5 ms·
They've reached a settlement equal to a slap on the wrist. They've agreed to share their API with third parties and a couple of people to verify that for a coup
by input_sh 6y ago
They've reached a settlement equal to a slap on the wrist. They've agreed to share their API with third parties and a couple of people to verify that for a couple of years (it expired in 2007).
So basically nothing.
- quelsolaar 6y agoIn legal terms they got off easy, but it did change Microsoft and computing forever. Microsoft became terrified of been seen as monopolistic and that lead to them effectively saving Apple, not buying Google or Yahoo, embracing Linux and so on. It was very much worth it.
- lenkite 6y ago"So basically nothing" Umm..no. IE could now be un-installed on Windows. After various settlement fines in the US with several parties, the EU took it further and also leveraged its largest anti-trust penalty of that era. (~1 billion) Microsoft were forced to share ALL their earlier private computing API's as open specs. MS word, excel formats, SMB, etc. This was amazing and resulting in several OSS libraries.
- krisgenre 6y ago>>IE could now be un-installed on Windows. Why is this important?
- disgruntledphd2 6y agoAnd I was never able to make it actually work. Like the whole system became much more unstable if you did uninstall IE. That being said, I didn't know much about computers back then, so I probably messed up somewhere.
- lenkite 6y agoAvoiding security vulnerabilities.