Microsoft screws up again!

[Adam Smith]

Imran:

quote:

Cost of what and to whom?

Average cost to each of the companies, which would lead to a higher price charged to consumers. With a decreasing average cost curve, any competitor would have a much higher price when it entered, meaning that it would fail.

Cost in this case would also include time and money cost to consumers and producers of complying with or operating under multiple OS standards.

[Urban Ranger]

SpencerH,

" I disagree. As I was trying to point out with my "anecdotal evidence" is that there were supporters of netscape who didnt switch to IE until netscape started bundling other (unwanted) software with its browser."

That's fine. The thing is, once MS started giving IE away, users slowly and surely stopped paying for Netscape. That killed the company because it had nothing else to sell, unlike Mincrosoft. Eventually it was bought by AOL, you know that.

"The problem with your comment is that the trial judge was about as biased as was possible without failing to have a trial at all. Because of that, his rulings are completely suspect, thats why the appelate court threw out his break-up plan although they couldnt void the whole ruling."

The Appellate court upheld Jackson's founding of facts, this is of utmost important. It means the Appellate court agreed that MS is guilty, but that's clear as water to any non-biased watcher of the case.

"If the question is whether microsoft inhibits product development, I'd still say no. Tell us one product/company that MS has bought out and kept hidden. I cant think of any."

This is not the only way to "inhibit product development." MS usually uses "bundling" and "embrace, extend, extinguish" to kill competing products and companies. It tried the EEE tack with Sun's Java. Unfortunately for Emperor Bill Sun is not a small fish and slapped MS silly in court. Smaller companies such as Stac Electronics, Digital Research, and Quarterdeck were ruthlessly crushed.

"A major reason why netscape failed to compete with IE was because they failed to stay on the cutting edge."

This is not that the courts found.


Echinda,

I understand your point now.


Glonk,

"So how do Mac users pay for IE when they download it from the website for free, UR? Telepathy? Nothing in life is free, stop playing with semantics..."

Mac users may not have to pay for it because Windows users pay with blood and first borns. You still haven't answered my question. How much is a copy of XP Pro retail? Here, it is at 1/3 to 1/2 of what a new computer costs. That is outrageous. That's why IE is "free."

" Check the EULA for Netscape (as someone else mentioned). It's only free as long as IE is free. AOL wants to sell their browser again, or at least bundle it with their ISP (which would be a near monopoly in itself)."

AOL doesn't care. It's readying to switch the browsers they give away from IE-based to Mozilla-based. They had a pilot program with their Compuserve users. Now tell me how AOL benefits again?

"Netscape was full of incompetent execs and had a bad business model."

Even your master, William Gates III, is glad that his lawyers didn't try your crap in court. Show me some evidence, if you have any. Bald assertion doesn't cut it.

"Internet browsers, like file system browsers, became something that was essential for regular computer operation."

What, where, and why?

"Well it seems Mozilla and Opera are still popular."

Oh, so now they are popular. Just not that long ago you asserted that IE had 98% of the browser market. Please, make up your own mind and stop speaking from both sides of your mouth.

"I find this absolutely amazing, because bundling IE gives people no choice, right?"

Theoretically a user can download and use whatever brower that suits his fancy. Unfortunately for you, that's not what happens in real life.

"And because I just love shooting UR down."

Sadly, the ability for such an effort lies beyond your grasp.

"I just tend to know a lot about computers."

You wish


Imran,

"Why not? It seems obvious to me."

"Obvious" isn't a very good argument.

"Average cost to each of the companies, which would lead to a higher price charged to consumers."

What companies? The OS developers? Application developers? Who?

"Even before IE, the price of Windows was the same as it is now."

You noticed, eh? The big question is why hasn't the price of Windows gone down while hardware has been dropping like a rock.

" IE has 90% of the market, and yet MS still hasn't charged for it. They believe that it is an integral part of the OS, and it seems they really mean it. If they really wanted to preditory price, they would have charged for it by now."

Because Windows users are paying with blood and first borns on Windows licenses. As you so astutely observed, the price of Windows has stayed the same while PCs cost less and are more powerful. Consumers are getting royally ripped off.


AS,

"Cost in this case would also include time and money cost to consumers and producers of complying with or operating under multiple OS standards."

That would be the case if there were one OS, and it was cheap to purchase and maintain. None of these holds for Windows. First of all, there are multiple versions of Windows: 3.x, 9x, NT/2K, and XP. That's 4 (3 if you count XP as part of the NT family) OSes from the same company [Actually Windows 3.x aren't OSes but MS called them as such]. Windows isn't cheap. In fact the licensing fees are getting more expensive. The big whammy is Windows is expensive to maintain, both because of it being unstable and insecure. In the commercial world there's around a PC technician for every 10 PCs. Some companies go with 20 and let the small problems lie. For *nix or Mac you can get away with 1 technican per 100 boxes. Not only that, but because of all the security holes in IE, e-amil viruses have costed millions if not billions in damages.

