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Microsoft to EU: You win, we'll change
Microsoft has decided not to appeal the latest EU court ruling, which means the company will fork over $705 million which had been sitting in an escrow account since since the fine was levied in 2004.
Other highlights of the agreement include:
- Microsoft will allow third party companies to license non-patented technology to ensure interoperability with Windows
- Companies will only have to pay a one-time €10,000 fee for that intellectual property, not an ongoing royalty
Comments
8
Subscribe to commentsGardiner WestboundOct 22nd 2007 4:10PM
Microsoft undoubtedly raked in far more than the legal costs and $705 million penalty during the nine years it waltzed the EU court.
michaelOct 22nd 2007 5:12PM
Oh yeah, a monopoly where people can also buy OS X, get Linux for free, and other choices.
That's definitely a monopoly that has controlled all our computer. I really hope those Microsoft fines help with your mini-tea parties there.
(sarcasm)
kdmurrayOct 23rd 2007 8:07AM
I wanted to post a comment here about this... but the response ended up so long that I wrote a post about it. In short though, this smacks of government interference.
In a day and age where the percentage of Microsoft instances on home computers is as low as it's been in a decade, and falling with more Mac and Linux PCs sold each day, it doesn't make sense to stomp all over the intellectual property rights of companies.
I'm no Microsoft fanboy, hell I'm writing this on my macbook while setting up an Ubuntu Server, but I do believe an action like this is unfair to the company and will do little to benefit consumers in the long run.
JanoOct 23rd 2007 8:52AM
Michael: tell that to the companies whose products depend on unreleased APIs from Microsoft. Fair play is not "I sell oranges you can sell something else or go bankrupt".
JanoOct 23rd 2007 8:51AM
@Michael: tell that to the companies whose products depend on unreleased APIs from Microsoft. Fair play is not "I sell oranges you are free to sell something else or go bankrupt".
michaelOct 23rd 2007 5:05PM
@Jano : Nobody told them they have to use Windows :)
They could have chosen Linux or OS X to do the job. But obviously, they, and the market, prefers Windows.
JamesOct 23rd 2007 5:28PM
Can anybody give me an actual - concrete! - example of one of these "unreleased APIs" for Windows? As a software developer who normally targets the Windows platform, I've never run into a situation where I said "boy, I wish I could do X, but MS just won't let me!". It's always been a matter of just looking hard enough for the function, which always turns out to have been right there in MSDN, waiting for me to find it. What are these people trying to do with Windows that they can't figure out on their own?
JamesOct 23rd 2007 5:27PM
[PS: Not to mention, who the hell says, "Your API isn't robust enough, I'm going to sue you!"?]