World War 3.0: Microsoft And Its Enemies 92
| World War 3.0 Microsoft And Its Enemies | |
| author | Ken Auletta |
| pages | 397 |
| publisher | Random House Publishing |
| rating | 4/10 |
| reviewer | jeffy124 |
| ISBN | 0-375-50366-8 |
| summary | A look at the antitrust case United States vs. Microsoft, it's history and the people and corporations involved. |
Just in time for a possible settlement in the famous case, this book by Ken Auletta, writer for The New Yorker, takes a look at the case from before it's beginning to almost the end. Written in terms suitable for both the non-techhie and non-lawyer, he doesn't do a good job of maintaining reader interest. Chock full of details that deviate and distract from the main theme of book, it was enough such that this reader hasn't touched the book since school started back in mid-August. (The pending settlement gave me the motivation to do this review)
The book details each person involved in the case, everyone from Justice Dept Prosecutor David Boise to Judge Jackson to good 'ol Billy Gates. Every time a new individual is introduced in the story, the book goes off and tells that person's life story, causing some loss of interest and me asking "Get to the point already!"
However, this biographying of each person does have it's plusses. We see a side of Bill Gates the public is not used to seeing. Auletta describes him as a kid who must have everything go his way or else, and how that attitude worked against him in the infamous videotape. We see the pure intellect of Boise in how he had to be kicked out of Boston College's Law School because he was too smart, and how his performance in the 1970s IBM anti-trust suit applies to his superior execution of the MS case.
The book tells how Microsoft handled the initial problem of Netscape, how Gates orchestrated his company into their predicament of investigation by the Justice Dept. Auletta tells why Netscape Navigator was a "middleware" threat to the Windows platform and why Gates and Microsoft acted the way they did in order to keep Windows as a key piece of the Internet. Key point made was that publicly, Gates appeared to have no interest in the threat Netscape was having against his company while internal memos at the same were telling how MS was going to maintain control.
The case itself is fairly well told. Auletta does a decent job of explaining the Sherman Act and how previous anti-trust cases and decisions would weigh in on this case. Key points for the Justice Dept were the famous videotape of Gates repeatedly denying or not knowing knowledge of something being immediately followed by Boise showing an email sent by Gates; the program by Dr. Ed Felton of Princeton that was able to remove IE from Windows without performance loss vs. the poorly performing Windows presented by MS's developers; the infamous line by an MS Exec to a Netscape Exec "we will cut off your air supply;" and the MS Marketing Exec testimony on how MS restricted partners (like AOL) from advertising Netscape on the same webpage as IE.
Auletta does go off at some point telling about the history of anti-trust cases and how many monopoly cases have not lasted much longer than 13-15 years. He tells that by the end of IBM's anti-trust case, IBM was no longer a monopoly, and other examples. Although I havent reached it yet, the last chapter of the book is titled "Microsoft Loses Even If It Wins."
The chapter that really made me lose interest was the one entitled "Nerds In the Bunker." I was expecting a short tale of how geeks (like us slashdotters) were taking on MS with Linux and other open source and free (as in beer) software. Instead, I got a tale of the "nerds" of the press. A chapter on how the press was factoring into the case. MS was distracting themselves by trying to maintain a good public image while at the same time damaging evidence was repeatedly being presented to Judge Jackson, and the few members of the press lucky enough to get passes for that day.
Overall, if you time available to you and have an interest in this story, it may be worth your time to read the book. Sooner or later I know I'll finish it - Thanksgiving and Christmas breaks are comming :)
Final Note: The book covers the story up to last January, yet mentions the February Court of Appeals hearings that were scheduled at time of publication.
