A judge has ruled that the Web site Linux vendor Lindows set to aid California residents in processing claims against rival software maker Microsoft will not be tolerated.
Court: No Microsoft claims via Lindows site
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
Follow me on Twitter @EugeniaLoli
The courts allow people to file a joint claim but they will not allow people to collect funds in a joint venture. Some what mypocritical, dont you think.
“The software maker also said it needed traditional paper-based verification in order to help eliminate fraudulent claims and to keep other software vendors from attempting to cash in on the settlement.”
“Microsoft’s claim that digital signatures are valid when used to sell their software–but not when it costs them money–is pure hypocrisy. Their true intentions are not to remedy their abusive pricing policies but simply to escape financial redress to Californians.”
I wonder when MS will have people send registration cards in for their OS instead of having personal information broadcasted via network connection over the internet. And yes I know you can use the phone to call into MS directly.
My points are
1) with the courts in not allowing joint filings.
2) invasion of privacy via online registration or software updates.
“Microsoft’s claim that digital signatures are valid when used to sell their software–but not when it costs them money–is pure hypocrisy. Their true intentions are not to remedy their abusive pricing policies but simply to escape financial redress to Californians.”
I guess it just goes to show everyone how much MS trusts their own software. So … who’s software DOES MS use when they buy things through the internet. Macs? Linux? Don’t trust it at all even with Verisign?
I personally disagree with Lindows on this one. Because as a Microsoft rep said, they would have to deal with fraudulant claims and deal with a host of other problems. Keeping it paper based keeps it fair, plus this will benefit Lindows in the long run because what would happen if someone did file a false claim and it was found out, it would have been pointless for Lindows to go after the person who recieved a free computer or free software. When someone says free everyone comes running out, even the theives.
it was just a PR campaign on Lindows part, and a good one at that. I think its funny Microsoft would even waste the money to drag this into court. Everytime Lindows gets mentioned its free publicity. And Microsoft taking someone to court like this makes themselves look bad, specially after the whole monopoly thing.
Oh well.
I don’t think that microsoft cares if they look bad. Companies that operate in a competative environment care about public image. Monopolies don’t.
Companies that operate in a competative environment care about public image. Monopolies don’t.
Boy that really hit the nail on the head!! 🙂
Kreek
Lindows Insider!!
If, as reported, the earlier settlement stipulated that no digitized claims could be accepted, then this court had no recourse but to rule that claims collected by Lindows are invalid.
Lindows is not without responsibility here. We have two choices: Lindows didn’t read the settlement and proceeded out of unnecessary ignorance, or Lindows read the settlement but put up the website anyway. In either case, Lindows engaged in behavior that may result in many people losing money Microsoft owes them.
Most likely, Microsoft wanted that in the settlement because they know it will reduce the number of claims they must pay out. You can dislike MS for a lot of reasons, but you can’t accuse them of not knowing how to play the game. Unlike the folks at Lindows, who would have use believe they were just trying to help people.
but you can’t accuse them of not knowing how to play the game.
Yes you can, if they played the game correctly, they wouldn’t be a monopoly, and they might actually be writing better software to compete in a fair market, and if the played the game correctly, this anti-trust suit would have never been filed in the first place.
Many idiots will still accuse Microsoft for stupid reasons, but I am happy to see that Lindows lost. Looking for an alternative doesn’t mean that you can let somebody to take advantage of this and get the money of the consumers for their own profits. You can’t argue that the consumers should pay to 100$ per year to Lindows instead of paying a one time 100$ for their product for an inferior product. Not only that, but consumers should not be misled about these issues. Lindows is clearly trying to confuse people and make money while doing it. Many idiots support them, cause they hate Microsoft. No one has the right to mislead consumers into giving money to companies like Lindows whose whole business idea is to bark on Microsoft and make money by doing that. Sooner or later they are going to go bankrupt, because you can’t beat Microsoft by being an idiot, you have to offer people some value, work harder.
