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Microsoft Antitrusst Case
Free Essay Submitted by bignerds on 06/28/2008 08:11 PM
- Category: Business
- Words: 1585
- Pages: 7
- Views: 36
- Popularity Rank: 1023
Microsoft Antitrusst Case
America's century-old antitrust law is increasingly irrelevant to our modern global information technology market. This law is obsolete, in accordance to the current Microsoft situation, because in the past there wasn't technology as there is now. Recently the government has been accusing Microsoft as being a monopoly. "Techno-Optimists" claim: "efforts by government to promote competition by restraining high-tech firms that acquire market power will only stifle competition." Some analysts disagree. They concede that dynamic technology makes it tough to sustain market power. Still, consumers will want compatible equipment, which will lead them to buy whatever product other consumers are using, even if the product is inferior. Hence, is Microsoft a monopoly or not? The range of views extends from the optimists who think that changing technology removes the need for antitrust, to "middle-of-the-roaders" who think that antitrust has always been and still is an important weapon in the government's arsenal. Microsoft is not a monopoly. Our world of telecommunications and information technology has brought about many changes in many fields but new technology has neither extinguished nor revitalized the reason for antitrust. There are monopolies that the government ought to control. Those are the very monopolies that the government created itself.
It is the government that creates monopoly power by erecting and maintaining barriers to market entry. In the most recent dispute between Microsoft and the Department of Justice (DOJ), Microsoft is accused of "tying-in" an Internet browser into Windows. Microsoft's "tie-in" of its browser (Internet Explorer) with its operating system (Windows 95) is a tie-in that shows no greater threat to competition than the packaging of tires with cars, cream with coffee, laces with shoes, even left gloves with right gloves. In actuality, tying arrangements is pro-competitive. Consumers will buy the product that is more...
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