“The European Union on Thursday threatened Microsoft Corp. with fines of up to $4 million a day, claiming the software giant had failed to live up to promises for providing affordable and useful information that could help rivals make software for workgroup servers compatible with its Windows system,” Raf Casert reports for The Associated Press.
“‘This is a company which apparently does not like to have to conform with antitrust decisions,’ said EU Commission spokesman Jonathan Todd,” Casert reports.
“Under a landmark 2004 antitrust ruling by the European Union, Microsoft had to disclose complete and accurate interface documentation on reasonable and non-discriminatory terms, allowing its competitors to interoperate with Windows PCs and servers,” Casert reports. “Under a ‘statement of objections’ released Thursday, the EU’s executive Commission said there was ‘no significant innovation’ in the requested information.”
“‘Microsoft has agreed that the main basis for pricing should be whether its protocols are innovative,’ said EU Antitrust Commissioner Neelie Kroes said in a statement. ‘The Commission’s current view is that there is no significant innovation in these protocols. I am therefore again obliged to take formal measures to ensure that Microsoft complies with its obligations,’ Kroes said,” Casert reports. “Microsoft has four weeks to reply to the Commission after which the EU could impose fines going as high as 3 million euros ($4 million) a day, Todd said.”
Full article here.
Give ’em a break, EU. Poor Microsoft. Everybody knows Microsoft is incapable of innovation, so stop with the unreasonable demands!
Related articles:
Microsoft caught off-guard, beaten badly by Apple’s iPhone innovations – February 13, 2007
TIME Magazine: Microsoft’s Windows Vista ‘an embarassment to the good name of American innovation’ – February 02, 2007
Bill Gates lists Microsoft ‘innovations’ that Apple has offered Mac users for years – January 30, 2007
Pioneer Press: Windows Vista shows ‘Apple is an innovation engine; Microsoft, not so much’ – January 29, 2007
Dave Winer: ‘Microsoft isn’t an innovator, and never was – they are always playing catch-up’ – December 01, 2006
Microsoft Windows Vista: If you can’t innovate… try to impersonate Apple’s Mac OS X – August 10, 2006
Ballmer: I’m Microsoft’s ‘primary champion of innovation’ – July 27, 2006
Innovative Apple has changed the course of the personal computer revolution many times – April 02, 2006
Apple Computer consistent innovator again and again over 30 years – March 26, 2006
Apple Computer No. 1 on Fortune’s ‘Most Admired for Innovation 2006’ list – March 14, 2006
Imitating Apple Computer is no match for innovation – January 17, 2006
Apple’s talent and innovation vs. Microsoft’s hype – October 25, 2005
PC World: Microsoft innovation – an oxymoron – September 14, 2005
Apple Computer tops The 2005 Wired 40 list of companies leading tech innovation – April 25, 2005
Charles Arthur: Microsoft’s definition of ‘innovation’ different from everyone else’s – April 27, 2004
Just shut Microsoft down and give the money back to the shareholders.
The strikes keep coming…
“Innovation”, btw, does not mean “invention”. Asking a company to innovate is like asking a human to breathe- it’s a requirement for survival. Microsoft should be fined just for taking up space, these days.
Poor poor Mediocresoft…
They should really change their corporate startegy to more open and innovative. No wait. That would be the end.
MW: research
Bill Gates wants to encourage competition so he can squash it.
$4 Million a day is just about what Bill Gates makes in interest.
How ironic.
here in the tale of the EU the apple halo effect is taking more than we hope we still kicking Bill Gates in the A$$…
Booyah!!
I second that Jim! Amen! A-bloody-men!
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Don’t cheer too loudly. The EU is the new Soviet Union now moved to Brussels. They are also coming after Apple. It may well be true — hell, it is true — that Microsoft is a corporate thug, but that is not the reason the EU goes after them. The EU goes after successful American companies because the socialist gangsters are always in protectionist mode. They are also going after Apple.
LinuxGuy and Mac Prodigal Son said: “They are also going after Apple.”
So fine, let ’em go after Apple. All I care about is the defeat of MS. Once that happens my life will be fulfilled.
Now Gates & Co. will have to learn to convert dollars to Euros.
(Remember how Billy Boy flubbed a European interview, when asked why Vista was so much more expensive in Europe, he mumbled something about not staying on top of currency conversion rates.)
Qka wrote:
“Now Gates & Co. will have to learn to convert dollars to Euros.”
No! Now all currency should be converted to POINTS! POINTS, I tell you!
MW=maybe, as in maybe I’m nuts – NUTS, I tell you!
“… had to disclose complete and accurate interface documentation on reasonable and non-discriminatory terms, allowing its competitors to interoperate…”
wtf? I’m certainly no M$ fan, but what the hell are they asking for here? Gates is becoming quite a regular revenue stream for the EU. Does M$ have to allow beaurocrats in the EU to decide what pricing is fair for their own products? M$ is not a utility, it’s a software vendor. There are other choices. Are they seriously requiring Gates & Co. to be innovative? I don’t speak lawyer, somebody please translate.
