Re: Microsoft Cleared In Conn. Of Antitrust Violations

[Joe Barr <joe@pjprimer.com>]

On Sun, 18 Jul 1999, you wrote:

> Perhaps, but I keep asking myself a selfish question: what does it matter 
> to me anyway? Even if Bristol had won a large cash settlement from 
> Microsoft, how does that affect the market for competing products? Not 
> one bit. This is especially the case with the Caldera suit -- a battle 
> over a long-obsolete product. Unless you believe that Microsoft, once 
> bitten, is twice shy, then the outcomes of these antitrust suits are 
> anticlimaxes to non-events.

I disagree.  A quarter billion here, a few billion there, pretty soon you are
talking about real money.  MS will never operate within the law when it is so
easy and so profitable to continue to steal, pillage, and rape.

Further, every case brought against their unregulated monopoly brings to their
enterprise the thing it likes least: light.  It will take enormous ill-will
towards MS to bring them down.  The good news is that they have an incredible
knack for creating it.

See ya,
Joe