You can purchase World 3.0 at fatbrain. The TOC
Chronology
Prologue: Gilded Voctim
Ch 1: The Prosecutors
Ch 2: Hard Core
Ch 3: The First Pitch
Ch 4: Opening Salvos
Ch 5: The Government's Story
Ch 6: Microsoft's Hole Gets Deeper
Ch 7: Spin
Ch 8: The Real Bill Gates
Ch 9: Children At Play
Ch 10: Elephants and Mice
Ch 11: Micorosft's Witnesses Speak
Ch 12: Nerds In The Bunker
Ch 13: Spring Break
Ch 14: Exile
Ch 15: The Trial's Final Innings
Ch 16: The Trial Pauses, The Planet Doesn't
Ch 17: Judge Jackson's "Facts"
Ch 18: The Mediator
Ch 19: Disconnect: Washington, DC, vs. Redmond, Washington
Ch 20: Davos, Again
Ch 21: So Much Effort, So Little Result
Ch 22: Remedy, And Appeal
Ch 23: Microsoft Loses Even If It Wins
Glossary
Acknowledgements
Bibliography
Index
Microsoft is NOT the enemy (Score:4, Interesting)
Closed source is our enemy. Narrow-minded software is our enemy. Bad PR and buggy releases is our enemy. Unstable programs is our enemy. Limiting the decisions of users is our enemy. The practice of eliminating competition is our enemy.
Windows is not a BAD operating system, it's simply an inferior one put out by a company obsessed with the prospect of being the only operating system on the market. We don't need to fight Microsoft, we only need to fight that mentality.
My two cents.
-Evan.
Re:Microsoft is NOT the enemy (Score:5, Interesting)
I find this flawed logic. Sort of like:"We should only fight the mentality of violence, but allow those who profiteer of it to continue to do so"
While the minds of people are often changed one at a time, there is a justice action involved which involves getting the criminals off the street. The problem of course, is that there is the most commonly used tactic to change the mind of people is fear. touchy feely psychotherapy can take decades with mixed results, and chemicals ofter merely make people feel good without addressing ethical concerns, which are usually relative to a culture anyhow.
So while the sentiment is perhaps laudable, it is highly ineffective, and may in fact be dangerous because of this.
Re:Microsoft is NOT the enemy (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't agree with closed source being an enemy... After all, if you don't want everyone peeking in your code, it's your right.
Buggy software is usually damaging the people who wrote it.
What must be fought are the bad commercial practices that are aimed at denying other programs to be used (like Microsoft's monopolistic practices), that try to remove some of our rights (like the Region Coding of DVD and the CSS system that removes the right to program our own DVD player) or that try to deny small companies/individual the right to create program by over-patenting.
I do like opensource (and GPL) and contributed to several GPL programs (bugfixes or code contribution) but I want to have the right to do my own closed source program. There may be several legitimate reason behind closed source.
For example, generated code... Take the output of yacc+lex... No-one sane will try to reverse engineer it... If the source generator behaved in a more visual way than yacc/lex, it may be very unpractical to give the source code away.
Re:Microsoft is NOT the enemy (Score:1)
I disagree, at this point buggy software is damaging the entire computer industry.
People have come to expect and except buggy software.
10 years ago people would not have accepted your C64 to crash every other game. DOS didn't crash. Dos programs didn't crash.
Durning that era if a program was buggy or crashed it did not sell well.
Now Microsoft has convinced us that the computer needs to be rebooted daily and some programs will crash and people are expected to accept it. ASd worse yet most people do, those that dont move to Linux or Macs.
If the public would stop accepting buggy software and hold companies responcible for the software actually working then maybe windows and newer software would start working the way it should.
Ok, I will step off my soap box and relax.
Re:Microsoft is NOT the enemy (Score:3, Insightful)
Hackers reverse engineer executables for fun. And hackers are sane*.
* for arbitrarily broad [slashdot.org] values [slashdot.org] of sane [slashdot.org]
-
Re:Microsoft is NOT the enemy (Score:1, Insightful)
BTW: Half closed software with the tendancy to unfairly gain control is a bigger enemy than closed software from people who have to earn their living.
Re:Microsoft is NOT the enemy (Score:1, Interesting)
Because MS is successful & they are not.
Re:Microsoft is NOT the enemy (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:Microsoft is NOT the enemy (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Microsoft is NOT the enemy (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Microsoft is NOT the enemy (Score:2)
Grab.
Re:Microsoft is NOT the enemy (Score:1)
And exactly why is this "Overrated?"
Re:Microsoft is NOT the enemy (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Microsoft is NOT the enemy (Score:1)
Easily. Go into your local Best Buy. See any Linux and/or macs? Didn't think so. As a whole, you might have options, but in Best Buy, the only option is a Microsoft OS. No wonder there's a monopoly. Your average user isn't going to look around for options on the internet or elsewhere. They're going to walk in the store, look at what the store has, and walk out. And 100% of the time they walk out with a computer it's going to be a Microsoft OS because they don't sell anything else.