I hope that the EU doesn’t start to revamp Apple’s pricing structure to whatever the committee thinks is “fair” this week. It’s past time for businesses in the EU and elsewhere to slip out of Microsoft’s noose and USE SOMETHING ELSE, rather trying to change to change a bad company to a good one by legislation.
I heard from a reliable source that Steve Ballmer offered the EU 5 million Microsoft Points instead of Euros.
The EU, quite rightly, told him to fsck off.
Whilst the EU may be a bit left wing for your tastes, I think they are spot on here and people are seriously misunderstanding what they are saying.
This has nothing to do with pricing. One of the tactics that Microsoft to push its application software is to ensure that it interfaces better with windows that those of other developers by not revealing the full details about windows interface protocols to external vendors. This artificially boosts the performance of MS products over those of other vendors and is grossly unfair.
The EU has not required MS to do anything other than share with external the same information about the windows interface that it share with its own application software developers in order to create a level playing field. MS refuse on the spurious grounds that the interface is “innovative” and they should not be forced to share these innovations with other developers.
This is not a part of some communist takeover conspiracy, it is sound attempt to prevent MS from sweetening the market for its application software. Typically MS seem to believe that they are above the law.
EU misunderstood,
What you say is plausible, a word related to specious. You are absolutely correct about Microsoft’s criminal behavior. But given the recent EU members assault on Apple, essentially beating up on Apple for the DRM inflicted by the music companies and Hollywood, I see the EU’s actions as an anti-capitalist assault by envy driven socialists. I am very worried about the Europeans conflating Microsoft’s illegal behavior with Apple’s legal and ethical business model. The arguments used in Europe against Apple are utter claptrap.
@Linux Guy
“The EU is the new Soviet Union now moved to Brussels.”
“The EU goes after successful American companies because the socialist gangsters are always in protectionist mode.”
What is wrong with this post?
1. Several unsubstantiated assertions.
2. Sweeping generalisations
3. Emotional language
Your post adds nothing to the debate. I suggest you select one issue, research it, and only then make a contribution. In the meantime, I suggest you try to resist the temptation to express an opinion on a subject which you clearly know nothing about.
@Linux Guy
“What you say is plausible, a word related to specious.”
What is wrong with this statement?
1. It is wrong.
plausible: believable and appearing likely to be true, usually in the absence of proof
specious: Deceptively pleasing or attractive. Apparently right; superficially fair, just, or correct, but not so in reality; as, “specious reasoning; a specious argument.”
Example: Judging by this poster’s specious arguments, it is plausible that he has never been to the EU, never studied international politics, and does not own a dictionary.
@Linux Guy
“I see the EU’s actions as an anti-capitalist assault by envy driven socialists”
More emotional language. Even less fact. And a ridiculous assertion.
Let us just put this into context. You would be hard pressed to find a European who is envious, in any way, of anything American. Most Europeans consider themselves, their culture and their lifestyle, to be eminently superior.
Charles de Gaulle once said: America is the only nation in history to have gone from barbarism to decadence, without encountering civilisation.
I suggest you research the case. Which you evidently have not. If you do I think you might find more than adequate reason for the EU to find against Microsoft without having to invent such silliness…
BTW Linux Guy, it’s not the EU harassing iTS and FairPlay. It’s a bunch of European countries (which, I think, are not even working together on this). Norway isn’t a member of the EU.
@Linux Guy
“I am very worried about the Europeans conflating Microsoft’s illegal behavior with Apple’s legal and ethical business model.”
You might be less worried if you knew more about the topic. I suggest you worry less, write less, and read more…
MS says they can’t release more info about their server software to their competitors because it’s patented. I think it’s more like there is so much stolen code that they’d rather keep it closed, fight and pay the fines.
@linuxguy
I think you shouldn’t tie together the actions of the EU anti-trust authorities and the actions of some consumer authorities in member states. For the record the EU authorities have taken no action in relation to iTunes.
People such as the Norwegian consumer office (which is not in the EU) are not wrong per se, just short-sighted. They don’t realise that the protection of iTunes market power (which is arguably anti-competitive) is preventing a much greater injustice, which is the record label’s view of
the potential of DRM. They hate the pay for multi-play model which is fair-play. They see a world in which individual licenses would be required for each device you use, unlocking significant additional earnings. The only thing stopping them is the leverage that iTunes has, i.e. they cannot play chicken with the dominant provider of digital music to force a change in fair-play terms of use. In a world of inter-operable DRM this would change.
Please lay off LinuxGuy. He cannot help being the way he is. He is the victim of a brain malfunction that makes it impossible for him to absorb information and process it in a rational way in certain areas. He is not truly stupid or evil. It only appears that way. Mentally, he is stuck in a box filled with slogans, with no way of escaping. Show him sympathy, and support brain research.