That's not exactly cheap.

[Adam Smith]

UR:

I'm not much of a high-powered computer user, as you are probably aware. But AFAIK, all the programs I use run on 3.x, 9x, NT/2K, and XP, so I count them all as one OS. I was speaking more of needing to maintain / develop for the entire set of Windows OS's you list vs Unix vs Mac. What if there were several other operating systems. Would we be better off? Could the companies earn enough money to continue producing?

But you do raise some valid points. The higher maintenace cost you mention goes to the quality of the product produced by a monopolist vs. that produced under competiton. Also, the family of Windows OSs you mention is also considered to be an example of "versioning", which allows software manufacturers to extract more money from higher end users. People like me, who don't use their computers much, settle for old, cheap OS like 95. Heavier users want new OS and pay more. More $ for MS.

[SpencerH]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
The Appellate court upheld Jackson's founding of facts, this is of utmost important. It means the Appellate court agreed that MS is guilty, but that's clear as water to any non-biased watcher of the case.

The appellate court had no choice but to uphold those findings

"A major reason why netscape failed to compete with IE was because they failed to stay on the cutting edge."

This is not that the courts found.

Maybe not, but that doesnt make it untrue

The big question is why hasn't the price of Windows gone down while hardware has been dropping like a rock.

Supply and demand. I'm not willing to switch to linux and neither are most people.

The big whammy is Windows is expensive to maintain, both because of it being unstable and insecure. In the commercial world there's around a PC technician for every 10 PCs. Some companies go with 20 and let the small problems lie. For *nix or Mac you can get away with 1 technican per 100 boxes. Not only that, but because of all the security holes in IE, e-amil viruses have costed millions if not billions in damages.

That's not exactly cheap.

I havent used a mac with OSX yet, but theres no way any mac OS prior to that was more stable than windows. I was a mac user for 10 years before I even looked at a PC.

[Tolls]

Hang about.
Surely if OSs are a natural monopoly then so are architectures, by the same argument...it costs to develop an OS for different chips, ergo it's best to only have a single chip architecture.

Now, that sounds incredibly fishy to me...

Surely in both cases the presence of competition drives the technology? Isn't this an advantage?

[Urban Ranger]

Adam,

" I'm not much of a high-powered computer user, as you are probably aware. But AFAIK, all the programs I use run on 3.x, 9x, NT/2K, and XP, so I count them all as one OS."

Your programs are that old? Seriously, programs run on 9x may not run not NT/2K, noticably games. Most programs on 3.x do not run on newer versions of Winodws and vice versa. Some do, sure, but it's a dicey thing. XP supposedly run all the 9x and NT programs, but it is still not 100%.

"I was speaking more of needing to maintain / develop for the entire set of Windows OS's you list vs Unix vs Mac."

The thing though is, since the codebase is splintered (using a geek phrase), application developers have extra work to do. Perhaps not as much as a complete port to another OS, but still significant.

"What if there were several other operating systems. Would we be better off? Could the companies earn enough money to continue producing?"

I really don't see operating systems as different from other programs. Virtually for everything else there are two or more companies competing. The same questions apply there. PhotoShop is probably the closest you get to a monopoly, but Paint Shop Pro is alive and kicking. There are at least 5-6 different programs for 3D rendering and animation, same number for CAD, at least three anti-virus programs, and so forth.


SpencerH,

"The appellate court had no choice but to uphold those findings"

Why? MSFT asked the court to throw the entire case out. It didn't.

"Maybe not, but that doesnt make it untrue"

It didn't matter either way. Not only IE was free but it was bundled. Users didn't need to go to the effort to download it. As I said before, revenues slowly dropped to a trickle for Netscape. It didn't have enough to do anything about the situation.

"Supply and demand. I'm not willing to switch to linux and neither are most people."

That doesn't hold, because supply is practically infinite. Unlike traditional goods a publisher loses nothing when he sells a copy of his program. The cost of publishing software is laughably low compared to the retail prices.

"I havent used a mac with OSX yet, but theres no way any mac OS prior to that was more stable than windows. I was a mac user for 10 years before I even looked at a PC."

I have provided support for around 200 Macs, a couple thosand PCs, and around 200 *nix boxen of various flavours. My experience is PCs are the least stable and *nixs the most, given that they are properly configured.

[moomin]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui

Two, giving stuff to the cosumer can hurt. You see there is this thing called dumping, or predatory pricing, designed to drive the competitors out from the market.

