Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Microsoft must pay $1.4bn to EU
- Thread starter edesignuk
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I agree. I was going to post the same thing.
Personally, I think Apple really should get the same treatment that Microsoft has received. I like Apple, but there is a big case against them. Being charged would be entirely warranted, if the case against Microsoft is deemed fair.
Sorry, but this is simply not true. It is by no means a trivial task to prove that a company has abused their market power, but Microsoft has been proven in courts of law to have done it, again and again, over a period of decades. They have violated trade laws repeatedly.
Why? Please be specific, and cite the applicable trade laws.
Funny thing, I haven't heard to this "big case" against Apple. Can you please describe what Apple has done wrong?
^ Never mind. I just noticed IJ posted nearly the same thing.
I just don't see much difference between what Apple is doing with the iPod, iTMS, movies, Fairplay DRM, and locking everyone else out, and what Microsoft has done with something like.....Internet Explorer with Windows XP.
Quit arguing and read about antitrust law. Specifically, read up on EU antitrust law and you'll know the answer to your question.
Have you ever heard of BeOS? NeXT? Those are two operating systems developed that were 1.) Years ahead of Windows and Mac OS In almost every way and 2.) Crushed by Microsoft using illegal business practices like the ones they are being punished for by the EU. Your argument is totally moronic, by the way. No company should be given full power or they will abuse it like Microsoft does and put out crappy products, like Microsoft often does, and any company that chooses not to compete on the Windows platform was, up until recently, killing itself.
I can't believe people don't see a difference. iTunes is MEDIA Internet Explorer is THE WEB. Is there no difference? The web is the most important thing on a computer at this point, and the fact that IE at one point had pretty much a stranglehold on it made it a big deal. Apple doesn't really have much of a choice with their DRM and obviously would like to get rid of it, except that not all the labels will let them sell DRM-free tracks.
It's all about market power, and how it's used. If a competitor (or the government) could demonstrate that Apple is restraining trade and creating artificial barriers to competition, then maybe an antitrust case could be made against them. Some complaints have been made about the iPod, but I don't think much of them, in terms of antitrust. All of the music players support some proprietary DRM schemes and not others. The iPod plays non-DRM formats. So how is competition being thwarted here? In such a diverse market, that would be very difficult to demonstrate, which is probably why nobody has yet. I can't think of a single potential antitrust issue with the iTMS. Do you know something I don't?
Microsoft has been accused and convicted of multiple antitrust violations. They involve using their overwhelming OS market share to deliberately disadvantage competitors. When you own 90% of a market, you have to be very careful about not using that power to decide who wins and who loses in that market. Maybe we forget that Microsoft drove Netscape out of business simply by having the huge competitive advantage of owning the platform where Netscape had 90% of its market. They've been using their market power in similar ways to destroy competitors for decades. This is what gets them in trouble with regulators. It also doesn't help their case that they routinely try to avoid complying with court and regulatory orders.
Let me first say that I can't understand how the moderators let you get away with your username. Do you actually know what it means? (I am talking of invading Poland, Belgium, The Netherlands, killing lots of Jews and all that stuff).
And second, you don't seem to have any idea what is going on here. Nobody wants Microsoft's source code. Absolutely nobody. Microsoft even volunteered to publish their source code, and the EU told them to p*** off. What everyone wants is the definition of protocols. A specification that says what messages you can send to a server, and how it is supposed to respond to those messages. Since Microsoft has a hold on the market, there are only two possibilities to keep competition alive: Either force Microsoft to publish their protocols so that anybody can write software to connect to them, or make the use of Microsoft's protocols illegal and require the use of protocols following standards that are available to everybody.
I think where they will get hit is dealing with the music store more than the player. They are hurting music stores opening up because only DRM that will play on the number 1 MP3 by far is apples. On top o that apples DRM only will play on the iPod and no one else.
The work around of burning and ripping is not an acceptable solution or a defense.
Apple set up hurts other music stores from really breaking in.
I don't see it, especially given the number of online music stores offering downloads free of DRM. Amazon just started their music store and already they moving up the sales list quickly. Also, all iTMS content plays on iTunes, which is free, so an iPod isn't even required.
but does not change the fact that most of that paid for music ends up in some type of mp3 player.
I just stated exactly where they would get hit with an anti trust. They are taking advantage of the iPod market power by keeping other music stores from gaining power and limiting how far they will go.
A lot of music will always be limited by DRM.
That's hardly clear. The trend seems to be away from DRM. How quickly it moves is entirely up to the music industry, not Apple. But it is evident that Apple isn't creating any anticompetitive barriers to entry from other online music sellers. You haven't made any argument for antitrust violations that I can understand.
Do you know what it means?
Dictionary said:
In it's literal meaning, the German word blitzkrieg has nothing to do with the Holocaust or any other war crimes committed by the Nazi regime. It is however, closely associated with the Nazi's as they were in political control of Germany at the time Blitzkrieg was first used as a battle strategy by the Wermacht.
I think it is more apple blinders so you can not see the argument.
Number 1 player only plays DRM music from iTMS. The iTMS only works on the number one MP3 player.
Those 2 facts really hurt others from moving into the market.
Ridiculous. You simply have not demonstrated any circumstances which approach, let alone equal, antitrust. You haven't even tried.
I pointed out earlier that making an antitrust case is not a trivial exercise. I pointed out the number of years and the mountains of evidence it required to bring successful charges against Microsoft. I pointed out that it has nothing to do with whether you like the company. It's all about facts and the law. You must have both in your favor, not just vague theories and opinions.
This simply not true, if a company wants to get into the iPod market, they have to sell DRM-free songs.
Frankly, except for iTunes, the rest of the digital music field is a graveyard of companies that tried and failed to sell DRM-laden music. Even the mighty Walmart failed to convert the brick-n-mortar stores' sales into a good digital business. Rhapsody, Sony, and others have tried and failed while eMusic has been a continuous, if relatively unacknowledged success.
Simply put, the existence of eMusic disproves any anti-trust argument that could be brought against Apple.
Further, if you want to use an iPod, but not iTMS, you're free to do so. If you want to use iTMS, you're going to have to jump through a hoop to avoid using an iPod/iPhone, but you still can. Thus, consumers are free to make choices and therefore there is not even a monopoly much less grounds for an antitrust lawsuit.
Blitzkrieg is also a song by Metallica. Why don't you call them up and complain? And while you're at it tell Lars they haven't had a good song worth steeling since "Justice for All." ; )
We all know that customers don't want DRM anyway. So anyone who wants to sell downloadable music can just do what Amazon does: Sell music without DRM. In MP3 format. Or preferably in AAC format (which is just as open as MP3, but many manufacturers didn't use it because they were afraid of Microsoft). It's what customers want, and it plays everywhere. Or sell CDs. The huge majority of all music is sold on CDs.
The other way round, you can make music that you buy from Apple with DRM play on any portable music player whatsoever in two simple steps, using the same software that you used to buy the music in the first places. Two well-documented steps. And here we are in the comparison with Microsoft: Microsoft was charged $1.4bn for withholding information how to interact with their servers. Apple provides the information how to use Apple DRM'd music freely, and it has documented how to convert any other music format to make it playable on the iPod. The documentation is freely available from Apple, at no charge. Microsoft was also charged for disobeying a court order from 2004 to 2007, that is actually the bigger part of their fine. There is no court order against Apple at all.