There's a whole lot of reasons Microsoft became a monopoly and how it's maintaining it. The retailers are just one of those reasons. I remember a few years ago when Best Buy offered an imac, but they only had one unit that users could play with, while they had 30 other Wintel computers laying around. That's shitty product representation, which is why Apple backed out of Best Buy. Circuit City suffers from the same problems too. They have three macs here, all lowend units, with about 25 or so computers running Windows XP. hmmm....I wonder which ones they're going to buy.
I find it sad that the whole reason Apple is opening their own retail stores is because they need to get the word out about Apple. People don't know about them or their products. When people can just not know about alternative operating systems and get along fine and dandy, you KNOW there's a monopoly in the midst.
Re:Microsoft is NOT the enemy (Score:1, Insightful)
If that doesn't qualify as "bad" to you, may I ask what DOES?
Re:Microsoft is NOT the enemy (Score:1)
Yes, Microsoft puts out insecure and sometimes extremely shoddy code. But the real problem isn't that it's closed, it that they're using their power and connections in the manufacturing market to force Windows 98/ME/XP/whatever on people and at the same time integrating every damn application they can into the OS.
It isn't the code - it's the people running the company and making decisions to do unethical, legally questionable acts that's the real issue.
-----
Microsoft IS one of the enemies (Score:3, Insightful)
As for closed source being the enemy, it sure ain't mine. If it weren't for closed source, I might have to do Real Work for a living. ;-) Also, I
wouldn't have Loki's enjoyable games. Nah, I don't have a problem with
closed source; I just, as a user and when all other things are
equal, consider closed source software to be worth less than Free Software. Think of it as a very big bullet point in a feature list.
Microsoft is an enemy, but not because their products suck and are are worth less than their competitor's products. They are the enemy because they break laws to avoid accountability in the marketplace for that suckiness and inferiority to their competitors. MSDOS/Windows per-processor licenses and prices that depends on whether or not a reseller sells competing products, are examples of this. Nobody acting in good faith would ever do those things. Doing such things also happens to be against the law too. And IMHO and most (but not all) peoples' opinions, laws to keep the market free, are justified and right. Microsoft deserves to be severely bitchslapped for these actions, in the amount of billions of dollars in fines (whatever their total gross sales since the late 1980s happens to work out to) and the individuals in power at Microsoft who were responsible for these crimes, should be charged. Anyway, that's what makes MS the enemy. May the criminals face judgement and appropriate sentences.
DoJ, by not enforcing these laws which most US citizens support, are shirking their responsibility to society while simultaneously keeping their power. That is a violation of the social contract, so DoJ are the enemy too. May the traitors' heads rest on pikes.
The only other "enemies" are Microsoft's users, since they give Microsoft their power, in spite of suffering for it. Generally, those entities are really only just their own enemies, not my enemies, since I don't have the right to tell others not to hurt themselves. The exception are companies that I own stock in (since I resent my money being wasted, my company's computers' security being compromised, etc) and the government itself (since I resent my taxes being wasted and my government's computers' security being compromised). Fuck the decision makers in those private institutions, and in the case of the government people, may the traitors' heads rest on pikes.
Re:Microsoft is NOT the enemy (Score:1)
Jon Katz, where are you? (Score:2)
Tell me about it. Of all the books Jon Katz should be writing, this is it - but he's absent on this subject. He seems to love the touchy-feely stuff, but steers far away from anything with dollar implications.
Re:Jon Katz, where are you? (Score:1)
That's what I don't get: commies would be all over this issue, right? Microsoft is clearly flying in the face of the red empire, flouting its capitalism, and yet Katz stands still on the sidelines.
Who will read that book ? (Score:3, Interesting)
The majority of the people don't mind about the trial, the MS background,... as long as they can have their little computer with Windows preinstalled, a quick recovery CD-Rom and their brand new game/MS Office working.
So it will end up in hands of people who already know a lot of what is told and don't have to be shown that Bill Gates is using bad practices.
Too bad... The audience who could have learned something from that book won't probably read it.
