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LYNX-DEV of interest


From: Laura Eaves
Subject: LYNX-DEV of interest
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 1997 10:00:20 -0500 (EST)

I got the following on another mailing list.
Thought you might find it interesting.

> From address@hidden Sun Dec 14 01:07:43 1997
> Date: Sun, 14 Dec 1997 00:02:20 -0600
> Sender: address@hidden
> From: address@hidden
> To: Multiple recipients of list <address@hidden>
> Subject: Federal judge restrains packaging of IE with Windows
>
> Thought this may be of interest,
> Jamal
>
> ----------
> 12/12/97 -- Copyright (C) 1997 The Washington Post [Article 300584, 95 lines]
>
>                      Microsoft Told to Sever Software Link
>         Judge Issues Temporary Ruling, Names `Special Master' to Probe
>                        Distribution of Internet Browser
>                             By Rajiv Chandrasekaran
>                          Washington Post Staff Writer
>  
>      A federal judge ordered Microsoft Corp. yesterday to stop requiring
> personal computer makers to distribute its Internet-browsing software until a
> court-appointed official fully examines the company's business practices.
>      The decision is at least a temporary victory for the Justice Department,
> which has long sought to mute Microsoft's power in the technology industry,
> and for many of the software giant's competitors. The ruling also could hinder
> Microsoft's ability to create new versions of its popular Windows computer
> operating system, legal specialists said.
>      The Justice Department had wanted Microsoft to be held in contempt of
> court for making PC manufacturers install its Internet Explorer software as a
> condition of buying Windows 95. The department argued that Windows and
> Internet Explorer are two separate products and that Microsoft shouldn't be
> allowed to require that they be distributed together.
>      By tying them together, the government contends, Microsoft is trying to
> corner the market for browsers, effectively allowing it to dominate commerce
> and content on the Internet.
>      Though declining Justice's request to hold Microsoft in contempt, U.S.
> District Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson issued a preliminary injunction
> preventing Microsoft, starting today, from forcing the Internet Explorer on PC
> makers.
>      The Justice Department argued that a preliminary injunction was needed to
> halt Microsoft's practices before the company gained dominance of the browser
> market.
>      "The probability that Microsoft will not only continue to reinforce its
> operating system monopoly by its licensing practices, but might also acquire
> yet another monopoly in the Internet browser market, is simply too great to
> tolerate indefinitely until the issue is finally resolved," Jackson wrote.
> "Those practices should be abated until it is conclusively established that
> they are benign."
>      Jackson did appoint a special master, lawyer Lawrence Lessig, who is to
> report back to the judge in May on the legal and factual issues raised in the
> case. "Disputed issues of technological fact, as well as contract
> interpretation, abound as the record presently stands," Jackson wrote.
>      Officials at the Justice Department, which has pursued Microsoft since
> 1990, were elated by the decision.
>      "I am absolutely delighted," said Joel Klein, the department's antitrust
> chief. "No consumer should be denied the browser of their choice because
> Microsoft made their computer vendor an offer they couldn't refuse."
>      Microsoft officials had no immediate comment last night. A company
> spokesman, Mark Murray, said Microsoft lawyers were still reviewing the 
> ruling.
>      The company can choose to appeal Jackson's decision.
>      Several analysts said the ruling is likely to have little effect on what
> software consumers find already installed on the personal computers they buy.
> Internet Explorer, for now, is a free product -- a common tactic for software
> companies trying to win acceptance of a new product -- and as a result PC
> makers will continue to install it on their machines, the analysts predicted.
>      "It doesn't cost them anything, so most of them are going to continue
> doing what they've been doing," said Rick Shurland, an analyst with investment
> bank Goldman, Sachs & Co. in New York.
>      But Shurland said the decision could have other drawbacks for Microsoft.
> PC makers could gain new leverage in negotiating contracts with Microsoft,
> potentially forcing the software company to pay manufacturers to install its
> browser. Microsoft also could be dragged into a bidding war with its chief
> browser rival, Netscape Communications Corp., over exclusive installation
> deals, analysts said.
>      Nevertheless, legal specialists and industry observers said the decision
> could have a host of broader ramifications for competitors and Microsoft's
> future products.
>   Microsoft is planning to release next year a new version of Windows that
> will more closely integrate Internet browsing into the operating system. In
> his decision, however, Jackson said Microsoft would be prevented from
> requiring browsing software to be distributed with "any successor version" of
> Windows 95.
>      Klein, whose lawyers continue to investigate other Microsoft business
> practices, called the judge's language "very significant for the future."
>      Microsoft is expected to argue that its new product, to be called Windows
> 98, will so closely integrate browsing that the browser and operating system
> will not be two separate products.
>      Microsoft, in court papers, has maintained that Windows 95 would be
> unable to perform some crucial tasks unless Internet Explorer is installed
> with it. Klein said yesterday that removing browsing functions from the
> operating system would be "very easy." He said he planned to meet with
> Microsoft within a week to discuss ways to "uninstall" Internet Explorer.
>      In a related issue, the judge refused to order Microsoft to remove
> "non-disclosure" provisions of contracts it has with other companies that
> require them to notify Microsoft when disclosing information to the
> government. Although Microsoft has maintained that those agreements do not
> prevent the companies from talking to federal regulators, Justice argued that
> the wording might have had a chilling effect on people wishing to complain
> about the software giant.
>      Jackson said there was no evidence that the company used the
> nondisclosure provision to prevent its business partners from speaking with
> government investigators.
>      Lessig, the special master whom Jackson appointed, is a professor at the
> University of Chicago Law School. He is to deliver a report to Jackson on the
> legal and technological issues by May 31.
>      Lessig teaches a course in Internet law at the university. A 1989
> graduate of Yale Law School, Lessig clerked for for Supreme Court Justice
> Antonin Scalia.
>
>

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