Rep. Cicilline says he's crafting around 10 smaller antitrust bills, to be ready in May, instead of a one huge bill that would be easier for Big Tech to defeat
MS IE was *totally* dominant 2000-2011, >80-90% most of decade, see https://visualcapitalist.com/ ... Q: how the hell do u drop the ball on IE & lose the battle for internet developer mindshare?!? cc @stevesi @bradsilverberg @Carnage4Life @benthompson Benedict Evans / @benedictevans : Mobile is not a neutral platform. I wrote this five years ago, and it took quite a long time for it to turn from a notional and very niche issue into a general question, but suddenly Apple is using its power. https://www.ben-evans.com/... Ben Thompson / @benthompson : @charlesarthur @benedictevans @davewiner @davemcclure People inside Microsoft are *extremely* motivated to blame the DOJ for missing mobile instead of the alternative which is blaming...*checks notes*...themselves Charles Arthur / @charlesarthur : @benedictevans @davewiner @davemcclure But people inside Microsoft who I've spoken to say that the antitrust case made them more wary about how they approached mobile for some years - crucial for Android to begin. Possibly they would have inevitably lost mobile because of their licensing model. Benedict Evans / @benedictevans : @davewiner @davemcclure Well, they tried to stop Microsoft taking over browsers, but 1 it didn't work 2 MSFT then lost to Chrome anyway because IE became bad 3 the web took over 4 mobile happened And now no-one is scared of Microsoft
If I worked in tech antitrust policy, I would really want to understand why all the cases against Microsoft 20 years ago were such an unqualified failure. You won, yet achieved nothing, and then MSFT's dominance went away anyway. Why? https://www.ben-evans.com/...
@davemcclure @benedictevans @davewiner @stevesi @bradsilverberg @benthompson A standards based browser makes the OS irrelevant. Once that was no longer a threat to Windows, why continue to invest in tech that might undermine your cash cow? Apple has the same dynamic with Safari a…
@benedictevans @davewiner still puzzled why #2 happened — MS IE was *totally* dominant 2000-2011, >80-90% most of decade, see https://visualcapitalist.com/ ... Q: how the hell do u drop the ball on IE & lose the battle for internet developer mindshare?!? cc @stevesi @bradsilverbe…
@benthompson @charlesarthur @benedictevans @davewiner @davemcclure They might well be extremely motivated to say so. But this the problem with this category of questions: You cannot gauge the effect of a disincentive *unless* the company (or person) involved attempts to ignore th…
The Gilded Age for Big Tech must come to an end. If the People's House will not break up monopolies, the people will be governed by them. Proud of the leadership of Antitrust Subcommittee Chair @DavidCicilline. https://twitter.com/...
@florianederer It would tell us you haven't paid much attention to tech in the last 25 years ;) No-one building things that attracted a lawsuit a decade later was thinking about that, thought they had market power, or thought the lawsuit was justified. Nice theory, though
@ianbetteridge @benthompson @charlesarthur @davewiner @davemcclure The Occam's razor here: 1: Was Microsoft aggressively shipping mobile stuff in 2006? Yes 2: What should Microsoft have done? Ship a free, OSS mobile OS and abandon Windows compatibility. Would Balmer have done tha…
@benedictevans @davemcclure I don't know if this is the cause, but they thought the problem was the office apps, even though the bad behavior was with the browser. It didn't work, again imho, because at the time the web was a juggernaut and even mighty Microsoft couldn't stop it.
@antondinev @Caffar3Cristina @florianederer I agree. No-one writing App Store policies at Apple in 2011 was thinking about Microsoft's Office APIs and wondering if they might breach the precedent.
@Caffar3Cristina @benedictevans @florianederer That's why I think Microsoft is not a great example of antitrust deterrence or regulatory foresight. By the time it was all over (incl. appeals in the EU), people had forgotten Netscape (Chrome vs Firefox was the real deal) and the w…
@benedictevans @benthompson @charlesarthur @davewiner @davemcclure Oh sure, they were shipping aggressively in 2006: but not “winning” even at that point (iirc). Could they have done so without antitrust considerations? What could they have done to “crush” BlackBerry even before …
Mobile is not a neutral platform. I wrote this five years ago, and it took quite a long time for it to turn from a notional and very niche issue into a general question, but suddenly Apple is using its power. https://www.ben-evans.com/...
@charlesarthur @benedictevans @davewiner @davemcclure People inside Microsoft are *extremely* motivated to blame the DOJ for missing mobile instead of the alternative which is blaming...*checks notes*...themselves
@benedictevans @davewiner @davemcclure But people inside Microsoft who I've spoken to say that the antitrust case made them more wary about how they approached mobile for some years - crucial for Android to begin. Possibly they would have inevitably lost mobile because of their l…
@davewiner @davemcclure Well, they tried to stop Microsoft taking over browsers, but 1 it didn't work 2 MSFT then lost to Chrome anyway because IE became bad 3 the web took over 4 mobile happened And now no-one is scared of Microsoft