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  Microsoft Witness Slams States' Plan for Windows
Time: 10:40 EST/15:40 GMT | News Source: Reuters | Posted By: Robert Stein

Antitrust sanctions that fragment the Windows operating system would set the computer industry back almost 20 years, Microsoft Corp.'s first witness told federal court on Tuesday. Jerry Sanders, chief executive of computer chip-maker Advanced Micro Devices Inc. , said the personal computer standards that have formed around Microsoft's operating systems have greatly benefited consumers.

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#1 By 20 (68.53.242.24) at 4/16/2002 12:11:13 PM
MS must be allowed to ship Windows Media Player because their Movie Tools and other programs depend on it. They must have these applications to compete with Apple and their iTunes and iMovie software.

#2 By 2960 (156.80.64.135) at 4/16/2002 12:56:44 PM
"Since when is Apple a serious competitor?"

They are to those who aren't blinded...

I have three major-strength PC's fully loaded at home (including a very high-end Athlon XP system), and I wouldn't dream of doing any of my digital video, audio or home computing on anything but the iMac out in the living room.

TL

#3 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 4/16/2002 1:15:29 PM
daz, you are making the fallacious presumption that users wouldn't be able to install these apps if OEMs chose to uninstall them; they would still be provided on an install CD. You are making the fallacious presumption that 100% of all OEMs will choose not to bundle these apps--if just 10% of the OEMs ship Windows with these apps, they have a larger marketshare than Apple's products.

And, yes, are you saying that Mac OS X is more compelling with bundled apps than a version of Windows w/o Movie Maker? Thanks, that's my point in the first place--too bad Apple hasn't done anything illegal so we don't have to protect MS's ability to compete in this scenario; for now, they are aiming to protect other companies for things MS did illegally.

This post was edited by sodajerk on Tuesday, April 16, 2002 at 13:23.

#4 By 143 (172.175.246.74) at 4/16/2002 1:16:33 PM
I’m guessing… (-:

The best way would be to let the customer chose the OS not the vender.
Allow quality and Capability to win out.
Not contracts or a firm of Lawyers........



#5 By 2332 (129.21.145.80) at 4/16/2002 1:28:46 PM
#7 - Ah, yes... so because you have one, Apple is a serious competitor. :-)

Just a thought, but I think a company needs to have more than about 3% market share to be considering even a mild competitor.

#6 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 4/16/2002 1:32:54 PM
that's funny, RMD, daz says he finds Windows no longer compelling to buy if it doesn't have Movie Maker so I guess Apple is a strong enough a competitor in his mind.

#7 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 4/16/2002 1:43:55 PM
Ha, ha, ha --- Reuters just reported it, but I'll wait for more info... Sanders is a bigger moron than I thought, jesus christ! He admitted that he hasn't read the proposal remedies, that he simply took Gates' word that they were "insane." And then he admitted that when he was asked to testify, he predicated his response to Gates on MS supporting Hammer. )Oh, this is going to be fun!

#8 By 135 (209.180.28.6) at 4/16/2002 1:53:17 PM
#12 - You haven't figured it out yet? I'm shocked, you didn't think anything of it when Novell and AOL blackmailed Microsoft.


TechLarry/sodajerk - Ok, look. Let me spell it out for you. Apple is irrelevant. Let it go.

#9 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 4/16/2002 1:57:37 PM
You haven't figured out that I don't care--that I'm laughing at how much more pathetic it is to bitch on these other guys who did do their own research, who have been involved in the case, who at least tried to figure some of this stuff out--this moron walked into court only having been prepared by Gates perception of the case. Hilarious.

By the way, how did Novell blackmail MS? I thought they were irrelevant? What did Novell get from MS, I though they were still unhappy? Same for AOL.

I wasn't trying to make a case that Apple was relevant--I was trying to find out if the softies really believed Apple is so powerful, or if they are blowing smoke up their own @sses.

This post was edited by sodajerk on Tuesday, April 16, 2002 at 14:04.

#10 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 4/16/2002 2:15:36 PM
Yeah, but that investment didn't cause the Apple rebound, and almost all (if not all) of that Apple stock was subsequently sold by MS--mostly back when Apple lost half of its value over a year ago.

