3 ms·

While this does align with my beliefs and biases, do you have any proof or evidence to point to that was the case? Specifically that the antitrust suit was due

While this does align with my beliefs and biases, do you have any proof or evidence to point to that was the case? Specifically that the antitrust suit was due (in whole or in part) to Microsoft not engaging with politics, and that the result has been a trend towards big tech playing ball, and hence future antitrust being unlikely?

MichaelCollins 4y ago
The spy shit is hard to back up, due to the inherently secretive nature of spy shit. However I can back up the lobbying aspect of my claims above: Fortune magazine article about it from 2002 (hosted by CNN): > For a couple of embarrassing years in the mid-'90s, Microsoft's primary lobbying presence in D.C. was "Jack and his Jeep." As the software giant's sole in-house lobbyist, Jack Krumholtz, then 33, had to battle endless traffic jams to get from Microsoft's suburban sales office to Capitol Hill. "Early on I spent most of the day in my Jeep Grand Cherokee on my cellphone," Krumholtz says. "I hit an all-time low on the day I was parked on a Capitol Hill side street reading through my mail with the laptop on the steering wheel." > No longer. After the Justice Department filed its antitrust suit in 1998, Microsoft--a company famous for its disdain of government--undertook the largest government affairs makeover in corporate history. The company now boasts one of the most dominating, multifaceted, and sophisticated influence machines around, one that spends tens of millions a year. It's no great surprise that one of the country's wealthiest companies can bankroll a beefed-up lobbying operation when it faces a crisis. But what few people realize is that Microsoft has reached the very highest ranks of lobbying so quickly. Says David Hart, a lobbying expert at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government: "Microsoft has joined the top tier"--with such longtime heavyweights as Philip Morris, Lockheed Martin, and AT&T. https://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2002/04/29/321995/index.htm https://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2002... Bill Gates quote from 2020: > "I was naive at Microsoft and didn't realize that our success would lead to government attention," Gates said, referring to Microsoft's antitrust challenges from more than 20 years ago. "And so I made some mistakes — you know, just saying, 'Hey, I never go to Washington, D.C.' And now I don't think, you know, that naivete is there." https://www.cnbc.com/2020/10/14/bill-gates-i-was-naive-at-microsoft-on-antitrust-scrutiny.html https://www.cnbc.com/2020/10/14/bill-gates-i-was-naive-at-mi...
- cma 4y ago
  They had bought/partnered there way into their own 24/7 cable news network a good bit before that, which is probably worth a thousand lobbiests politically.

MichaelCollins 4y ago

The spy shit is hard to back up, due to the inherently secretive nature of spy shit. However I can back up the lobbying aspect of my claims above: Fortune magazine article about it from 2002 (hosted by CNN): > For a couple of embarrassing years in the mid-'90s, Microsoft's primary lobbying presence in D.C. was "Jack and his Jeep." As the software giant's sole in-house lobbyist, Jack Krumholtz, then 33, had to battle endless traffic jams to get from Microsoft's suburban sales office to Capitol Hill. "Early on I spent most of the day in my Jeep Grand Cherokee on my cellphone," Krumholtz says. "I hit an all-time low on the day I was parked on a Capitol Hill side street reading through my mail with the laptop on the steering wheel." > No longer. After the Justice Department filed its antitrust suit in 1998, Microsoft--a company famous for its disdain of government--undertook the largest government affairs makeover in corporate history. The company now boasts one of the most dominating, multifaceted, and sophisticated influence machines around, one that spends tens of millions a year. It's no great surprise that one of the country's wealthiest companies can bankroll a beefed-up lobbying operation when it faces a crisis. But what few people realize is that Microsoft has reached the very highest ranks of lobbying so quickly. Says David Hart, a lobbying expert at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government: "Microsoft has joined the top tier"--with such longtime heavyweights as Philip Morris, Lockheed Martin, and AT&T. https://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2002/04/29/321995/index.htm https://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2002... Bill Gates quote from 2020: > "I was naive at Microsoft and didn't realize that our success would lead to government attention," Gates said, referring to Microsoft's antitrust challenges from more than 20 years ago. "And so I made some mistakes — you know, just saying, 'Hey, I never go to Washington, D.C.' And now I don't think, you know, that naivete is there." https://www.cnbc.com/2020/10/14/bill-gates-i-was-naive-at-microsoft-on-antitrust-scrutiny.html https://www.cnbc.com/2020/10/14/bill-gates-i-was-naive-at-mi...

cma 4y ago
They had bought/partnered there way into their own 24/7 cable news network a good bit before that, which is probably worth a thousand lobbiests politically.