begin quoting Tracy R Reed as of Fri, May 06, 2005 at 10:33:48AM +0700: [snip] > Uh...Doesn't the fact that people had to give away technically superior > products and services FOR FREE (Linux, Google, Firefox) in order to > compete demonstrate that Microsoft was indeed a monopoly?
Er, no, not really. > I bet if > someone could have given away gasoline for free they could have broken > Standard Oil's monopoly without government intervention. They used to give away gasoline for free. Actually, they threw it away. > I bet if > someone could have given away telephones and phone service for free they > could have stopped AT&T without government intervention. AT&T was _granted_ a monopoly in order to get telephones everywhere. And they were strictly regulated. > Does this show > that they also were not monopolies? Without the AT&T monopoly, the telephone would have taken a lot longer to become ubiquitous. > I think MS was quite justly > prosecuted. What was unjust was the government giving up on the case and > letting them off easy. Unjust to us, the citizens who have to put up > with Microsofts business practices. Unjust to the companies they crushed, yes. The citizens... well, they generally gleefully flocked to Microsoft. They're reaping what they've sown. I don't blame Microsoft as much as I do their supporters. -Stewart "Utilities are natural monopolies, and not *necessarily* bad." Stremler
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