microsoft on crime?

By Todd Stadler · Friday, November 30, 2001 7:20pm

As others have pointed out, the proposed $1 billion settlement for Microsoft's anti-trust case makes no sense whatsoever.

Never mind the $4 billion accounting error (whoops!) that makes the settlement less in value than it could or should have been.

I just want to know why making a software provider donate computers (which, hey, run the software of said provider, wow!) to schools is punitive.

When these computers start to fall apart, or, heaven forfend, get too buggy to deal with, how do you think the schools will deal with upgrading their software? Will they install Linux, which has very little educational software that is used widely? Will they throw away their PCs and buy Apple computers? Or will they buy more Microsoft software?

Is it possible that these schools - which are too poor to buy their own computers - are just another increase in Microsoft's consumer pool? And isn't it odd that educational software was an area previously dominated by Apple, whose hold on the market is slipping?

Is it too late to just replace what our government with an meritocracy or gerontocracy or something?