I don’t think that microsoft cares if they look bad. Companies that operate in a competative environment care about public image. Monopolies don’t.
Which probably explains why they have such a huge budget in advertising and PR… not. Besides, Microsoft don’t care about trying to do damage control over this matter – people who read this news are either lawyers connected to the case and geeks. Both groups most likely have their minds made up about whos the winner and whos the loser.
But I do agree that Microsoft is stupid in suing companies like Lindows. Look at any market – copycats normally loose. That’s why Niki is trailing Nike, Rolez is trailing Rolex, etc. And if it doesn’t work out for Microsoft, with this amount of market they could afford a product rename. Just say instead of calling the next Windows as Windows 2006, rather than Longhorn 1.0. And since Longhorn isn’t a common term in the computing world, there wouldn’t be any arguments against it.
Lindows.com on the other hand is shooting themselves on the foot. They seriously think that nobody would connect Lindows and Windows and start comparing them more than they should? And since Lindows provides little compatiblity with Windows, customers are going to get pissed. They may not use the law against Lindows, they certainly would stop using Lindows and start look for its competitors.
Sergio: Lindows doesn’t cost $100 per year. $50 for a “digital download” (there is analog download?); $60 for a retail package. Same price for “Laptop Edition”. LindowsCD cost $30, and the “Value Bundle” cost $90 (or $100 ion retail pack). Probably you were talking about the Insider – $100 as you said; CNR is $50 a year.
Personally, though, I much rather buy Xandros for potential Linux users I know than Lindows.com. There is much more polish detail in Xandros 1.0 (haven’t used 2.0 yet) comparing with Lindows 4.0 (haven’t used 4.5 yet). Xandros 2.0 with its Plastik style, looks so much better, much better than LindowsOS theme.
” Yes you can, if they played the game correctly, they wouldn’t be a monopoly, and they might actually be writing better software to compete in a fair market, and if the played the game correctly, this anti-trust suit would have never been filed in the first place. ”
They did play the game correctly, they have over 90% of the desktop market, they didnt get there overnight and I think Microsoft writes good software, in most cases Microsoft writes superior software. IMO Windows Server 2003 is running neck and neck with Linux in terms of performance and security. Microsoft got accused of being a monopoly, so what. Thats over and done with. Open Source has many problems and concerns for IT and yes you have some that are blindly making bad choices in their migrations but Linux will continue to make inroads and there will be a lot of Linux deployments but I doubt it will ever truly replace Windows.
>>Yes you can, if they played the game correctly, they wouldn’t be a monopoly, and they might actually be writing better software to compete in a fair market, and if the played the game correctly, this anti-trust suit would have never been filed in the first place.
The history of the software market has shown it has a natural tendency toward consolidation of vendors. Customers do not want to deal with the issues of incompatibility that arise when competing vendors attempt to differentiate their products. This is especially true because most of these products are seen as doing the thing in a deliberately different, market-driven, way.
I’m not certain what you mean by Microsoft playing “correctly”, but I’d suggest that it was inevitable that the first company, whether or ot it was Microsoft, that supplied the OS and programming tools for the first popular mainstream PC platform would eventually dominate that market.
Honestly, this didn’t cost them nuts. Lindows didn’t get too much publicity with it in the wide world but every time MS sues someone, that just gets straight to the headlines. They just bought Lindows a whole heap of cheap publicity.
Personally I think that Lindows were *really* trying it on with this one but it worked for them.
you are right that the first company supplying the mainstream pc platform would by definition dominate the market.
However I am sick and tired of hearing about court cases and back-dealing and all that crap from the legal profession. The fact is that the monopoly is getting worse not better! And worse think of the money down the toilet for all these stupid court cases – where the only thing that gets fat is the lawyers. That is the saddest part. Everyone complaining about costs, and having to reduce costs to the barest minimum, but having millions to blow on court cases. The mind boggles.