RSSUS Antitrust Chief, EU Competition Chief Spar Over Microsoft
By Scott M. Fulton, III | Published September 20, 2007, 10:43 AM
In an unusual move, US Assistant Attorney General for Antitrust Thomas Barnett issued a statement earlier this week, following the European Court of First Instance (CFI) decision in the Microsoft matter, politely but clearly dissenting from the Court's decision and implying the American antitrust system is more evolved.
"It will...be some time before the full impact of today's decision on antitrust policy in Europe will be apparent," wrote Barnett last Monday. "We are, however, concerned that the standard applied to unilateral conduct by the CFI, rather than helping consumers, may have the unfortunate consequence of harming consumers by chilling innovation and discouraging competition."
Barnett then went on to carefully imply that the CFI may have had particular special interests in mind other than simply promoting and protecting the spirit of competition.
He went on to write: "In the United States, the antitrust laws are enforced to protect consumers by protecting competition, not competitors. In the absence of demonstrable consumer harm, all companies, including dominant firms, are encouraged to compete vigorously. U.S. courts recognize the potential benefits to consumers when a company, including a dominant company, makes unilateral business decisions, for example to add features to its popular products or license its intellectual property to rivals, or to refuse to do so."
It's that reference to "protecting competition, not competitors" that had EU Commissioner for Competition Neelie Kroes broiling mad this morning. Bloomberg news quotes Commissioner Kroes as telling reporters in Brussels, "I think it's totally unacceptable that a representative of the US administration criticizes an independent court of law outside its jurisdiction. It's absolutely not done. The European Commission doesn't pass judgment on rulings by US courts, and we expect the same degree of respect from US authorities for rulings by EU courts."
From there, Kroes indicated the gloves are officially off, as Bloomberg News cites her as having openly invited US companies seeking redress for the conduct of American competitors, to come on over to Europe where they will be more than happy to investigate their claims.
Thus far, Barnett's office has not issued a response.
In a press conference last Monday, Kroes noted that courts in both the US and Europe had confirmed Microsoft's conduct in certain markets to be anti-competitive. But immediately after referring to America, she added, "You may hear scare stories about the supposed negative consequences of this ruling for other companies and for innovation on the market. The Commission notes that the Court [of First Instance] itself has concluded that Microsoft failed to show that the decision would have a significant negative effect on its incentives to innovate. Let me be clear: There is one company that will have to change its illegal behavior as a result of this ruling: Microsoft. Other companies will benefit from increased opportunities to compete, to the greater good of consumers."
If companies remain confused as to whether the decision could impact them, Kroes added, "my door is always open."
During the formative years of the European Community, member states became familiar with the practice of plaintiffs shopping their cases from country to country, in search of the most amenable court to their pleas. Now, Commissioner Kroes appears to have hung the proverbial shingle outside her office door, for American and perhaps other countries' competitors in tough markets to come make their case. Why should American courts, the EC appears to be asking, hold a monopoly on US markets?
I agree with the EU. The U.S. really needs to let other countries run their own countries.
What in the world was that assistant attorney thinking for issueing a statement. It was a moronic and embarrassing idea.
What's next? The kibbler elve's telling France how to make champagne!
Score: 0
|EU is the reason the American dollar is falling .. they keep suing all of our companies!
Score: 0
|The reason the American Doller is falling is because the NEW PRESIDENT of the WORLD BANK is a GERMAN.......
Score: 0
|...Dependance on Alliances with foreign nations is what's killing us. I so wish that Thomas Jefferson could be alive today...still, we probably wouldn't listen to him because he is too "old fashioned" just like the Constitution is...
Just one quote: "Commerce with all nations, alliance with none, should be our motto."
More relavent quotes at http://etext.virginia.ed...quotations/jeff1400.htm, too many to bore readers with here. Why doesn't anyone care what the Father of the Constitution says anymore? Agree with him or disagree, but WE AREN'T EVEN CONSIDERING HIS OWN ADVICE. We truley are far from the nation we once were...
Score: 0
|I hope it keeps falling. Then we will get some of our manufacturing jobs back from Asia.
Score: 0
|You know what I said was pure satire... and besides wouldn't the fall of the US dollar lead to more outsourcing ... regardless .. it really doesn't matter how cheap they make the US dollar because we still lead the world in technological innovations and natural resources.
