As we learned Friday, Judge CKK has conditionally accepted most of the MS/DoJ antitrust settlement, effectively shutting down the unsettling states unless they can find solid grounds for an appeal. "The court is satisfied that the parties have reached a settlement which comports with the public interest," she wrote.
There will be no breakup, no forced disclosures of source code, no bare-bones Windows.
There are, to be sure, a number of provisions which ought to be useful in cultivating a slightly more diverse software marketplace, only most of them are so rotten with loopholes that MS' competitors are basically where they were at the outset of this four-year fiasco; that is, pretty well forced to rely on Redmond's renowned openness, good will and honest competitive spirit.
First off, the technical committee originally envisioned to verify Redmond's compliance with the deal it helped craft will be replaced with a committee of MS board members, CKK has determined. This, she imagines, will provide adequate oversight, apparently on the assumption that the company has now been greatly humbled by the rigors of legal warfare. The assumption is a poor one; MS will burn immense amounts of capital in exchange for the right to gloat; and the DoJ cave-in is nothing if not gloatworthy. Any notion that the board will be disinclined to soft-pedal borderline issues which an outside committee might flag for further scrutiny is wishful thinking.
News source: The Register - MS settlement rotten with loopholes