IE has 90% of the market, and yet MS still hasn't charged for it. They believe that it is an integral part of the OS, and it seems they really mean it. If they really wanted to preditory price, they would have charged for it by now.

I take it you meant to say "predatory", right? Predatory pricing can be utilized to increase market share, yes, but also to keep it, by creating high entry barriers. But MS needs no such application - IE's raison d'être isn't to kill Netscape, since it's already done that, it's to leverage MS applications in fields where MS does not yet dominate - Windows Media Player and phrase to domain resolving being prime exemples.

As someone already pointed out up-thread, the EU is actaully doing something to stop this - this time - since the lesson MS taught the world at large when they squashed Netscape was actually noticed on this side of the pound. The EU is about to demand MS uncouples WMP from Windows. MS, unsurprisingly, is screaming bloody murder. We'll see how all that turns out.

Did I overdo my argument when I said the reason MS can keep this up - which, admittedly, they do very skillfully - is that the American justice system is crooked? Well, in part. But I recongnize that if MS were, say, a French company, the EU would probably not be as eager to stick it to them. Nevertheless, the US has enough of an it industry I really think it cannot afford to stiffle so much of it just to satisfy one, if very successful, company.

[DarthVeda]

I don't see why you people don't like Microsoft. They sell their products at reasonable prices and they work well (hey I've stayed up for weeks on XP). They provide an industry standard, order to chaos you know.

Sure some of their business practices are a little questionable but they're just protecting their interests. We're talking about a company that reached the top by producing software at a competitive price and using lucrative contract arrangements to smush the competition. There is no wrong-doing in that, it's just a little disappointing that their competitors were tooth-less old grannies incapable of offering resistance.

Heck I still prefer Windows over Unix. It's ease of use and vast software library make it an easy pick. Sure there is improvement to be done with Windows, but Microsoft can do it a hell of a lot faster than independent developers.

The government anti-trust suit against Microsoft is nothing but a garbage campaign. Look deep enough and you'll find idiots in the company that say stupid things such as the above story. No company is safe from hiring people who run at the mouth. I'm sure if you were to take any company and inflate it to multinational size that you would easily be able to find several dozen rotten apple employees in the ranks.

[Imran Siddiqui]

What companies? The OS developers? Application developers? Who?

The OS companies that enter into the market. Their average costs end up being much higher than Microsofts, especially with declining average cost curves in the industry (due to economies of scale).

You noticed, eh? The big question is why hasn't the price of Windows gone down while hardware has been dropping like a rock.

You realize that computer games prices have stayed relatively at the same prices even though hardware has been dropping like a rock? *gasp* Computer game companies are monopolies .

Because Windows users are paying with blood and first borns on Windows licenses. As you so astutely observed, the price of Windows has stayed the same while PCs cost less and are more powerful. Consumers are getting royally ripped off.

Like I said, computer games (and other application software) have stayed the same as well. Just because you despise Microsoft doesn't mean that by keeping their price the same means a damned thing, because it really doesn't. It's a non-issue.

Cost in this case would also include time and money cost to consumers and producers of complying with or operating under multiple OS standards.

Yep... oppertunity costs also would factor into the calculation.

Also, the family of Windows OSs you mention is also considered to be an example of "versioning", which allows software manufacturers to extract more money from higher end users. People like me, who don't use their computers much, settle for old, cheap OS like 95. Heavier users want new OS and pay more. More $ for MS.

Well yeah, smart business practice . They are trying to get all of the consumer surplus they can, by a form of price discrimination. This price discrimination is legal though .

I take it you meant to say "predatory", right? Predatory pricing can be utilized to increase market share, yes, but also to keep it, by creating high entry barriers. But MS needs no such application - IE's raison d'être isn't to kill Netscape, since it's already done that, it's to leverage MS applications in fields where MS does not yet dominate - Windows Media Player and phrase to domain resolving being prime exemples.

This makes little sense. Why would it try to force Netscape out so it can dominate Media Player ?

I mean, it really isn't sending out much of a message, both Quicktime and RealPlayer have free versions as well.... and MS hasn't shown me squat that it will increase the cost of IE or Media Player at all.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
Mac users may not have to pay for it because Windows users pay with blood and first borns. You still haven't answered my question. How much is a copy of XP Pro retail? Here, it is at 1/3 to 1/2 of what a new computer costs. That is outrageous. That's why IE is "free."

XP Pro is the same price as Win2K Pro, which was the same price as NT4, which was the same price was NT3...

Really, UR, your arguments are getting pathetic.
First it was IE adds additional costs to consumers, now it's that the OS is simply too expensive to begin with.

XP Home is cheaper than OS X by $10 or so, so why aren't you sitting around trolling Apple?

AOL doesn't care. It's readying to switch the browsers they give away from IE-based to Mozilla-based. They had a pilot program with their Compuserve users. Now tell me how AOL benefits again?

