EC to pursue Microsoft

[Sackboy]

Like I said... this has nothing to do with IE, it's greedy lawyers looking to milk microsoft.

Or a greedy corporation stifling competition for decades without heeding calls to stop and threats from the EC and US authorities.

=
I use Win XP Pro & Office 2007

 

[kingmonty]

I use Win XP Pro & Office 2007

And browser?

 

[adrianx]

My question is, if say for instance Mozilla had 95 of the user base, would the developer's job be easier? If so then i am all for it.

As far as i understand MS "force" developers to code according to MS because the user base is so large.

As far as I understand it, they force out as much competition as they can by blatantly ignoring standards set by anyone but themselves. Are w3c.org just a bunch of crazy people with a vendetta against Microsoft?

I think the US would have taken action a long time ago if it were true that the EU are only trying to milk one of their own - the Mighty Microsoft Corporation.... Don't you think? Who knows, maybe the US themselves are in on this conspiracy (to milk MS, that is...)?

 

[Sackboy]

And browser?

FF
and Opera Mini on my Smartphone.

 

[kingmonty]

FF
and Opera Mini on my Smartphone.

So... if a complete dumbass such as yourself can download and install an alternative browser, wtf can't a European do it? Oh, wait, can it just be laziness?

Or maybe it's because the company that's complained happens to be a European company.

 

[Sackboy]

So... if a complete dumbass such as yourself can download and install an alternative browser, wtf can't a European do it? Oh, wait, can it just be laziness?

Or maybe it's because the company that's complained happens to be a European company.

Ignoring the childish (& incorrect insults) for a minute. Again the point is lost on you. MS has made IE part of the OS. You cannot dispense with it. (Stuck record)

 

[kingmonty]

Ignoring the childish (& incorrect insults) for a minute. Again the point is lost on you. MS has made IE part of the OS. You cannot dispense with it. (Stuck record)

Why do YOU care? You installed an alternative and MS didn't gain anything (or lose anything) for that matter.

 

[Sackboy]

/waits for apology

Why is always about MS? If I had been a good little uneducated MS user, I would have stuck with IE in all its ugliness and FF would have lost a customer. Netscape went out of business for the same reason. (How we ignore history)

 

[chiskop]

Why do YOU care? You installed an alternative and MS didn't gain anything (or lose anything) for that matter.

kingmonty, MS has repeatedly ignored the conditions of doing business in the EU. (And the US for that matter - but the US has failed to enforce the convictions it has secured against the US)

No, strictly speaking it may not be democratic or make business sense to include your competitors products with yours - but MS has tilted the playing field so that their competitors to prevent their competitors entering the market. They are not a normal company - they have been repeatedly found guilty of anti-competitive behaviour in both the US and Europe.

The Eu requested that other browsers be included in the install - MS has decide to be passive-aggressive and remove all browsers. That is clearly not in the consumers' best interests.

I'm surprised that SA telecoms consumers don't have a better appreciation for the dangers of a monopoly. We all know how Telkom's monopoly has stifled and retarded telecoms in this country, while Telkom profits.

 

[kingmonty]

/waits for apology

Why is always about MS? If I had been a good little uneducated MS user, I would have stuck with IE in all its ugliness and FF would have lost a customer. Netscape went out of business for the same reason. (How we ignore history)

Apology?

Oh, I'm sorry you're a complete dumbass.

By exactly the same token why not force the removal of MS Paint, or WordPad or Notepad? Why the browser? As for the "IE in all its ugliness comment" that is just silly. IE has many features that make it superior for many collaboration tasks - it most certainly has its place. And historically it also drove many of the innovations that developers today rely on for dynamic web development. In fact, Microsoft is widely acknowledged as responsible for giving us AJAX.

 

[chiskop]

Oh, I'm sorry you're a complete dumbass.

We're discussing browsers - I don't think it's necessary to start taking things so personally.

 

[Sackboy]

/end of conversation.

 

[kingmonty]

kingmonty, MS has repeatedly ignored the conditions of doing business in the EU. (And the US for that matter - but the US has failed to enforce the convictions it has secured against the US)

Nonsense. MS were fined, they paid the fine and made a windows version available excluding media player. Now they're stripping out the browser, and low and behold - that's not good enough either. Why should they be forced to bundle competing products?

No, strictly speaking it may not be democratic or make business sense to include your competitors products with yours - but MS has tilted the playing field so that their competitors to prevent their competitors entering the market. They are not a normal company - they have been repeatedly found guilty of anti-competitive behaviour in both the US and Europe.

They've paid massive, unprecedented fines already. This latest EC action seems to be more about money than anything else.

The Eu requested that other browsers be included in the install - MS has decide to be passive-aggressive and remove all browsers. That is clearly not in the consumers' best interests.

That is a ridiculous request and had MS followed such a directive it may very well have opened a massive litany of lawsuits from companies forcing their competitors to include some of their products on the basis of such a precedent. It is unreasonable and forcing MS to comply to it reeks of bullying by the EC.

I'm surprised that SA telecoms consumers don't have a better appreciation for the dangers of a monopoly. We all know how Telkom's monopoly has stifled and retarded telecoms in this country, while Telkom profits.

In this case the EC is acting unreasonably. MS were anticompetitive in the past - we all know this and we all realise this, but given the choice available today and the fact that MS's share of the browser market continues to decline, surely enough is enough now?

 

[kingmonty]

We're discussing browsers - I don't think it's necessary to start taking things so personally.

No, we're not discussing browsers - we're discussing the forceful removal of Microsoft's browser from it's own paid for OS.

MS bundled the browser with their OS... so what? All the other OS's do the same. The problem MS had that made them anti-competitive (and as you put it tilted the playing field) was it forced OEMs to ship MS Windows pre-installed - that is what gave them the *unfair* advantage.

FireFox has been downloaded how many millions of times now (they hold a world record for most downloads in a 24 hour period - 8 million +)? Clearly people are able and capable to do so today.

 

[Empiricism Philosopher]

Does IE not have a uninstall?

 

[LazyLion]

http://abetterbrowser.org/

They could have just used that page. Would have been enough

 

[Drake2007]

Does IE not have a uninstall?

You can't uninstall it in the real sense as many programs rely on the underlying engine.
Turn pictures off in internet options and see how many programs actually use IE in some shape or form. How the EU expects MS to untangle the browser out of the OS is beyond me.

 

[PeterCH]

aw come on... this is just beyond ridiculous now. When is the US govt gonna step in and start punishing European companies in the US?

US government DOES punish European companies when they don't play ball in the US. US government can't reciprocate though over this or they'll get hammered in the WTO. Besides this action is welcomed by many US companies - after all MS destroyed mostly US companies in the beginning and recently Ballmer threatened to move his assets abroad to avoid taxation.

“It makes U.S. jobs more expensive,” Ballmer said in an interview. “We’re better off taking lots of people and moving them out of the U.S. as opposed to keeping them inside the U.S.”

Barry Bosworth, an economist in Washington at the Brookings Institution research center, said many software companies such as Microsoft have exploited tax and trade rules in the U.S. and other countries to achieve a low overall tax rate.

Ireland Subsidiary

Typically, he said, a company like Microsoft develops a product like Windows in the United States and deducts those costs against U.S. income. It then transfers the technology to a subsidiary in Ireland, where corporate tax rates are lower, without charging licensing fees. The company then assigns its foreign sales to the Irish subsidiary so it doesn’t have to claim the income in the United States.

“What Microsoft wants to do is deduct the cost at a high tax rate and report the profits at a low tax rate,” Bosworth said. “Relative to where they are now, the administration’s proposals are less favorable, so there will be some rebalancing on their part.”

Ballmer is one of 10 U.S. software company executives pushing back against the tax proposals in meetings today with White House officials including Jason Furman, deputy director of the National Economic Council, and the heads of congressional committees such as House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel, a New York Democrat.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aAKluP7yIwJY

Please remind me why Americans should support Microsoft here?
Why should tax dollars be used to support a company with no shred of patriotrism???

LOL, so let's cut the US vs EU thing. This is an EC (this time on the side of angels) vs MS (the likes of Telkom, Sasol and other exploiters) battle.

I support the EC. Gooo Brussels!!!

 

[PeterCH]

This really seems to be a bit of a vendetta being waged by the EC

This really seems as if someone is totally clueless and is just punting his ill informed opinion. Vendetta is you telling me to 'choke on anime' in another thread after we disagreed and you could'nt coherently explain to me why my arguments were incorrect.

Please read up about the subject before making such ill informed statements.

 

[PeterCH]

We're discussing browsers - I don't think it's necessary to start taking things so personally.

The man told me to 'choke on anime' in another thread instead of explaining why I was incorrect in my assessment of Windows installers. He tends to take things personally - he sees a plausible attack on a company an attack on himself. He also made some snide remarks in the Off Topic forum when I responded to another forumite. On forums you never know who you're arguing against, it's best to just ignore or report rude behaviour.