Microsoft acting too smart, say anti-trust regulators
Washington, Jan 20: Microsoft Corp could have easily complied with a federal judge's order to change its Windows 95 licensing requirements but instead offered a `senseless' alternative, anti-trust regulators said Monday.Microsoft, making a final written defence before the judge rules on whether the company is in contempt of the order, said it was impossible to remove the web browsing technology from Windows 95 without rendering the operating system unusable.The comments from the two sides in the anti-trust dispute came in documents filed in federal court ahead of final arguments in a contempt hearing scheduled for Thursday, after which Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson is expected to rule. Jackson, responding to Justice department charges that Microsoft is in violation of an anti-trust agreement, issued a preliminary order on December 11 ordering Microsoft to offer computer makers the option of shipping a version of Windows 95 without the Internet Explorer browser. Microsoft, contending that the browser isa fully integrated feature of Windows, offered computer manufacturers the choice of shipping the existing version of the operating system, a non-functional version, or a version more than two years old. ``Microsoft construed the preliminary injunction to require what it knew to be a senseless option," the Justice department said, recapping two days of arguments in the contempt hearing last week. Microsoft replied that removing the obvious means of access to the browser, as the Justice department has suggested, would not comply with the order. Microsoft also noted that there was no evidence that any computer manufacturer actually is interested in licensing an alternative version of Windows 95.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
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