I was quite surprised when I learned that some peoples at JCXP wanted to boycott the opera browser because of the EU actions against Microsoft regarding the bundling of IE 8. The problem is that their main argument would be valid in the US, but absolutely not in the EU. Here is the point that I have a problem with:
"Microsoft is entirely within their right to include Internet Explorer as the default browser within their own OS, just like Apple includes their own Safari as the default browser in Mac OS X, and just like Opera Software would be free to include Opera as the default browser in their own OS, should they ever make one."
Well, sorry but no, they don't have the right.
From an European point of view at least they don't. You see the way the EU and the US deal with monopolies is completely different. In the US the state reaction when faced with a monopolistic company is to break it apart, something that almost happened to Microsoft during their first US antitrust investigation.
The EU doesn't break up companies, in fact they are usually quite OK with monopolies. For a long time water, power, cable and telecoms have been monopolies in most European countries and most people were OK with that. Of course there is a catch: in almost all cases the government owned a controlling share of those monopolistic companies and actually imposed some policies on them.
Now that most industries have been liberalized the state operate in a similar but subtly different way: You are entitled to operate a monopoly or quasi-monopoly as a private company, but you are expected to let the state have some control over your company in exchange. In other words from an European point of view if Windows is a quasi-monopoly then the state has the right to impose features and restrictions on Windows, as simple as that.
Of course Microsoft still own Windows and the financial benefits it produces, but they are not the only ones in control anymore. The logic is that if Windows is a monopoly that is practically imposed on citizens (through the "Windows tax") then the citizens 's democratically elected representative should have the right to control what is imposed to them. In Europe the "Windows tax" concept is more perceived as this, if it's mandatory, it's a tax, if it's a tax it's controlled by democratically elected people (i.e. the state).
I understand that my US readers would find this disturbing as it is is contrary to the way that the US corporations do business. As I pointed out in a previous post there is quite a big culture clash between US and the EU on antitrust issues. You should keep in mind that this is about Europe, and that businesswise Europe is not the US.
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9 Responses to "MS vs EU: Microsoft does not control Windows anymore":
I guess we define rights differently here in the US too. Here, our philosophy is rooted in the fact that rights (i.e. freedom to do what you want, as long as you don't impinge on another's freedom to do the same) are innate. We tend to feel that rights exist whether a bureaucrat agrees or not. We feel that's true of Europeans too, but some things have to be believed to be seen.
The reasoning fromout the EU is that on first a monopoly is not desired, but it can ofcourse happen. If it happens, you are not allowed to use your monopoly to create more monopolies. Concrete: Microsoft is not allowed to use its monopoly on Operating Systems to acquire a monopoly on web browsers.
That means that as long as Microsoft is considered to have a monopoly with his Operating System, it is not allowed to force other applications with it, like IE, Media Center, etc.
The reasoning is that many do not have a choice than to work with Windows, but that should not lead to the fact that they do not have the choice other than to work with Internet Explorer, considered that most people do not even know what a webbrowser is and that they just use whatever is availlable.
But i still don't understand why Apple can bundle Safari with OS X ? and get away with that.
Apple doesn't have a monopoly. If you can choose to use Apple, you can also choose not to. However, many people are not in the position to choose for something else than MS Windows. These people must not be forced to use Internet Explorer because of this.
If Microsoft wasn't considered to be a monopolist, they would be allowed to ship Internet Explorer with Windows again. Now however, they have the responsibility to keep the market open.
@Wanja - What's the difference? There is no difference between the two in terms of distributing an operating system with a built-in browser. The only difference I see is the market share.
-Anonymous said:
-The EU is a fascist, leftist regime.
Maybe, but only in the same way that the USA is an uber-capitalist, warmongering, racist, terrorism-supporting regime that cares nothing for its people.
Indeed, the only difference is market share and Microsofts Market Share was so big that they are now considered monopolist, and when someone is considered a monopolist, that's bad for the economy because it makes to consumers to dependent. One way to see that is the more than 80% profit directly for Microsoft for every Windows sold. So being a monopolist, the rules changes. In the states, that means, splitting up the company, in EU that means having the responsibility to keep the market as open as possible.
Ofcourse, if Microsoft keep losing market share, they can no longer be considered a monopolist and they can no longer be forced to remove Internet Explorer from Windows. But they will probably not want to choose for that cause of action.
B.t.w. the EU is not a regime, it's a coöperation of regimes, and it seems that they days of it being left is slowly marching to an end.
@ Anonymous
The point of the article is that in Europe market share DO make a difference in what you are allowed to do as a company.
There is a tendency to consider that any company with a large market share (like more than 70%) do have so much power in it's market that special rules must be applied to it. The reason is that owning a large market share in itself gives a company a competitive advantage that would allow it to prevent other players to prosper or influence other markets, like with IE.
The only way to compensate for this advantage is to actually be "unfair" toward the company owning the large market share by imposing more restriction on it than on it's competitors. If apple owned more than 70% of the desktop operating system market they would be forbidden to bundle safari and Microsoft would be allowed to bundle IE.
The problem per se is not that IE is bundled in Windows and Apple can do the same with Safari/OSX or OperaOS/Opera for that matter, but a little more complicated than that.
It's just that Windows is virtually a monopoly as a desktop OS (try to find a computer that comes without windows... thank god it's getting better, though). When they bundled IE, they forced people out of the market (Netscape, someone?) by leveraging their browser through Windows... That is the problem.
If microsoft owned 5% of the market and bundled IE, I don't think it would be so troublesome. Too bad that this action is over 10 years late, anyway.
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