On Wed, Apr 14, 2004 at 09:39:08PM +0800, Andy Sy wrote: > Are you now saying that a company like RedHat or Netscape can extend well > established standards and not be considered anticompetitive, but Microsoft > can't? At what market share/size does a company have to have before its > extension of standards becomes regarded as anticompetitive? >
The antitrust laws in the United States (which is what we're talking about here), state that an action that will serve to create or sustain a monopoly is anticompetitive. So the answer to your question is that if an extension of standards will serve to create a monopoly or further entrench a monopoly, then it is regarded as anticompetitive, and in violation of the Sherman Antitrust Act. Many of Microsoft's embrace and extend tactics fall under this category, as might have Netscape's actions before the fall, in hindsight, but Microsoft chose to out-anticompete them with the even more anticompetitive masterstroke of bundling IE with every copy of Windows they sold, instead of taking them to court over antitrust violations. -- Philippine Linux Users' Group (PLUG) Mailing List [EMAIL PROTECTED] (#PLUG @ irc.free.net.ph) Official Website: http://plug.linux.org.ph Searchable Archives: http://marc.free.net.ph . To leave, go to http://lists.q-linux.com/mailman/listinfo/plug . Are you a Linux newbie? To join the newbie list, go to http://lists.q-linux.com/mailman/listinfo/ph-linux-newbie
