Re:Hidden backdoor API to root privileges in Apple OS X
by laumars on Friday April 10, 2015 @02:14AM
(#9352801)
It's the same thing. If you don't have a monopoly then it's a feature, if you do have a monopoly then it's anti competitive.
I do agree that Microsoft did a whole boat load of other, really down right despicable, business practices as well. But in the MSN Messenger and Defender cases it was purely about shipping their own products preinstalled in Windows when competitors weren't included.
I guess you're right that my wording was perhaps a little too vague though. But my point was that when it comes to software bundling, Microsoft are damned if they do and damned if they don't.
Except that bundling itself is not what got Microsoft in trouble. Having a monopoly, and then taking a coordinated series of actions relating to conditions of sale, bundling, and other steps to extend that monopoly into other markets and to eliminate threats to the monopoly -- with evidence, including fairly explicit documentary evidence from senior decision-makers at Microsoft -- that that was the intent of the action is what got Microsoft in trouble.
They got in trouble under anti-monopoly laws, not anti-bundling laws.