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Microsoft Anti-Trust Trial

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The Microsoft trial has been one of the biggest investigations of antitrust behavior since the turn of the century. Supporting the governments side research and present a cohesive argument to the other (microsoft supporters ) side.

You can choose to go on microsofts side if that can work for you.

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Solution Summary

The solution discusses the Microsoft trial. It discusses the following issues
1)There is no such thing as a private monopoly. There is dominance. One should not confuse one with the other.
2) Do the consumers have the right to buy Microsoft Windows without Internet Explorer?
3) Is it "unfair" for Microsoft to "leverage" its success (dominance) of Windows to help it succeed in other areas like sell more copies of applications such as web browsers?
4) Role of capital markets
5) Did Microsoft harm consumers ?
6) Is Microsoft is a threat to consumers because it "could" raise its prices.

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Source:
The discussion relies heavily on the material at the following web sites:
http://www.moraldefense.com/Campaigns/Microsoft/Antitrust_FAQ/default.htm
https://www.moraldefense.com/Campaigns/Microsoft/Essays/Judge_Jackson's_Findings_of_Fiction.htm

In defense of Microsoft:

In the antitrust case the Department of Justice, the U.S. antitrust enforcement agency charged Microsoft with "engaging in anticompetitive and exclusionary practices designed to maintain its monopoly in personal computer operating systems (OS) and to extend that monopoly to Internet browsing software."

For the case against Microsoft to have any validity two things needed to be established:
(1) that Microsoft has monopoly power in the OS market and
(2) that Microsoft obtained or perpetuated that monopoly power by anticompetitive means.

The case against Microsoft does not have any basis as the following points demonstrate:

1) There is no such thing as a private monopoly. There is dominance. One should not confuse one with the other.

Economic power is not the same as political power. As a private corporation (having economic power), Microsoft cannot force anyone to buy its products. Only the government wielding political power can forcibly prevent competitors from entering a market. The entire case for antitrust laws is based on the erroneous equation of political power with economic power.
Political power is the power of the government. The special nature of that power is its monopoly on the use of physical force. Only a government can make laws?i.e., rules backed up by physical force. Economic power is the ability to produce material values and offer them for sale.
Microsoft dominates the software industry, but dominance is not monopoly. Market dominance has been earned by providing better products and better prices than anyone else. There have been dominant companies (like Xerox, IBM, General Motors and Kodak) who have bitten the dust when their market share eroded, sometimes very quickly.
There is no threat from dominant players in the market as long as their competitors are legally ...

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