[KLUG Members] MSFT wins

[Peter Buxton]

On Thu, Jun 28, 2001 at 03:26:40PM -0700, Scott Wood was only 
   escaped alone to tell thee:

> overturning all but accused judge Jackson of being prejudiced in his
> choice to split of microsoft. (pointing out the nature of his language as
> being hostile and such)  I think this will make any other judges less
> prone to follow Jackson's lead when solutions are being dolled out.

They accused him of displaying impartial attitude and acts. You have to
remember you're reading the official words of the Federal judiciary. If they
all but said something, they did *not* say it.

> Furthermore, a lot of the discussions I am reading and hearing point to
> the possibility of a 'settlement' between the DoJ and M$, and all are
> saying the same thing - Micro$oft will probably go for anything short of a
> break-up when considering a settlement resolution.

Frankly, I read 1/2 of Penfield Jackson's findings of fact last night (200K)
and I must say that it was damning, but one or two points, very minor, were
unsupported (to me, not having sifted through 2 years of evidence). I had
not heard half of MS's nigh criminal mischief.

The appellate court overturned the sentence--or the remedy, rather--of
breakup. That's all. Their 7-0 decision in removing Penfield Jackson could
be read as paranoid caution in keeping the judiciary's impartiality
inviolate, rather than pro-MS sentiment; frankly, that a US Appelate Court
(rumored soft on business) upheld the finding of MS as an abusive monopoly
astounds me (in a good way).

The breakup of AT&T was all for the best. Each RBOC is now the size the Bell
System used to be. But separating long-distance and 5 final-mile servers was
easy. Each state's Bell company was a separate entity. Splitting and joining
was simple math, as it were. The breakup of M$ would likely have been the
Federal judiciary's Viet Nam--or another Roe v. Wade. Breakup would be a
political, economic and judicial nightmare. I also cannot see the good in a
protracted battle over hard to prove issues like licensing, which are
endlessly immutable (like designer drugs' law evasion, but worse, and with
no end in sight). "Never get involved in a land war in Asia!"

Even as the Federal Govt.'s POSE standard cleared the was for Unix (and
OpenVMS, Windows NT, et al.), a new application standard would go a long way
to cracking MS's monopoly. If I *knew*, for instance, that the Federal
Application Standard defined an Open Mutable Documant, say--a somewhat
simpler version of the Word97 file--and that the state of Michigan was
required to accept and distribute documents in that format, and that
spreadsheets et al. were also available as open standards (and not as a
Federally cracked verion of MS Office), I would recommend that CARES switch
to Linux as fast as possible. Such an app standard would be a real
FUD-killer.

As for another court, just remember that 19 state attorneys general are in
on US v. Microsoft. That's a wolf pack even Chairman Bill will be panting to
leave behind.