Time to Pay the Piper

[Attila T. Hun]

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>From: Bill Stewart <bill.stewart at pobox.com>
>To: "Attila T. Hun" <attila at hun.org>, 
>    cypherpunks <cypherpunks at cyberpass.net>
>Subject: Re: Making them eat their words... (while they watch!)
>Date: Sun, 21 Dec 1997 11:56:54 -0800
>
> At 05:15 PM 12/21/1997 +0000, Attila T. Hun wrote:
>>    there is only one solution to organizations like M$ 
>>    which are operated without ethics: treat them to the
>>    pleasures of not only the antitrust laws but the 
>>    exquisite delights of RICO.

> Nonsense, and I'm surprised to hear this from you.

    No, Bill. it's not nonsense... 

    1)  when a true market monopoly exists, society _is_
        entitled to intervene. I wrote my Harvard thesis on
        antitrust and the effect on society of a monopoly,
        regulated in the public interest as in AT&T v. the
        industrial monopolies. this may have been 35 years
        ago, but the principles are even more imperative
        now with the increasing concentration of real wealth
        both individually and corporately in the hands of a 
        few.
    
    2)  why should you be surprised to hear this from me? 
        sure, I would prefer anarchy per se, but have
        absolutely no faith that the vast majority would do
        anything except rape, pillage, and plunder. and, I
        think I have made my beliefs more than plain over 
        the history trail of cypherpunks.
   
    anarchy is nothing more than an isolationist theory; as 
    a political system it does not work --never has, never 
    will. ergo, there is a need for some government in the
    interest of the people (sheeple, if you prefer).  man 
    has not proved his worth on this planet, and whether or
    not you believe in God is irrelevant.  the last several
    generations have bequeathed a wilting, dying polluted
    earth to their children and grandchildren.

    therefore, I am neither your revolutionary anarchist
    nor your "lost in the clouds" libertarian idealist; I am
    just a pragmatist who wishes we could govern with an
    enlightened electorate in the manner of a New Hampshire 
    town meeting; a pragmatist that I believe limited
    regulation is essential, but a foolish dreamer to hope
    for an enlightened electorate.

> Treat them to the pleasures of the free market -
> if you don't like them, start a Boycott M$ campaign,
> and see if people stop buying their lousy software.

    no, Bill, there is no alternative in the mass market. A
    perfect example is Gate$ buying _both_ WebTV and their
    competitor to make sure he has _all_ the action.

    another is EnCarta. Gate$ gave it away until the other
    vendors dropped out of the market; now M$ charges for
    the encyclopedia.

    Gate$ is the perfect example of not only a pure monopoly
    with 90% of the OS market, but also a constructive
    monopoly who has leveraged the first position to force
    monopolies in other areas: 95% of word processing, 95%
    of spreadsheets, and approaching the total domination of
    the browser market.

    Secondly, Gate$ is spreading into the control of the
    means of distribution in cable, networks, etc. and
    likewise into media content. Gate$ current actions are
    those of a spoiled four year old child who sees nothing
    wrong with demanding it all.

> The direct democracy of the free market is far more 
> appropriate than government here - it's $1/vote, 
> and if enough people vote against M$ they'll get the hint, 
> and it enough people vote _for_ M$, it's none of your 
> business.

    WRONG! when 90% of the voters are dependent on M$, M$ has
    bought the vote. to the average user, to vote against M$ is
    to vote against a free v. a not-free browser, etc.

    WRONG AGAIN: the OEM computer group has no choice either;
    software is available from virtually every software house
    for M$ --and only M$.  therefore the OEM has no choice of
    operating system. without the software, any competing OS
    is useless. M$ has also intimidated and constrained the 
    software houses. Corel is a good case in point with M$
    threatening to withhold critical information on Windows 
    95 if Corel delivered their 32 bit product to OS/2 
    first.

    WRONG AGAIN: M$ has required OEMs to load Explorer as part
    of the "privilege" to be able to load the OS. That is
    restraint of trade. when they try to exercise total
    market control through their customers with their own
    marketing policies.

    WRONG AGAIN: M$ is forcing Explorer on totally 
    non-related software vendors. Why should the 
    accounting software vendor in MN be required to load
    Explorer to be able to distribute the OS --and, most
    additional M$ packages in networking, etc required
    Explorer for essential DLLs.  this is "binding" in
    FTC unfair practices regulations.

