Microsoft files EU Android complaint

[D. Hugh Redelmeier]

| From: William Muriithi <william.muriithi-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w at public.gmane.org>

| Microsoft files EU Android complaint
| http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-22078746
| 
| Interesting coming from Microsoft.  Kind of admission they have kind of
| lost it.
| 
| Now question is, since Google don't charge handset manufacturer for
| android, how strong is this argument?

It's worth reading the FairSearch press release:
<http://www.fairsearcheurope.eu/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/FairSearch-Announces-EU-Complaint-on-Google-Mobile-Strategy-9-April-2013.pdf>

    FairSearch is an international coalition of 17 specialized search
    and technology companies whose members include Expedia, Microsoft,
    Nokia, Oracle, and TripAdvisor

A bit rich coming from Microsoft.
Oracle is not an attractive complainant either, given its history.
Nokia is now just a Microsoft serf.
I thought that Expedia was owned by Microsoft; in fact, they founded
it but spun it off in 1999 and it has been though a number of hands
and transformations.  TripAdvisor was/is part of that.
  <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expedia,_Inc.#History>
  <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TripAdvisor>
So none of the named members of FairSearch looks to be totally clean.

    Google achieved its dominance in the smartphone operating system 
    market by giving Android to device-makers for ‘free.’ But in reality, 
    Android phone makers who want to include must-have Google apps such as 
    Maps, YouTube or Play are required to pre-load an entire suite of 
    Google mobile services and to give them prominent default placement on 
    the phone, the complaint says.  This disadvantages other providers, 
    and puts Google’s Android in control of consumer data on a majority of 
    smartphones shipped today.

This seems to be accurate.  The quoting of "free" seems to be a
negative insinuation, but it is correct -- the meaning of free is kind
of tricky.

    Google’s predatory distribution of Android at below-cost
    makes it difficult for other providers of operating systems to recoup
    investments in competing with Google’s dominant mobile
    platform, the complaint says.

That's one way of looking at the situation.  But Android didn't start
with a phone software monopoly.  They did start with a search
"dominant position".  So was the growth of Android an exploitation of
a dominant position (and thus against regulations)?  Not clear to me.

Linux is distributed "below cost", so the argument is interesting to
us.

It sure looks to me as if Apple's IOS is worse from a competitive
standpoint: the whole iDevice ecosystem locks out or severely taxes
anything that competes with Apple.

Microsoft's Win8 for phones or tablets seems to be just as bad as
Apple (but not yet dominant).

I'd guess that Microsoft Windows XP and Win7 Starter Edition were
sold below cost to netbook vendors to drive out Linux.

Windows Mobile licensing might be interesting for Google lawyers to
study.

Nokia gave Simbian for "free".  Ditto Maemo (with all its different
names).