Linux Networks & the Competition Act (Was: Fwd: [d at DCC] Competition Act)

[S P Arif Sahari Wibowo]

On Tue, 16 Jun 2009, ted leslie wrote:
> - MS isn't a monopoly , it was, it is a big company that 
> extorts (now), but a monopoly? saying its a monopoly (on OS), 
> means you don't really think to highly of linux?

Monopoly does not mean the only one in the market, but that the 
company has power (either from market share or any other way) to 
exclusively control the market behaviour. At one time this 
definitely true about Microsoft in personal computer and 
business workstation market. Those power has erode somewhat 
(thanks to Linux as well), but I am sure it is still not a free 
market for all.

> - I did some reading years ago, and found some stuff that 
> seemed to indicate MS agreements that running the cheaper 
> copies on VM, may not be binding in Canada.

That will be interesting if it can be confirmed.

> from MS side, they don't like VM, because it allows licensing 
> to be skirted a bit more, i.e. clone VM's. They get you on SP 
> upgrades, and HW changes that trigger license "call ins", but 
> in general it opens them up to having their wares cloned.

In the other hand, AFAIK the usage of virtualization may 
actually cause the use of more Windows installation (separate VM 
for each function).

> Mark Ubuntu says its clear extortion, I wonder why no one has 
> been able to call MS on it?

Good question. :-)

-- 
    ____  ____  ____  ____ (stephan paul) Arif Sahari Wibowo
   /___  /___/ /___/ /___      http://www.arifsaha.com/
  ____/ /     /   / ____/
--
The Toronto Linux Users Group.      Meetings: http://gtalug.org/
TLUG requests: Linux topics, No HTML, wrap text below 80 columns
How to UNSUBSCRIBE: http://gtalug.org/wiki/Mailing_lists