[Am-info] Microsoft vs. Sony

[John Poltorak]

On Sun, May 19, 2002 at 07:56:35AM -0400, John J. Urbaniak wrote:
> Microsoft is obviously selling X-Box at a loss.  

The loss is part of a big strategy for getting their home entertainment 
system into everyone's home. The big payback comes when people start using 
Xboxes, or whatever follows on, for accessing games, films, music etc over 
the Internet. You can be certain that Xboxes will only connect to MSN, 
hence the mopping up of ISPs around the world by Microsoft. AOL will 
doubtless get caught out. As video streaming becomes more popular (and 
profitable) people will just hire a movie and receive  a stream over the 
Internet, so Video rental stores will take a big hit. In due course video 
streaming will be the major way to watch videos at home and major film 
companies will be keen to get in on the act by signing up with Microsoft 
to provide access to their films. Here I would suspect some dastardly 
contract under which Microsoft would claim that the right to the films had 
been transferred to them under Digital Millenium Copyright Act, so that 
Microsoft would eventually own every film or piece of music transmitted 
over their network.

It's a scary scenario, but I woudn't put it past Bill Gates and his band 
of Pirates.

> Obviously, they intend to make
> up the money elsewhere, say for example, by increasing Windows licensing fees.
> 
> I thought this was illegal under Antitrust laws.

Didn't you know that Microsoft are exempt from the Antitrust laws?

 
> John
> 
> 
> John Poltorak wrote:
> 
> > Over the next few years, I can see a huge fight taking place between
> > Microsoft and Sony. The main area of conflict is likely to be computer games
> > consoles, but the two companies are also competitors in the markets for
> > mobile phones and PDAs. I guess the long term goal is the domination of
> > home entertainment systems. I fear that Microsoft with its finger in the
> > pie of so many technologies all built round Windows is going to win. It has
> > the Xbox with connectivity to the Internet via broadband, Pocket PC,
> > SmartPhone, TV set top boxes, .NET, a huge stake in many telecomms
> > companies and ISPs - it has just bought Europe's biggest ISP. It has more
> > spare cash than anyone can imagine as well as US govt approval for
> > extending its monopoly into every area it wants to enter.
> >
> > You wonder what chances Sony has in the long term, but it would be nice to
> > see them making a strong fight of it.
> >
> > --
> > John


-- 
John