microsoft to release such informations, as an Operating System could be considered as something essential for a Computer
And it is not only in the Interest of Programmers that the informations you need to program an Application which works under this OS is available, but also in the Interest of the Users who wish to use these Applications.

Wouldn´t Microsoft be forced to release these Informations what would hinder them from abusing their Power to a greater extent, by not only withholding the Informations for the interplay between Windows and Servers in their next Vesion of Windows, but also for the Interplay between Windows and all other Software,
so that only Programs from Microsoft would work flawless under the new Windows OS, which might give MS either an advantage for their own programs over programs from third Party Developers or the power to release these essential informations only to selected companies for lots of money (which would give the greater IT Companies a big advantage over smaller ones [as very probably only the big companies would have the money to buy these informations])

[Traianvs]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
Cuz iTunes isn't killing its competitors with a monopoly. Even if WMP isn't included with WinXP, I'd still download it for free. I like it better than WinAmp, RealMedia, QuickTime, etc.

You are crazy.

Winamp is easy to use (use the powerful classic skin), requires next to nothing from your computer in contrast to WMP that seriously bogs your computer down especially if you have many applications opened (and heavy ones in particular like games are even worse. I like some music whilst fragging some heads)
Also WMP often crashes whereas winamp has never crashed on me before. When attempting to play corrupted video files WMP will crash your computer, whereas a good movie player like BSplayer will not.

Windows media player classic is better though. I still use that for wmv etc

[Dinner]

Not to mention most of the music torrents use winamp. I'm loving Indie Torrent.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Asher
The vengeful non-business side of me would be tempted to withdraw all Microsoft products from Europe and revoke its use from European customers (as they only license the software to begin with).

That will be up to the courts to decide whether that is the case.

Originally posted by Asher
Force them to use Linux for a bit and see how quickly they change their tune.

They have been switching over, much to the disappoint of Bill and Steve.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Mr. Nice Guy
Antitrust law is designed to make sure that smaller, less powerful companies with less money in their pockets have the oppurtunity to grow much larger, become richer and become more powerful, but it also is designed to make sure that large, rich and powerful companies don't become too large, rich and powerful.

Antitrust laws exist to create a beneficial environment to the consumer -- that is their spirit. Such an environment is ideal if it is competitive.

The consumer benefits by having a default media player with their OS (it's stupid to not offer it). Further, there is a competitive market -- unless you want to argue there are no alternatives for consumers.

Let's face it, modern day Apple and Linux zealots are abusing anti-trust laws as a crutch to dethrone a company they don't like, rather than providing the consumer the best products (for example, the idiots arguing IE should not ship by default with Windows). My argument all along was that consumers should have basic services like Internet Browsers, FTP, File Browsers, and Media Players, but the option to get other ones.

I've been told by the Mac/Linux people that IE got where it was because of bundling alone. I dissmissed that, but only now is that undeniably true with Firefox burning up the marketshare. IE6 killed Netscape because it was a superior product -- period.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
They have been switching over, much to the disappoint of Bill and Steve.

Is that why Windows revenue continues to increase every quarter while you proudly proclaim everyone is switching from Windows?

It's time to escape the fantasy land of Chinese-Commie-Linux-Zealot and enter reality. It may be a bit harsh, but you're best off looking less like an idiot in the long-run in life.

You've been proclaiming that Linux is taking over since I came here, and since then Windows revenue is up somewhere aroun 25%.

That's a pretty spectacular achievement for a platform that's dying to the obviously-very popular Linux desktop.

[optimus2861]

Originally posted by Asher
IE6 killed Netscape because it was a superior product -- period.

Yes, Netscape at the time sucked. We know. You never miss a chance to say it.

But when Netscape was knocking on OEM's doors to try to get Netscape preinstalled on their PCs, and the OEMs had to tell them, "Sorry, if we do that, Microsoft will charge us more money for Windows, and we can't make Netscape icons appear on the Windows desktop even if we did," that was a violation of anti-trust law as an abuse of the Windows monopoly. Plain & simple.

That Netscape sucked does not mean Microsoft did not break anti-trust laws.

[axi]

But, Asher, the whole market has grown! Try to look up the revenue change for the biggest linux bundlers and compare it to Microsoft. That would be a better criterion.

[Last Conformist]

Originally posted by Trajanus

Also WMP often crashes whereas winamp has never crashed on me before.

WinAmp crashes on me in two circumstances; when I use shuffle with a playlist including wma files (this doesn't happen with WinAmp 2), and when trying to view certain (corrupted?) avi and mpg files. In fact, I only use WMP to watch videos that crash WinAmp.

[aneeshm]

Total BS .

If I was in MS' shoes , I'd pull out of Europe . When they beg for you to come back ( don't forget , most EU governments run MS software ) , make them pay a very high price . That should force them to reconsider their anti-capitalist anti-free-market liberal-in-the-negative-sense statist laws .

Anti-trust laws are a farce . If somebody refuses to hold your product because they think that it might impact their relationship with another product/company , deal with it . Nobody is coercing the vendor/product dealer to stay with MS . It's just that he values his relationship with MS more than with you . If , however , MS forced ( as in real force ) someone to use their product , then I'm all for state intervention to end the force - but not to try to change the policies of an independent company .

Asher - with you on this . Let the Eurocommies eat their own s*** . And I consider that in falling in with these ridiculous laws , MS has lost the biggest battle it may now have to fight the world over - the battle for legtimacy and its own integrity .

[Asher]

Originally posted by axi
But, Asher, the whole market has grown! Try to look up the revenue change for the biggest linux bundlers and compare it to Microsoft. That would be a better criterion.

Like who, Linspire?

It doesn't really matter in either case. If very small numbers of people are switching to Linux, but way more people are buying Windows for the first time, how can anyone say MS is in trouble?

[Ned]

According to this article, nothing is going to change in Europe. Computer companies will continue to sell Windows in Europe voluntarily with WMP because it has become a standard for many content providers.

http://apnews.excite.com/article/20041223/D875CM4G0.html

BTW, with my last Windows XP installations, I noticed that the OS does not come with WMP. One actually has to download and install it.