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| GETTING TOUGH WITH MICROSOFT
Is the Justice Department stifling or protecting innovation? May 26, 1998 |
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Questions asked
in this forum:
Should the Justice Department consider "vaporware" an unfair practice? Why hasn't a similar suit come about earlier? What occupies the 10 percent of the market Microsoft doesn't control? What innovations is Microsoft responsible for? Is there less public resentment towards Microsoft than other monopolies? 
Frank Tamborello of Houston, TX asks: What are the possible outcomes of this suit? Could Microsoft actually be broken up, as AT&T was some time ago? Microsoft has had a choke hold on the PC operating system market for many years, why hasn't a similar trial come about earlier? Paul Gillin responds:
Microsoft was prosecuted by the Justice Department for four years until a consent decree was reached in 1994 regarding the company's operating systems licensing practices. So while there was never any trial, Microsoft has been under government investigation for most of the last eight years.
As far as a breakup, that is highly unlikely. The government generally doesn't break up monopolies (AT&T and Standard Oil being the two major exceptions) but prefers to put limits on their activities. There are many possible outcomes, of course, but the most likely ones are that Microsoft has to deliver the browser separate from the operating system and has to uncouple the browser from the operating system in the way it writes licenses. I also expect there will be some limitations on Microsoft's ability to promote its own electronic commerce services from its browser homepage, but that's strictly conjecture on my part.
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