Hmm. I understand that, being a communist, you're pretty inept when it comes to business.

If AOL doesn't benefit either way from which browser is used, why the hell do they constantly and continuously lobby the government to force MS to un-bundled IE?

Even your master, William Gates III, is glad that his lawyers didn't try your crap in court. Show me some evidence, if you have any. Bald assertion doesn't cut it.

Look at the salaries and balance sheets.
They were losing money before IE3 even came out.

What, where, and why?

99.9% of computer uses use internet browsers.
If we don't bundle the browser with the computer, they must go out and BUY a copy from a store.

How do you recommend they download Mozilla and Opera without an internet browser, wise guy?

Oh, so now they are popular. Just not that long ago you asserted that IE had 98% of the browser market. Please, make up your own mind and stop speaking from both sides of your mouth.

It is popular. 2% of millions of people is quite a large number, and many people are quite vocal about how much they like it.

The point is, if consumers don't like IE, or simply don't like MS, they can download a bunch of browsers. There are more browsers out NOW than when NS/IE were competiting.

Theoretically a user can download and use whatever brower that suits his fancy. Unfortunately for you, that's not what happens in real life.

Oh? What is stopping people from downloading Opera and Mozilla, then?

I just did a test, and yes, I can download BOTH using IE.

You noticed, eh? The big question is why hasn't the price of Windows gone down while hardware has been dropping like a rock.

Why the hell should it?
Windows is not hardware, UR.

Because Windows users are paying with blood and first borns on Windows licenses. As you so astutely observed, the price of Windows has stayed the same while PCs cost less and are more powerful. Consumers are getting royally ripped off.

Jesus christ, sound the alarms...Apparently $49.99 is the price of UR's first born.

Consumers are getting ripped off considering Windows prices have stayed the same over the past decade? You do know that the real price of Windows has dropped due to inflation anyway, UR? Not that it matters.

Using your logic: Hardware prices have dropped, therefore Windows prices should drop. Windows prices have stayed the same, therefore consumers are being ripped off.

First of all, there are multiple versions of Windows: 3.x, 9x, NT/2K, and XP. That's 4 (3 if you count XP as part of the NT family) OSes from the same company [Actually Windows 3.x aren't OSes but MS called them as such].

Sorry to break this to you, UR, but Win3.x and 9x are not here anymore.

What we've really got are Windows 2000 and XP. That's 2. Windows 2000 is aimed at business servers and whatnot, XP for workstations and desktops.

Windows isn't cheap.

Opinions mean nothing in this type of argument. $50 isn't expensive, IMHO.

both because of it being unstable and insecure.

Is that why Unixes like Solaris have had more security vulnerabilities in 2001 than Windows?

UR, now you're just showing your "Unix is holier than thou" roots. Knock it off.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Tolls
Hang about.
Surely if OSs are a natural monopoly then so are architectures, by the same argument...it costs to develop an OS for different chips, ergo it's best to only have a single chip architecture.

Now, that sounds incredibly fishy to me...

Surely in both cases the presence of competition drives the technology? Isn't this an advantage?

No, not in computers.

1 single chip architecture for PCs is DEFINITELY a good thing. And we have that. It's called x86. Athlons, Pentiums, Cyrixes, etc all run x86 as an architecture.

If we had competing ones (which we WILL in a couple years, mind you -- AMD's x86-64 vs Intel's IA-64), you'll have to download different patches for each architecture, you'll need to buy different software for each architecture, and it'll be a complete hassle to developers to actually make more than one version.

1 chip architecture is a VERY good thing in PCs.

[Mr. Nice Guy]

Originally posted by Asher
XP Pro is the same price as Win2K Pro, which was the same price as NT4, which was the same price was NT3...

Really, UR, your arguments are getting pathetic.
First it was IE adds additional costs to consumers, now it's that the OS is simply too expensive to begin with.

XP Home is cheaper than OS X by $10 or so, so why aren't you sitting around trolling Apple?

Liar Liar

[Ned]

Monopolies, for a limited time, can suppress competition and raise prices. Socialism does the same, but it uses government power to suppress competition.

The lack of competition leads to lack of innovation and to inefficient cost structures.

Thus, for the same reason, both socialism and monopolistic capitalism are to be avoided.

It is a wonder that these truths are not self-evident.

Ned

[Mr. Nice Guy]

Well Asher. If all the stuff that you believe about Microsoft is true then tell us why you believe it.

WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY WHY!!!

Explain yourself!

[Imran Siddiqui]

Thus, for the same reason, both socialism and monopolistic capitalism are to be avoided.

But in some cases they cannot be avoided. In some industries there is really only room for a monopoly. Think about local phone service or before the satellite boom, local cable.