Re: Interesting comments from the Judge

[John N Bryan <johnb@austin.rr.com>]

At 3:31 PM -0600 1/6/99, Eric Bennett wrote:

>Interesting comment from Judge Jackson today... according to Techweb
>(http://www.techweb.com/wire/story/TWB19990106S0006), he advised lawyers
>from both sides to read a Washington Post column whose point is that the
>AOL-Netscape merger will have no effect on Microsoft.  DOJ witness
>Franklin Fisher apparently offered the same opinion under cross-exam.
>
>(I don't have a link to the Post article.  From a brief skimming of
>their site I would guess it won't be available on the web until
>tomorrow.)
>

Yup, it's in there, just had to hunt for it.
Too bad TechWeb didn't link that for us.

Ve-e-e-e-ery interesting indeed that he referenced this particular
article to these people.

Here it is:

There is probably a cleaner URL, I had to use Search
to get this one, so it's a little ugly.

"Knowing When Not to Compete", David Ignatius
http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-01/06/029l-010699-idx.html

The last few lines are:

"That's the marketplace reality that Judge Jackson will need to weigh as he
considers what to do about Microsoft. There is no easy solution here, no
deus ex Internet -- for the simple reason that no sensible CEO wants to
compete head-on with Microsoft. "

"I'm not convinced that a ravenous Microsoft poses a threat to consumers,
any more than AOL does. But if Judge Jackson decides that Microsoft has an
illegal monopoly in the software business, he may have to bite the bullet
and consider breaking up the company. He shouldn't wait for a natural
competitor to evolve. If they're smart, like Case, they'll run the other
way. "


John Bryan, johnb@austin.rr.com    http://home.austin.rr.com/johnb/
=======
"I want to get as much mileage as possible out of our browser and JAVA
relationship here. In other words a real advantage against Sun and Netscape.
Do we have a clear plan on what we want Apple to do to undermine Sun?"
 -- Bill Gates to staff, 8/8/97, after Apple made IE its default browser