> It _is_ funny to see the Feds hiring a big corporate lawyer
> to run their case; I guess they don't think Federal Prosecutors
> are good enough.  Surely if a low-level prosecutor can't hack it,
> they should use their boss, and on up the hierarchical chain.
> If Janet Reno can't do it either, they should replace her with
> someone who can :-) 

    GRIN?  Bill, I'm surprised you would say this.  Reno is
    not an anti-trust specialist.  just how many of them are
    there in the country as a whole?  not many?  why?  --not
    much anti-trust action; usually the FTC has been able to
    block mergers, etc.  before they become a menace to
    society such as M$ has become.

    this is where the failure of the free market comes in:
    few companies manage to attain the total monopoly
    position; _none_ to date have done so with clean hands. 

    frankly, Gate$' hands are dirtier than Cornelius
    Vanderbilt's hands were in his heyday; and Cornelius
    Vanderbilt made John D. Rockefeller and J.P. Morgan look
    like angels.

    Gate$' literally has not only violated the anti-trust
    laws and the FTC rules on fair competition, but he has
    done so deliberately in what can easily be defined as a
    conspiracy to limit or prevent access to the market
    --and that can be construed as a RICO offense --and
    should be. Neither Gate$ nor Ballmer show the slightest
    interest in backing off what they consider their God
    given rights in a free market to rape, pillage, and
    burn; they feel that M$ is entitled to tell the American
    (or world) buyer what he wants to buy. monopoly 
    eliminates freedom of choice.

    I do not usually have much use for Jesse Berst, whom I 
    generally consider a senseless and shameless M$ schill,
    like the rest of Ziff-Davis; however, this is what Jesse
    had to say Monday:

        Jesse Berst, 22 Dec.

        "I'm a fan of its [Microsoft's] accomplishments 
        and its great products.  More than that, I'm
        a fan of personal computing.  That's why I can say 
        that it's better for us -- and better for Microsoft
        -- if the DOJ forces the company to play fair.  Only
        intense competition can keep a company from the
        hardening of the attitudes that eventually damaged
        companies such as IBM, Digital, Wang and Data
        General."

    to engender that competition, M$ needs to be forced to
    divest either operating systems or products.  despite 
    any imagined gains of their increasing integration, the
    market can not fall to a monolithic line and then expect
    further advances with no-one nipping at M$' heels

    unfortunately, M$ idea of competition has not been to be
    just the market leader --it has fostered an attitude 
    that it can be the only player.

    and like all monopolies, M$ has fallen into the Al
    Sloan mode ("What's good for General Motors is good for 
    the country").

        more Jesse Berst, 22 Dec.

        "That's why I can say with all sincerity, the more 
        you like Microsoft, the more you admire its
        accomplishments, the more you appreciate its
        products, the more you should root for the DOJ to
        win its latest case.  Anybody who thinks otherwise
        should be forced to attend every single match of
        the World Wide Wrestling Federation next year.  That 
        will give them an up-close-and-painful taste of what
        happens when you do away with competition.

    Jesse, the Microsoft schill, is now at least as strident
    as I have been since the late 80s when the uncontrolled
    direction of Gate$' marketing and operating system
    leverage over office products became more than evident.
    the DOJ should have broken M$ into separate companies in
    1994.

    instead, the DOJ made a deal with a "Joe Stalin", who,
    true to Lenin's manifestos, would sign any treaty which
    bought him time to develop the prohibited weapons --then
    he broke it. M$ violated the consent decree before it
    was certified in court and.  in reality, applied even
    more onerous terms to the hardware OEM vendors; we are
    reaping the results of Gate$ incredible arrogance today.

    Gate$ also broke the public trust by arrogantly usurping
    by whatever means more of the market --his actions 
    today are untenable in a civilized market. any 
    suggestions that if you do not like M$, you should not
    buy M$ products are hollow inanities --to the public, 
    there is no alternative --economies of scale and market
    dominance have wiped out all but a few niche market 
    vendors. 

    the sheeple never revolt; they just follow the Judas
    goat to the abattoir happily enjoying the free software
    while Gate$ builds his tollGate$ (nice pun --guess I 
    will add that to my lexicon). the sheeple will not be
    happy when they find themselves being nicked for every
    transaction, on or off Gate$' networks.