#11 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 4/16/2002 2:25:58 PM
No, the cash didn't; the promise to keep Office around for 5 years did. From 97 to 2000, Apple went from a 1.5 Billion dollar company to a 17 Billion dollar company, now they are back to a 8.5 Billion dollar company--250 Million was not a substantial factor in that success. The iMac was.

#12 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 4/16/2002 3:19:28 PM
And my point was that Apple wasn't going to collapse BUT for the Microsoft threat to pull support of a profitable product. You can't say MS saved Apple from collapse with a straight face if it was Microsoft that would have caused the collapse, can you? The iMac would have been built with or without 250 million.

#13 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 4/16/2002 3:31:45 PM
No, I'm not proving your point by showing that MS is a monopoly; the initial point was that MS saved Apple, which they did not---not that they were dependent on them. I'm saying you can measure two factors to suggest that MS "saved" Apple--investing 250 million dollars which is a blip on the radar in what Apple achieved from 97 to 2000 financially or the tech commitment by MS--that commitment came out of a threat to destroy Apple, not to save them. Had they not made that threat, they'd still have made Office for the Mac because it has always made money. So MS can't take credit for saving Apple unless they want to say that they were the ones trying to destroy them in the first place.

I think you'll find that Apple will be doing more to do office software; because they haven't doesn't mean they couldn't. They enjoyed allowing MS provide the product in this market. You forget that Apple and MS always had a very close and collaborative relationship despite the problems. You forget that MS's early success as an app developer was made on the Mac first.

#14 By 116 (66.68.173.16) at 4/16/2002 4:25:16 PM
And you forget that Apple does make an Office product. Its called AppleWorks (remember ClarisWorks). To say that MS didn't save Apple is typical Apple behaviour. Just like we didn't save Europe in WW2...

I swear this stuff really irks me. Just admit it.

Man

#15 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 4/16/2002 4:31:12 PM
I didn't forget AppleWorks--this is like calling iMovie a high-end app--as someone did here the other day, AppleWorks is not ready to challenge Office. I had wanted to point that out, but I thought it too ridiculous: that Apple could only prove its innovativeness by developing a product it never intended to develop for the business market, a market it's platform isn't intended to serve just yet.

No, I see no reason to believe MS saved Apple. I think it points out the more typical softy view that Apple is on the verge of nonexistence every other quarter. The fact of the matter is they increased their value by about 1600% in a two and a half year period; I would say this had more to do with Steve Jobs, the iMac, even the purchase of NeXT (WebObjects still sold for $30,000 back then)... hell, you could even say their participation in ARM was more a factor in their recovery than MS was.

#16 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 4/16/2002 4:58:57 PM
I wasn't making a legal argument--I'm just trying to clear up a misconception. I think it's clear that if you say the tech commitment is what saved Apple; then that's a bad argument--it was a result of a threat from MS to kill Apple, not save them.

I think I know perfectly well what the current court case does and does not say.

#17 By 135 (209.180.28.6) at 4/16/2002 5:07:51 PM
sodajerk is incorrect as always... Apple had bigger problems in '97 than just whether or not Office would be around. They were bleeding money like crazy, had had no new ideas for the past 10 years(oh except color graphics), and the stock was in the toilet.

The $150 million committed by Microsoft boosted Apple's stock value because it represented a major investor showing support for Apple's turnaround under Jobs. It was a confidence builder, without it Apple's stock would have continued to sink and they wouldn't have had the capital to invest in the iMac and other new models.

Same thing happened with Corel.

Why? Because it would not help Microsoft's position to have major companies go bankrupt, especially not Apple.

#18 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 4/16/2002 5:26:39 PM
What were those problems, soda, explain to me how MS saved Apple? That year Jobs returned, bought NeXT, cancelled many products (Newton, printers, many hardware configs), introduced the iMac, and was already one of the largest ourside investors in ARM--those are just a few of the things I can think of that Apple was doing to recover. Don't see where Microsoft comes in? I can also sit around looking at Apple's stock value--I see a spike in 97, but I see all of that value eroded by the end of the year. I then see an intense and major two year ramp up which coincides with the fact that iMac and total revenues were kicking ass--I also recall that Apple BEAT expectations for 14 quarters straight during this time. I didn't know MS was pitching iMacs? Try again.