Score: 0
|"may have the unfortunate consequence of harming consumers by chilling innovation"
Innovators like Novell who created the workgroup server market, Real who innovated streaming media, and Netscape who innovated the browser market?
No, that can't be, those markets were all crushed by Monopoly abuse.
Score: 0
|"The Commission notes that the Court [of First Instance] itself has concluded that Microsoft failed to show that the decision would have a significant negative effect on its incentives to innovate."
Significant impact on Microsoft? Perhaps not as much. Significant impact on other companies with a dominant position in the market? Absolutely.
The message is clear--if you are too productive, don't ever include features along with your new products...otherwise, you'll be anti-competitive.
Seriously though, dkratter is dead on. Neelie Kroes was a big VVD (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VVD) member, so it should come as no surprise that she is partial to the U.S's form of free enterprise. The EU has purposely been setup in such a way that it isn't openly socialistic, but rather conforms the pre-existing systems to a more and more socialistic form of rule. Those who are "elected" to be leaders for the EU all have roots in such forms of government.
At this point, it amazes me how much America ignores the fact that the very thing we fought so hard to prevent in the 1970s is already controlling nearly all of Europe and we aren't even seeing it. That and, unfortunately, we are refusing to see it. By acknowledging it is there, we admit that the 'containment' of Communism never really took place, and those who sacrificed their lives during the cold war were just delaying the inevitable.
I'm sure I just made quite a few people "broiling mad" at me with these statements, but hey--would you rather me pretend the EU was something in which it is not? How long will Europe ignore the danger that's all around them? Their true colors will be revealed in the not-so-distant future, but unfortunately, it will be too late at that point.
Score: 0
|"Significant impact on other companies with a dominant position in the market? Absolutely."
Eh, I'm not so sure. Most other entities world wide don't seem impacted at all. Look at IBMs recent announcements concerning Office as just one example of many.
Score: 0
|dead on!
Score: 0
|Yeah, lets just adopt American policies for anything.
I'm sure there would be no problem there.
The US should hate every country, heck invade, that is slightly different, just to make sure ...
Europe is to the left of America, sure, so what? Socialist? I guess everything different from America falls under a label so you can invade it - communist, terrorist, socialist ... we can just give them a label and our dumb population will buy it, or atleast the ones whose vote actually matters ;)
I don't care much for the EU but every time I hear some ignorant American scared that Europe might reject US policies and throw all your little killing camps (millitary bases) out of Europe, or we might actually stand up to your congloms, or might choose to not invade a bunch of pointless countries, my Europsupport goes up ...
Europa retains the right to rule itself, its democracy ... but come on, invade us, bring us freedom and democracy, we won't fight back ;)
Score: 0
|What a telling response. Tell me--who are you listening to that tells you these lies about Americans, Denny? Blogs? Newscasts? Friends?
I'm sure you've had conversations with quite a few 'wacko' Americans no doubt, but you know very little about us as a whole, which is very apparent from your comments.
Score: 0
|It's that reference to "protecting competition, not competitors" that had EU Commissioner for Competition Neelie Kroes broiling mad this morning.
Of course that reference has her "broiling mad" -- it is entirely correct and makes the CFI look utterly foolish (big surprise there). The goal of these proceedings is supposed to be about allowing competition to happen on its own, and not about forcing a company to curtail its business practices just because it happens to have a dominant market share.
It was very telling last week when they said that they're looking to ensure that Microsoft's market share is significantly lower than 95%. It shouldn't matter what Microsoft's market share is, only that Microsoft doesn't willingly interfere with the natural progress of other companies trying to take some of that market share for themselves.
Score: 0
|If she was angered it was from the lack of decorum and the inappropriateness of a US Government lawyer publishing a personal opinion about a court outside of US jurisdiction. It was shameful and unseemly.
The phrase "protecting competition, not competitors" is just another bit of semantic nonsense. If you follow Microsoft's legal problems you've seen that dance before.
Score: 0
|Yes of course, because we (the USA) should not as individuals (regardless of where we work) have opinions on anything that the EU might do or say.
What a bunch of hog wash- the EU spends days upon days bad mouthing the US - a little constructive criticism would do them good.
His comments where even critical - they explained how the system works in the US.
Score: 0
|There are times when you should keep your opinions to yourself. Not here on Beta News of course. But if you don't like your mother-in-laws cooking, and you have any class at all, you don't complain.