    --and if Gate$ actions over the past 3 years were not
    enough, his ridiculous, affrontive, and offensive
    response to the Judge's order is prima facie evidence of
    not only a monopoly, not only a constructive monopoly,
    but a tyrannical, maniacal monster who is still a
    spoiled four year old brat with absolutely no conscience
    or sense of social responsibility.

    the fact Steve Ballmer, et al, echo this dictatorial 
    policy in violation of US law is prima facia evidence of 
    an ongoing criminal enterprise which employs extortion
    --yes, literally extortion-- in the furtherance of its
    business plan --and this is a RICO offense for which
    Gate$ and his henchman certainly appear to have
    deservedly earned the right to 3 hots and a cot for the
    20 years minimum on the lesser RICO charge, or mandatory
    life imprisonment on a conspiracy of greater than 6.  

    Secondly, none of Gate$ lieutenants and captains can
    claim they acted under orders; it wont fly any more than
    it flew at Nuremberg.

    Esther Dyson (with Margie Wylie of CNET)

        But it is big government that's watching them, not
        ...

        Yes--and that's why we need to keep...I mean, God
        bless the Justice Department for fighting Microsoft;
        God bless Microsoft for creating good products, and
        the customers for keeping everybody in line.  This
        is what I want:  I don't want anybody to win.  I
        want the game to keep going.  I want little guys to
        keep on coming up and tweaking the noses of the big
        guys.

        I've always been a believer in antitrust.  It's the
        concentration of power that bothers me, not whether
        it's "for profit" or "for government."  And I've
        never claimed to be or not to be a Libertarian.
        People put labels on things and stop thinking.

    a good clear statement from Dyson on the public 
    interest.

    do you think M$ should be permitted to behave in
    their autocratic and callous manner towards software
    developers who have no need for Explorer?

        Brian Glaeske, a programmer/analyst with Fargo,
        North Dakota-based Great Plains Software, complained
        to the US Justice Department last month that
        Microsoft effectively requires him and others to
        provide its browser in his accounting software,
        which has nothing to do with the World Wide Web or
        the Internet.

        "Microsoft should not be permitted to force
        third-party developers to redistribute Microsoft
        Internet Explorer in order to use [new] features,"
        Glaeske wrote to Joel Klein, the Justice
        Department's top pursuer of antitrust allegations.

    is not Glaeske's position reasonable? the real point
    however, does not relate to the browser; the bottom line
    is that Glaeske, and most of the software developers, do
    not have an alternative to Microsoft as an operating 
    system.  

    Oh, sure, some clients will run Unix flavours and there
    are vendors for most high profile applications on unix
    and OS/2, but the vast majority (90%) of the clients
    take the easy way out and go Microsoft --M$ is what the
    employees have at home; M$ is what the "trained"
    employees have used before.... there are millions of
    arguments, after WinTel being cheaper, why they should
    not change --starting with "why should we be different?"

    a pure free market is anarchy; anarchy may be a 
    wonderful idea for utopian people; the human race is far
    from being anything except a selfish, greedy collection
    of individuals who are constrained either by the threats
    of fire and brimstone from the church, or the laws of 
    the land which punish transgressions of socially 
    acceptable behaviour --fair or not.

    even Teddy Roosevelt wrote that anarchists should be 
    hunted down and exterminated like vermin.

    William H. Gates III is just another robber baron who 
    really believes the statement: "What's good for 
    Microsoft is good for the country."  Al Sloan never 
    realized his monopoly with General Motors, although 
    there have been periods where GM was over 50% of the 
    market (when Chrysler was close to failing). 

    Bill Gates has created an effective monopoly _world_
    _wide_ which far surpasses any monopoly ever created
    by one individual or company; even John D. Rockefeller 
    did not come close to Gate$' power.  John D. was also
    rather benevolent.  IBM never approached Gate$' level
    of monopoly.

    Gate$ has proven, and is proving while the very 
    litigation is going on, that he is not a benevolent 
    monopolist; there is only one way: Bill's way, and
    everyone will think like Bill, or they will be the
    vermin to be exterminated.

    and, that, my friends, is why there is such a thing
    as the public interest; and it should have been 
    exercised on BadBillyG in 1994.

    my vote goes to prosecute Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer,
    at the very least, for violations of the Sherman Act,
    the Clayton Antitrust Act, and the Robinson-Patman 
    amendments (FTC, etc.) to the full extent of the law,
    including criminal violations as warranted under those
    titles; and prosecute under the RICO statutes for an
    ongoing racketeering (extortion is racketeering) and
    criminal enterprise.

    frankly, I am disappointed that it has come to this, but
    Gate$ greed and lust for power has not only exceeded 
    his common sense, it has transgressed the boundary of
    baseline social responsibility.

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