Reading the article by a former Microsoft executive in today's NYTimes, one thought comes to my mind: the Microsoft antitrust case was a failure. It did nothing to foster competition, and it made Microsoft wary of developing. The best you can say is that it was stopped before doing even more damage. Add it to the complete failure of the AT&T breakup, and you start believing that antitrust legislation has no positive role to play in the technology industry.
I was very critical of Microsoft's monopolistic practices at the time and thought that the lawsuit made sense. I was wrong. I was not happy with Microsoft products and preferred to use NeXT. That part was correct. As Tartakower said, "Some part of a mistake is always correct."
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I disagree with Microsoft not being creativity, because they have Project Natal for XBox.
On the other hand, I also couldn't agree more, because even their notorious windows system in Windows OS has been copied from some other OS, I think it was some OS made by Xerox.
I don't really get the point. Is it better to have one dominating company that develops almost all of the new technologies, or a bunch of them? Because if Microsoft still had their pharaonic monopolistic practices, we would see no Google, Kindle, netbooks/slates, social networks, as we do today.
About the browser case that lead to the antitrust trial: nothing worked as expected in IE, it was/is the webdesigners nightmare. It was an open case against webstandards. Not puting a leash on that beast would have meant that Microsoft could set their standards as the web standards, which would have been very bad for the internet.
Microsoft has played an important role in expanding access to personal computing, but monopoly is never good.
The point is not that Microsoft is altogether bad, but that the company underperforms considering the quality of the people and the quantity of resources it can draw on.
The antitrust cases did very little to change Microsoft's monopoly; competition and technological advance had a big impact.
The antitrust case had a very small scope, it was about Microsoft embeding IE into Windows, while other browsers that would have to be downloaded through slow connections or would have to be bought. So, yes, it did little to change Microsoft's bad practices, but I don't think it was worthless because now at least the W3C standards are respected, and developers also started trying to leave Adobe Flash/Flex behind with HTML5.
About Microsoft underperforming, that is probably true. But Dick Brass does not say that the antitrust trial damaged MS's creativity, but it damaged their image and marketing skills. What really damaged MS's creativity is the fact that the company didn't develop a system to pursue it. I think those are two different statements.
a. you are right, there are many problems relating antitrust and technology, or network externalities. remember aol, from aol-time warner? this is a well known antitrust failure case, involving the issue.
b. microsoft and apple aren't the same thing?
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sgold
Probably true about limited scope, also that Microsoft hasn't found their way despite enormous resources. Still, I have a feeling that the lawsuit did more harm than good.
Apple's market share is very small by most measures - except profitability. If and when it becomes a lazy monopolist selling lousy products, it should be dealt with by the same methods that reduced Microsoft, and IBM before that, to their limited relevance - consumers should opt for the superior competition. For the time being, I am happier with my $2000 iMac that with a 5-and-dime Dell.
a. about apple and microsoft, let me rephrase it: didn't microsoft bought apple some years ago? am I wrong?
b. about antitrust case, eric is right about the scope.
c. about aol time warner, as far as i know,the antitrust measure was just ineffective, as technology overcame ftc or doj measures.
d. about antitrust measures, stigler once wrote that competition is more likely a tough weed which grows everywhere than a delicate flower in need to be protected.
nevertheless, i think it's quite an important task. long live to antitrusters.
hugs
sgold
a. Wrong. They made an investment, turned out to be a good one. Probably precisely to keep the competition running. Helpful to Apple at the time, but not a big deal.
b. OK.
c. I think the major issue was that Time Warner bought a huge pile of garbage. Aol never made any sense. The buyers were stupid.
Agree with the rest.
By the way I was asked: "I am looking for a book in the style of "China shaked the world" about Brazil, so a good read about the economic future of the country. Any ideas?"
Couldn't answer. Any ideas?
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