March 14, 2002
From the desk of Jane Galt:Meanwhile, this little tidbit from
Meanwhile, this little tidbit from the Wall Street Journal (Sorry, no link -- it requires a subscription):
WASHINGTON -- An attorney representing AOL Time Warner Inc. helped write a controversial agreement between two agencies dividing antitrust enforcement that steers future AOL merger reviews to the Justice Department's antitrust division -- headed by one of his former law partners.
The funny/sad thing about the Netscape lawsuit is that it is no longer a scrappy little David against Goliath -- it's one huge corporation against another, both of which are widely disliked by "serious" technology people.
There's been a large minority in the tech community that felt that, regardless of Microsoft's practices, the close involvement of key competitors in lawsuits was a dangerous precedent. In particular, questions have been raised about the involvement of Oracle, which has not been harmed by any of Microsoft's predatory practices yet is a key player, going through the garbage and writing briefs for DOJ lawyers. Why is Oracle involved? Because Microsoft makes database software that's cheaper than Oracle's -- and as Microsoft relentlessly improves it, it threatens Oracle's core business. Now there are serious concerns about whether certain key competitors, notably AOL/Time Warner (which as a media company is a veteran of working the regulatory system), are too good at litigation for comfort.
Posted by Jane Galt at March 14, 2002 09:51 AM | TrackBack | Technorati inbound links