#19 By 4209 (163.192.21.3) at 4/16/2002 5:54:32 PM
SodaJerk, I think the point is that Apples stock would have kept tanking without help from an outside investor. It just happened to be MS that invested. This would cause the stock to go up, since why would a company as big as MS invest in Apple id it was not worth it. This in turn gave enough money to Apple to design the iMac. Remember Jobs was not getting paid at the time either, he just got stock options from Apple. He did turn the company around, but who can say what would have happened if Microsoft did not make the investment. It could have gone either way, but we will never truly know if it was Jobs or MS's help that spiked the stock that year. Yes it went down but think how far it would have went down if MS did not invest.

#20 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 4/16/2002 6:09:10 PM
No, my point is the real effect on the stock value was iMac sales, beating estimates for 14 straight quarters. Is the theory that the iMac wouldn't have been built without MS? Because that's what I think the theory is dependent on.. The fact is, before 1997, Jobs was already consulting Apple--telling them what they'd have to dump, what they'd have to buy, etc... After executing a fair number of these things, he was still prepared to take MS to court as well over QT. So I don't think Jobs was concerned about having the support or not. He was still going to build and release his machine.

#21 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 4/16/2002 6:14:56 PM
By the way, you mention Corel--according to your theory, they have the support and money of Microsoft which should be enough to save them. But in fact, they have continued to spiral downward since the infusion.

#22 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 4/16/2002 6:20:21 PM
#31, No, anon, my point is--what would have had an effect was MS saying that we are pulling our products, but MS has always been a Mac developer--longer than they have been a Windows developer--and they've always profited at it. #32, committing to Apple cannot be attributed with a 1600% upturn in Apple's fortunes unless MS experienced the same upturn of sales in Apple products. Since they didn't, I wouldn't say MS software is what sold those machines.

#23 By 3339 (65.198.47.10) at 4/16/2002 6:57:19 PM
Right, but as we see now-_MS is still committed to the Mac without an agreement. The only risk the Mac had of disappearing was MS pulling support--it is a very simple and basic claim that you shouldn't be able to take credit for "saving" Apple if it was the threat of "killing" Apple in the first place that created any doubt of their survival. Nobody mentions that Adobe and Macromedia weren't considering dropping Apple--look at what their stocks did from 97 to 2000. Had MS pulled their support, Adobe and Macromedia and others would have continued development, the iMac would have been built adn released (some of its success may have been dampened but I don't think you can say they would have lost more than 50% of those sales--even 50% of those sales would have brought Apple out of a huge hole), as I pointed out--a lot of Apple's cash is a result of being an early investor in ARM which has reaped gains hand over fist, and (had they pulled support) Apple would have sued the crap out of MS.


#24 By 135 (208.50.201.48) at 4/16/2002 10:19:33 PM
"The only risk the Mac had of disappearing was MS pulling support"

No, you still misunderstand. The main risk Apple faced was going bankrupt. I don't think you fully appreciate just how bad of shape Apple was in 1997. They were announcing massive layoffs, major restructuring, there was no clear direction as to where they were going. Developers were abandoning Apple in droves, as were customers.

They got lucky with the iMac, by going back to the design of the original Mac and colorizing it. Perfect computer for the college student. The G4 cube was a complete failure, on the other hand because people expected much higher quality for the price premium.

Recently they've been struggling with their failed Apple store concept. The stores themselves are not attracting new buyers, and instead they are dragging business away from their existing dealer network, who they've further insulted now by directing limited supply channels towards the Apple stores.


You know, I've never really been a Mac fan. But I've also never really been a Mac hater. They just always existed on the fringe and left me alone. I've also never really encountered Mac owners until I started reading this web site, and I cannot for the life of me figure out why you keep coming in here with your rose colored glasses accusing us of being blind.

Look, I was a Commodore Amiga owner. I know what it's like when a platform is dying... Maybe it's time you take the glasses off.

#25 By 3339 (64.175.41.87) at 4/17/2002 3:51:12 AM
#38, I think you forget about what are truly the lifeblood apps of the Mac: Photoshop and Quark... I know maybe some out there think Windows has quikly stolen a lot of these customers, but I think you underestimate how these two apps would have kept Apple alive, the same way their film/video solution does anew today... You mention Mac in business, but the graphics business was the biggest business Apple had then. The other business would probably have to be what was inherited from NeXT--their was still a fair bit of OpenStep development going on, and at the time WebObjects was a $30,000 enterprise product... the Mac in business, was not office use, or the Office app.

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