from Executive Software Team Jump Executive Software>@@@ As the Microsoft trial proceeds, the future of computing (including our home
turf, Windows NT computing) may hang in the balance. Whichever side
of the fence you are on, your professional life will be impacted one way or the
other by the outcome of the Microsoft antitrust trial.
It's starting to look more and more as if Microsoft will remain intact at
the end of this trial, however. While on the surface the government's case
appears somewhat alarming and strong, Microsoft's attorneys have been able to successfully
counter most of the evidence presented. When the
government (and Netscape) charged that Microsoft had approached Netscape in an attempt
to "divide" the browser market, Microsoft presented evidence that Netscape
had themselves called the strategic meeting with Microsoft, and had contacted the
Justice Department almost immediately after it had concluded, apparently in an effort
to bring the Justice Department down on Microsoft.
Additionally, Microsoft presented evidence that America Online and Netscape had
schemed in 1995 to divide the online services market - something both Netscape and
the government are accusing Microsoft of attempting with Netscape. When the government
accused Microsoft of bullying Apple Computer into embracing Internet Explorer instead
of Netscape's browser, Microsoft introduced evidence that, instead, Apple was threatening
Microsoft with a 1.2 billion-dollar patent lawsuit, using it as incentive to gain
badly-needed Microsoft technology. When the government brought up Apple's charges
of failure in the market due to Microsoft's alleged desktop monopoly, Microsoft
introduced evidence showing that Apple's failure was due to its own marketing -
a charge made by their own developers in writing.
In cross-examining James Gosling, inventor of Java and vice-president of Sun Microsystems,
Microsoft introduced evidence that Sun had "market dominance" plans of
its own using Sun hardware and the Java platform. When the government charged
that Microsoft "corrupted" Java in order to weaken it as a competitor,
Microsoft brought evidence to show that Java was already weak and had never lived
up to its own "write once, run anywhere" promise, and in addition brought
evidence that Java and Netscape had colluded against Microsoft (again, a practice
the government is accusing Microsoft of).
Additionally, right in the middle of this trial, AOL purchased Netscape
outright. This places Netscape, which has consistently played the victim in
this case, in an awkward light at best. If they were doing so poorly, why
did AOL shell out 4.2 billion dollars for them? Why is AOL, following the
purchase, going out of their way to publicly state how the merger will
benefit both companies, and how good an acquisition Netscape was? If
Microsoft so dominates the market, why is this merger such a strong move?
This acquisition strengthens Microsoft's case, as "the other side" is
now
consolidating its resources in a similar fashion to Microsoft.
Add to all this the fact that the wind was knocked out of the Justice Department's
case before the trial even started, by the appellate court's
overturning of Judge Jackson's ruling on the combining of Internet Explorer
and Windows 95.
And the latest news: As of December 7th, South Carolina was dropping out
of the Microsoft antitrust suit with its own Attorney general citing the recent
proposed merger between America Online and Netscape as evidence that there is competition
in the high-tech industry.
Note that this is all before Microsoft has even presented its own side of
the case.
If the Justice Department wins this case, it will mean an enormous
difference in the Windows marketplace. But it's certainly appearing that,
despite all the bluster, it isn't very likely.
Several new items have been recently released to update SP4.
First, Microsoft has released the Service Pack 4 Resource Kit Support Tools,
(it's a subset of the full Windows NT 4.0 Resource Kit, which Microsoft
updated for SP4). The free version includes more than 30 tools. It's
available at:
There's also a new SP4 security hotfix. To find out if you should download
and apply this hotfix, you should read the Microsoft Support Online article
Q195733, which is located at:
