Microsoft Settles with State of Arkansas

By Ed Oswald | Published October 23, 2006, 5:58 PM

Following similar settlements in California and Wisconsin, an Arkansas court said Monday it had begun to issue notices regarding a proposed settlement against Microsoft. If approved, it would mean nearly $37.8 million in payments to businesses and consumers.

Microsoft has been accused of breaking state laws regarding antitrust, consumer protection, and competition through the overcharging for its Windows operating system, word processing and spreadsheet software. The court has not ruled on the merits of the suit, and Microsoft denies that it did anything wrong, despite agreeing to settle.

Current and former Arkansans who either directly or indirectly purchased Microsoft software between January 1, 1998 and December 31, 2004 would be eligible. Payment would come in the form of vouchers to be used as payment for computer equipment and software, regardless of manufacturer.

One-half of the unredeemed vouchers would go to schools in low-income areas, while the other half would be distributed to the Arkansas Department of Education, the court said in a statement.

A hearing has been scheduled for March 6, 2007 to approve the settlement. Class action members will have until February 15 to object and February 20 to be excluded from the settlement. Final deadline for the claims would be April 23, 2007 or 30 days after the settlement receives final approval

Those wishing to learn more about the suit or request claim forms can either call a toll free number, 1-800-572-0455, or vist microsoftarsuit.com to get more information.

Comments

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article makes sense as any article could...

case doesn't make sense. "You're guilty of charging what you want for your products" This isn't American evidently, seems like former Red Russia and/or current N Korea and communist china.

"You charge too much for these here'n hillbillies to buy!" (in case anyone doesn't realize, I'm being sarcastic and I am for MS).

-"One-half of the unredeemed vouchers would go to schools in low-income areas..."-

"Hey paw, dey dun got Microsoft ta give us some vouchays to go get us some cipherin tools". Yeehaw...get up offa yo sistah and lets git us some com-pu-ters! We bought us some microscopic software? Yeah, we somehow bought somefin' we ain't even know we bought.."

-"Current and former Arkansans who either directly or indirectly purchased Microsoft software"-

Next stop...expensive X (insert your choice of clothing, cars, shoes, etc etc)

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Do we get to follow this state by state?

2 down...

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"Microsoft denies that it did anything wrong"

lmao, that's funny

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One-half of the unredeemed vouchers would go to schools in low-income areas, while the other half would be distributed to the Arkansas Department of Education, the court said in a statement.
Sounds like they found a new source of school funding to me. Apparently, they'll use the money to teach children how two halves going to education leaves nothing for the individuals who purchased Microsoft software.

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Read the article! One half of the unredeemed vouchers would go to low income schools the other half to the state DOE. Your comment seems pretty ironic considering it appears that you didn't really read the article properly.

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That's why the schools need the money!

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yeah, apparently my brain skipped over the unredeemed part. Unfortunately, I am only human.

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