For a more concise version... (Score:2, Funny)
Special edition of the book for nerds (Score:1, Funny)
Last 8 months (Score:5, Funny)
The last 8 months can be summed up briefly in a dialog:
DOJ: Bad company!
MS: No we aren't.
DOJ: Yes you are.
MS: No we aren't.
Judge: Yes you are.
MS: Well, maybe, but not that bad.
Appeals Court: Actually, you were, but so was the Judge.
MS: Ah ha!! So the trail was unfair.
Appeals: Well, not quite. You're still bad.
DOJ: We can't tell who's bad anymore.
MS: Definitely not us.
DOJ: Hmm.. You're not? Ok, then. Maybe it's us that's bad?
State AG's: Excuse me?
MS: We will punish ourselves dearly, by selling coc^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hdonating software to the schools. By "donating" we understand something else than what those misleading dictionaries taught you...
Biased? (Score:2, Interesting)
I'm certainly not a MS worshiper, but I would think that a reasonable debate on the MS antitrust case would also include looking at what consistitues the OS, applications, interoperability, innovation, etc., all key terms and phases that have been critical during the trial. Again, while I would not doubt that these aren't covered in the book partially, the chapter titles would see to have very little looking at these aspects from the MS side of things.
The title of the book itself suggests that bias further. Despite all that they may have done to this point, Microsoft, while the biggest computer-related company out there, does not yet have control of the entire sandbox thanks to their faulty prediction of the impact of the internet; I'd argue that even with the latest XP and Office XP releases, the internet connectivity/interoperability is still an addition onto their system. As long as you follow standards (most of the time), the internet doesn't care what you run, and thus, Microsoft's powerplays on the OS and other fields are relatively meaningless. If there is a so called WW3, that will be when .NET and Passport are fully realized; they may cause a splintering of the internet where you have MS-blessed clients and services, and otherwise old-time clients and servers. And because that rubs against the entire concept of what the Internet means to most computer techs, that will cause an even bigger tussle than anything that MS could do on the OS side.
Of course, it could end up that .NET and Passport barely make a blip on the Internet radar at all, or actually play fair with the rest of the Internet community, and thus there will be no so-called WW3. And while it's faults during this latest anti-trust trial will have been made public and condemned by antitrust law, those are continually nullified by the openness of the Internet.
Re:Biased? (Score:2)
I did note the amount of MS bashing the book does, which probably contributed to why I got tired of reading after about 2/3 through. But the author did try to look unbiased, such as giving Gates's viewpoint on issues and such.
Oh, good... (Score:3, Insightful)
I didn't know this was a contest to see who could post the wildest speculation.
Actually Auletta started out from the viewpoint of a guy who was frankly awed by Gates' accomplishments but willing to consider the possibility the government might have a case. He listened to both sides and concluded that Microsoft arrogance did more to convince the judge than the Justice Department.
Such a viewpoint and methodology is recommended to those who complain about bias based on chapter titles.
Re:Biased? (Score:1)
After reading the book I felt that Auletta had a relatively neutral stance. At times it felt as though he was laying the entire blame on Microsoft and then later, he'd make it seem as though the Judge was fooled by Boise's charisma.
Maybe my memory is failing me (I read the book prior to summer) but I found the book to be very non-biased.
Review (Score:5, Insightful)
b) I believe reviewers should finish the book or not review it. If the book is so abominably bad that it just cannot be finished, that should get a 0 score.
c) It is Ken Auletta's style to include biography as the linchpin of his chapters. That doesn't mean you're wrong in not liking it. I would suggest that businesses always conflict. Technology happens. Only the people provide whatever uniqueness there is to human events.
d) Auletta has an interesting thesis, that if Microsoft had proudly admitted its philosophy and practices are all or nothing, and explained the basis in the context of their experience, it would not have angered the Judge (I simplify a bit). Whether one agrees with that or not -- its veracity as a business philosophy or its effectiveness as an alternative judicial strategy -- it was Auletta's reporting of the Judge's thinking during the trial that provided the basis for the Appeals Court to remove Judge Jackson. As a primary document in the narrative that extended past the book's publication, I would rate this book more highly.
