[Am-info] Gateway Official Hits Microsoft Licensing In Testimony

[Erick Andrews]

On Tue, 26 Mar 2002 06:14:32 -0800, T.Guilbert wrote:

>In a message dated 2002 March 26 (Tuesday), timestamp 01:21 PM, 
>   on the topic Re: [Am-info] Gateway Official Hits Microsoft
>Licensing In Testimony,
>   John Poltorak <jp@eyup.org> wrote:
>
>"|Don't expect anything from the courts.
>
>I am not yet giving up on the courts.  The least likely court of all
>(packed by Reagan ans a priority item on his agenda "to get the
>government off our backs"), the US Court of Appeals for the DC
>Circuit, showed, en banc and unanimously, that it "gets it."  I am
>much more worried about prosecutors with feet of clay.  The strongest
>"champions" out there -- the nine non-settlement states -- are asking
>for a remedy (modular Windows) that seems best suited to _entrench_ a
>(smaller but still proprietary) Windows rather than opening a window
>(no pun intended) to displace it.  Their remedies all go to the
>applications and add-on layer -- applications to run on Windows,
>add-ons and plug-ins for Windows. 
>
>
>"|You, waiting for George W Bush to drop by and ask your opinion about
>"| Microsoft is not going to be particularly effective IMV ;-)....
>
>A different result in November 2000 undoubtedly would have yielded a
>different posture in the Microsoft litigation. 
>
>"|It needs a big company with lots of $$$ to go lobbying in
>"|Washington, or even the Anti-capitalist mob realising that Microsoft
>"|is a bigger demon  that Macdonalds or Nike and going round smashing
>"|every computer with  Windows installed, to get the msg across.
>
>At least as long as we have this administration in Washington, we will
>see no effective initiative from the federal government.  And any
>publicly traded company owes it to its shareholders not to tilt at the
>Microsoft windmill:  the rate of return on investment is too low and
>too uncertain. 
>
>The change will come, bowever, when the Great Disaster hits:  the
>ultimate virus that rages across the entire Windows code monoculture
>and creates the equivalent of the 1930s Dust Bowl on Windows
>installations worldwide.  Especially if it temporarily disables our
>military defense infrastructure, you will see an overnight change in
>attitude. 
>

Or a coverup that would make Watergate look like kindergarden.

-- 
Erick Andrews