3 ms·

> A monopoly is historically identified with having a higher than market price, not a lower. Are you sure ? AFAIK it's about market shares, not about how much

by aikah 11y ago

> A monopoly is historically identified with having a higher than market price, not a lower. Are you sure ? AFAIK it's about market shares, not about how much one sells their goods. > along with the 1999 conviction of Microsoft being a monopoly in part because they gave away Explorer. They were giving away nothing, Users had and still have to pay for Windows.

dhimes 11y ago
The higher prices come once the monopoly is established and the competition is impotent. The problem with IE and the Windows OS is that IE was being seamlessly integrated into Office; MS was hijacking java and javascript making it impossible for users of competitive products to get the full office functionality; and their formats were proprietary. Any individual one of these may seem ok- but the result that was coming was that the web was going to be proprietary. Web pages would be written in Word (not by pros, but by, say, professors and mom-and-pop shops), put on the web via "convert-to-html," have hooks embedded that made the page only usable by MS Office users, etc. There was no technological challenge to this. Google wasn't around. VCs at meetups talking to young entrepreneurs would explicitly say they wouldn't fund anybody competing with Microsoft. Think what would have happened if IE contained adblockers: Google would have been killed at the outset. With no competition an important downward pressure on price is taken away (and an important upward pressure on innovation would be, too).
- WalterBright 11y ago
  > With no competition an important downward pressure on price is taken away True but there were competitors to Microsoft (such as Linux and Apple), and there was no evidence of an upward march in prices. The free software revolution was gaining steam rapidly. I've been in the software business for 40 years, and the free market free-for-all in software has been legendary. Pricing has trended to $0 for lots (most?) of products, and yet innovation continues at a furious pace. The only really bad part has been the execrable patent wars.
  - dhimes 11y ago
    In the 80s you could argue that there was a mainstream OS choice in Apple vs DOS. Even so, outside of desktop publishing (remember that term?) Apple had little place. I was fairly unique with my Mac Plus when it came out (and proud of my 1Meg of RAM!). Nevertheless, all official biz correspondence has to be retyped in WordPerfect on the IBM machine. In the 90s, aside from some niche use (artists and home) the Mac was done. I finally switched with Win 95. The only software that was (as far as I could tell) completely compatible between Apple and Win was Mathematica. By that I mean that if I wanted to collaborate electronically (with non-technical folks) I pretty much needed a Win system. So I got one. And while I'm a huge fan of free s/w I still have to use office to collaborate with people who don't have strong tech skills and perhsps aren't too clever. Ever try to co-write a presentation or doc with someone using Win Office when you are using Libre Office? They just can't seem to keep themselves from formatting and it screws everything up. So some prices have trended to zero, but there is a large discontinuity in the product set. Office 2003 has all the features I need, and I suspect that's true for most of us. So we are being coerced to upgrade by different means- the latest push is to rent the software so it can be continuously updatable. For all these things I don't need. And we are stuck in a tragedy of the commons situation: If I refuse to play along, I can't collaborate.

by aikah 11y ago

dhimes 11y ago

The higher prices come once the monopoly is established and the competition is impotent. The problem with IE and the Windows OS is that IE was being seamlessly integrated into Office; MS was hijacking java and javascript making it impossible for users of competitive products to get the full office functionality; and their formats were proprietary. Any individual one of these may seem ok- but the result that was coming was that the web was going to be proprietary. Web pages would be written in Word (not by pros, but by, say, professors and mom-and-pop shops), put on the web via "convert-to-html," have hooks embedded that made the page only usable by MS Office users, etc. There was no technological challenge to this. Google wasn't around. VCs at meetups talking to young entrepreneurs would explicitly say they wouldn't fund anybody competing with Microsoft. Think what would have happened if IE contained adblockers: Google would have been killed at the outset. With no competition an important downward pressure on price is taken away (and an important upward pressure on innovation would be, too).

WalterBright 11y ago
> With no competition an important downward pressure on price is taken away True but there were competitors to Microsoft (such as Linux and Apple), and there was no evidence of an upward march in prices. The free software revolution was gaining steam rapidly. I've been in the software business for 40 years, and the free market free-for-all in software has been legendary. Pricing has trended to $0 for lots (most?) of products, and yet innovation continues at a furious pace. The only really bad part has been the execrable patent wars.
- dhimes 11y ago
  In the 80s you could argue that there was a mainstream OS choice in Apple vs DOS. Even so, outside of desktop publishing (remember that term?) Apple had little place. I was fairly unique with my Mac Plus when it came out (and proud of my 1Meg of RAM!). Nevertheless, all official biz correspondence has to be retyped in WordPerfect on the IBM machine. In the 90s, aside from some niche use (artists and home) the Mac was done. I finally switched with Win 95. The only software that was (as far as I could tell) completely compatible between Apple and Win was Mathematica. By that I mean that if I wanted to collaborate electronically (with non-technical folks) I pretty much needed a Win system. So I got one. And while I'm a huge fan of free s/w I still have to use office to collaborate with people who don't have strong tech skills and perhsps aren't too clever. Ever try to co-write a presentation or doc with someone using Win Office when you are using Libre Office? They just can't seem to keep themselves from formatting and it screws everything up. So some prices have trended to zero, but there is a large discontinuity in the product set. Office 2003 has all the features I need, and I suspect that's true for most of us. So we are being coerced to upgrade by different means- the latest push is to rent the software so it can be continuously updatable. For all these things I don't need. And we are stuck in a tragedy of the commons situation: If I refuse to play along, I can't collaborate.