ncappel1
February 23rd, 2006, 03:30 PM
Here is a short article from the New York times about our wildest dream, suing microsoft. Enjoy!
In Europe, Microsoft Faces a New Antitrust Complaint
By Paul Meller
Published: February 23, 2006
BRUSSELS, Feb. 22 — Microsoft's antitrust battle in Europe intensified Wednesday when some of its biggest rivals filed a new complaint against it, accusing the company of a wide range of antitrust abuses.
I.B.M., Oracle, Sun Microsystems and six other companies submitted a formal complaint to the European Commission on Wednesday, claiming that Microsoft continues to abuse its dominant position in the software market in spite of a 2004 European antitrust ruling against it.
The complaint opened a new chapter in Microsoft's long-running battle with competition regulators. The European Commission says Microsoft has not complied with its antitrust ruling, and is threatening to fine the company as much as 2 million euros ($2.4 million) a day. Microsoft paid 497 million euros in fines after the 2004 ruling.
The commission's apparent inability to get Microsoft to comply with the ruling had frustrated many of Microsoft's rivals, but the threat of daily fines has restored the commission's credibility, and spurred the competitors to further action.
"Today's complaint brings to the European Commission's attention anticompetitive Microsoft practices in a growing number of areas," said Simon Awde, chairman of the European Committee for Interoperable Systems, a trade association representing the nine companies that filed the complaint.
The other companies behind the complaint are Nokia, Red Hat, RealNetworks, Opera, Corel and Linspire.
The complaint focuses on the Microsoft Office bundle of applications, which includes the PowerPoint software, made for use in public presentations.
The commission's spokesman for antitrust issues, Jonathan Todd, said competition officials would examine the new complaint carefully. Microsoft said it had expected the new complaint. "We have come to expect that as we introduce new products that benefit consumers, a few competitors will complain," it said in a statement.
It dismissed the trade association as "a front for I.B.M. and a few other competitors," adding that when faced with innovation, "they choose litigation."
The association said it believed that the issues raised in its complaint were vital to restoring competition in software. The Office bundle of software applications are especially important to businesses and its inability to work smoothly with applications like those in Star Office software, has prevented rivals from gaining a foothold in the market for desktop operating systems.
Open-source desktop operating system manufacturers have "effectively been kept at bay by the lack of interoperability of the Office applications," said Thomas Vinje, a partner in the Brussels office of the law firm Clifford Chance.
The lack of interoperability of Office applications was never part of an antitrust case in the United States, though the state of Massachusetts raised the issue in a discussion with Microsoft over public procurement. The state government said it would only order Office software if it worked well with open, interoperable software formats.
Microsoft agreed, and said it would open up Office. The new version, Office 12, which is to be released before the end of the year, will use extensible markup language, or XML, an industrywide standard, said Tom Brookes, the company's spokesman in Brussels.
Microsoft has submitted Office 12 to Ecma International, the industry standards body, to be registered as a standard software format interoperable with all rivals.
The trade association however, dismissed the move. "We are well aware of the XML standardization initiative, and we reached the conclusion that it doesn't solve the problem we are complaining about," Mr. Vinje said.
In Europe, Microsoft Faces a New Antitrust Complaint
By Paul Meller
Published: February 23, 2006
BRUSSELS, Feb. 22 — Microsoft's antitrust battle in Europe intensified Wednesday when some of its biggest rivals filed a new complaint against it, accusing the company of a wide range of antitrust abuses.
I.B.M., Oracle, Sun Microsystems and six other companies submitted a formal complaint to the European Commission on Wednesday, claiming that Microsoft continues to abuse its dominant position in the software market in spite of a 2004 European antitrust ruling against it.
The complaint opened a new chapter in Microsoft's long-running battle with competition regulators. The European Commission says Microsoft has not complied with its antitrust ruling, and is threatening to fine the company as much as 2 million euros ($2.4 million) a day. Microsoft paid 497 million euros in fines after the 2004 ruling.
The commission's apparent inability to get Microsoft to comply with the ruling had frustrated many of Microsoft's rivals, but the threat of daily fines has restored the commission's credibility, and spurred the competitors to further action.
"Today's complaint brings to the European Commission's attention anticompetitive Microsoft practices in a growing number of areas," said Simon Awde, chairman of the European Committee for Interoperable Systems, a trade association representing the nine companies that filed the complaint.
The other companies behind the complaint are Nokia, Red Hat, RealNetworks, Opera, Corel and Linspire.
The complaint focuses on the Microsoft Office bundle of applications, which includes the PowerPoint software, made for use in public presentations.
The commission's spokesman for antitrust issues, Jonathan Todd, said competition officials would examine the new complaint carefully. Microsoft said it had expected the new complaint. "We have come to expect that as we introduce new products that benefit consumers, a few competitors will complain," it said in a statement.
It dismissed the trade association as "a front for I.B.M. and a few other competitors," adding that when faced with innovation, "they choose litigation."
The association said it believed that the issues raised in its complaint were vital to restoring competition in software. The Office bundle of software applications are especially important to businesses and its inability to work smoothly with applications like those in Star Office software, has prevented rivals from gaining a foothold in the market for desktop operating systems.
Open-source desktop operating system manufacturers have "effectively been kept at bay by the lack of interoperability of the Office applications," said Thomas Vinje, a partner in the Brussels office of the law firm Clifford Chance.
The lack of interoperability of Office applications was never part of an antitrust case in the United States, though the state of Massachusetts raised the issue in a discussion with Microsoft over public procurement. The state government said it would only order Office software if it worked well with open, interoperable software formats.
Microsoft agreed, and said it would open up Office. The new version, Office 12, which is to be released before the end of the year, will use extensible markup language, or XML, an industrywide standard, said Tom Brookes, the company's spokesman in Brussels.
Microsoft has submitted Office 12 to Ecma International, the industry standards body, to be registered as a standard software format interoperable with all rivals.
The trade association however, dismissed the move. "We are well aware of the XML standardization initiative, and we reached the conclusion that it doesn't solve the problem we are complaining about," Mr. Vinje said.