Re:Review (Score:3, Interesting)
Given that, I did not find Auletta's biographical analysis of each person contributing much. A few were worth it, as the one about Gates was very revealing to how MS operates and acts as a corporation. But most were overdaunting in needless detail and were distracting from the main theme.
I still have not finished the book. But it doesnt take finishing to know that the book is of poor quality, IMO. If you watch a bad movie, does it take sitting through the entire two hours to realize that? And does it take that entire two hours to tell your friends "dont bother"
Re:Review (Score:1)
If it were me, I'd read the whole book before publishing a review. I think the readers deserve at least that amount of effort on my behalf. I also think that a complete reading for published review purposes is a courtesy to the author. Maybe we just disagree on these points, and that's okay, too.
Re:Review (it is about people) (Score:1)
fuzzy math hemos? (Score:2)
It's about eight months out of date now
From my review
The book covers the story up to last January
perhaps 11 months feels like 8 to Hemos
Re:fuzzy math hemos? (Score:1)
Re:fuzzy math hemos? (Score:2)
Yeah, this book stinks (Score:3, Informative)
I liked it... (Score:1)
I don't think that the material was "unrelated." I thought the author did a great job of showing how Microsoft's current situation was a direct consequence of the same sort of business practices that transformed them from a scrappy little company into a software giant to begin with. In order to demonstrate that thesis, a lot of this "unrelated stuff" was actually necessary. Some of it might not have been, but I enjoyed it nonetheless.
My favorite chapter covered the history between M$ and Novell (I spent a year going through a Novell CNE class, only to discover that there wasn't much demand for the certification. Me stupid.) I never really understood why Novell tanked before reading it. It covers the broken deals between the two companies, the war between IP and IPX, Novell's purchase of WordPerfect for way more than it was worth, and a litany of other mistakes that turned Novell from a powerhouse into a small company with an identity crisis.
If you're interested in the MS wars with Netscape, Oracle, IBM, and Sun, there are great chapters on each. Linux, unfortunately, got a single mention near the end of the book (IIRC, a single sentence).
If your friends quote MS propaganda... (Score:4, Informative)
The judge compared specific acts of MS execs to specific acts of organized crime figures. Microsoft PR put out a press release which accused the judge of saying they were like gangsters. The press picked this up and it became accepted as fact that the judge said the biased things which MS PR attributed to him.
So, if your friends make wild claims about how biased the judge was, get this book and read the actual things which he said and how they were actually reported. You will be able to respond with the actual facts (since this is the place they were reported, without the MS-influenced misreporting). This is the primary source on the judge's statements. The judge talked to Auletta throughout the trial under the condition that his comments not be published until after it was over. He was talking about what his reactions to each piece of evidence were and what his reasons for those reactions were.
Judges are paid to evaluate what they are hearing based on the evidence in front of them. This is not bias. To report exactly what those reactions were and how they were based on what happened in court should be considered as useful insight into the system, not as a way for a criminal enterprise to dodge its responsibility for its actions.
Anybody who tells you the judge said something different than what he said in this book can be shot down with finality.
Re:If your friends quote MS propaganda... (Score:1)
its called capitalism (Score:1)
Windows is not a BAD operating system, it's simply an inferior one put out by a company obsessed with the prospect of being the only operating system on the market. We don't need to fight Microsoft, we only need to fight that mentality.
What you describe here is called capitalism. Capitalism says that the best man wins, and in this case its Microsoft.
-Vic
Re:its called capitalism (Score:1)
et al,
Difficult Subject (Score:2)
The whole Microsoft story is fascinating as far as anti-trust is concerned.
In the earlier anti-trust trials, such as Standard Oil, IBM and ATT, was there as much potential to obfuscate the issues throught the sheer complexity of the technology?
I found the book Hard Drive to be an interesting portrait of MS and Bill Gates. While I love to hate what BillG has done to the computer industry, I have to admit that he combined technological prowess and business acumen in a brutal and bloody way that, on one hand, left business-ignorant nerds gaping for breath and, on the other hand, left the technologically-deficient business droids flat on their asses. A rare combination of talents at the right time and he basically "won" the game of monopoly.
Tired of being a software bigot. (Score:1)
http://www.whytheylie.com
I guess that I am spreading the same stuff...
Tim McMichael
What OS do you want to abuse today?