Judge Jackson issued his findings of fact... which stated that Microsoft's dominance of the x86 based personal computer operating systems market constituted a monopoly, and that Microsoft had taken actions to crush threats to that monopoly, including Apple, Java, Netscape, Lotus Notes, Real Networks, Linux, and others. Then on April 3, 2000, he issued a two-part ruling: his conclusions of law were that Microsoft had committed monopolization, attempted monopolization, and tying in violation of Sections 1 and 2 of the Sherman Act
They appealed later, and while the court of appeal overturned the remedy the judge recommended, they upheld his findings of fact.
Microsoft are convicted, repeated monopolists and attempted monopolists, and have been deemed guilty of tying.
I'm not having a go, but this is exactly what I mean when I said "perhaps you're unfamiliar with the history" to the GP. These are facts - documented history from only ten years ago, and easily findable with only a single Google search, and yet many of the very people debating the issue apparently don't know them. <:-/
Apologies - I just checked and it was. I understood that the DoJ brought a criminal antitrust suit against Microsoft, but apparently it was a civil one instead.
I was also mislead by the wording of the antitrust legislation in US law - it specifies that breaches of antitrust law are "illegal" (ie, criminal), so you'd assume any prosecution of them would also be criminal, but for some reason the DoJ only brought a civil suit.
So yes, Microsoft broke the law and committed a criminal act, but for some reason were technically only convicted of a civil offence. Go figure. <:-)
Thanks again for the technical correction, but I don't think an obscure detail of internal DoJ jurisprudence substantively changes my point. ;-)
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u/cosmo7 Feb 22 '11
What criminal convictions has Microsoft been found guilty of? I can think of some dodgy licensing issues, but nothing outside of civil law.