Score: 0
|As an INDIVIDUAL yes, however this person represented the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. That said, it's not our place to comment on these matters.
Score: 0
|There are times when you should keep your opinions to yourself. Not here on Beta News of course. But if you don't like your mother-in-laws cooking, and you have any class at all, you don't complain.
I do agree that it really wasn't Thomas Barnett's place to make the complaint that he did publicly. I don't disagree with what he said, and I'd applaud him, but unfortunately, everybody has to follow the rules and "common courtesies", even when the other side breaks them.
Score: 0
|While I am not much of a Microsoft proponent, I do think in this case that the EU CFI went too far in its decision. Forcing any software company to divulge its source code robs it of the benefits of its own intellectual property. If a company can be forced to lose revenue to recoup its development costs, what motivation would it have to develop new technologies?
I wonder what the impact would be if Microsoft just pulled out of the EU market rather than share it server source code?
Score: 0
|They were not told that they needed to divulge all of it's source code. You are either perpetrating lies, or you are grossly uninformed. Pick any one.
"Microsoft Goes Beyond EU Decision by Offering Windows Source Code Announcement underscores Microsoft’s commitment to resolve compliance issues by giving licensees access to its source code."
"The company is making this voluntary move in order to address categorically all of the issues raised by the Commission’s December 22, 2005 Statement of Objections."
"With today’s announcement, Microsoft is going far beyond the European Commission’s March 2004 decision and its legal obligations to provide companies with the technical specifications of its proprietary communications protocols."
- Microsoft, http://www.microsoft.com...1-25EUSourceCodePR.mspx
The EU never demanded it, Microsoft OFFERED it.
Get your facts strait.
Thanks.
Score: 0
|Also, AFAIK, it's not the "entire" windows source code, but only code relating to interoperability of the networking components.
...and for a license fee (originally).
Unless I am thinking of something else entirely, I didn't actually read the article this time. :p
Score: 0
|No source code at all, not one line. Just network protocols.
Score: 0
|network protocol specifications to be concise.
Score: 0
|precisely.
Score: 0
|Microsoft has a great influence in US, it may buy senators and important persons in order to achieve its goals. In Europe, it has to struggle for the market with the competitors. No wonder why in Europe almost everybody uses Firefox as the default browser instead of IE...
[off topic] In general, American laws s**k! Kids shot their classmates in schools, everybody is supposed to be able to speak freely, but when you try to, you get reduced to silence...
Score: 0
|Yes, MS is buying senators and important people, you might want to adjust your tin foil cap.
Personally, what does MS need to do in order to not be anti-trust, from what I can see is they demand the source code (correct me if I am wrong)Is it MS fault that Linux is for people who wish to spend time with their pc? Is it MS fault that Apple refuses to allow their software to run on a pc? What exactly does the EU want MS to do?
@ lucianct - Uh, Engrish?
[off topic] In general, American laws s**k! Kids shot their classmates in schools, everybody is supposed to be able to speak freely, but when you try to, you get reduced to silence...
/no, that's not a typo
Score: 0
|"what I can see is they demand the source code (correct me if I am wrong)"
See my post above for your correction.
Score: 0
|so you're saying that the reason i'm using IE right now is because senators are bought, and not because I tried IE, FF and decided I liked IE more?
and i'm pretty sure (without having to go dig up numbers), that not "ALMOST EVERYONE" like you said, uses FF as default and not IE
Score: 0
|Don't be dishonest while trying to make a point. Only one European country has Firefox usage above 50 percent, and that is Slovenia.
And lets not forget what gets Microsoft their money in Europe. It's Windows and Office, not their free web browser, which competes with another free browser. In addition, the use of Windows in the US is actually lower than in Europe. Apple still has a strong and rapidly growing following here, and some of our large computer companies like Dell have started to offer Linux preinstalled in place of Windows.
Score: 0
|I'm also pretty sure kids aren't shooting up schools because of free speech...just a guess.
Score: 0
|"Is it MS fault that Linux is for people who wish to spend time with their pc?"
Yes, that is precisely why i use Linux...i "...wish to spend time with my pc", rather than deal with all the problems of M$ Windows. my Ubuntu machine just works. No viruses. No silent patches. No constant crashes. No forced upgrades, etc....
When i just want things to work, i run Linux. If i want to have to fart around with all sorts of crap, i boot into Windows.
Score: 0
|thank you
Score: 0
|