PUBLIC MARKS from ericpaul with tags Monopolists & multinationals

'Vista Capable' lawsuit against Microsoft now a class action By JOSEPH TARTAKOFF AND TODD BISHOP P-I REPORTERS In a blow to Microsoft Corp., a federal judge granted class-action status to a lawsuit late Friday alleging that Microsoft unjustly enriched itself by promoting PCs as "Windows Vista Capable" even when they could only run a bare-bones version of the operating system, called "Vista Home Basic."

"If you didn't know what was really behind Microsoft's open standards and source promises, it might sound like Microsoft was making real changes. You've got to give Microsoft credit for gall. They take a crunching defeat at the hands of the European Unio

"If you didn't know what was really behind Microsoft's open standards and source promises, it might sound like Microsoft was making real changes. You've got to give Microsoft credit for gall. They take a crunching defeat at the hands of the European Union court system for trying to conceal information and now that the court has forced them to reveal that same information, Microsoft is all about increasing "the openness of its products and drive greater interoperability, opportunity and choice for developers, partners, customers and competitors." Urgh. Excuse me. I feel a little ill." - Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols

Since then, I've looked more closely at the details of Microsoft's "new" position and it looks even more to me like a new coat of paint on the same old Microsoft "We're so interoperable" BS. In other words, Microsoft is opening up its secrets for you to look at, but, woe to you if you try to use any of them in anything that might actually make money. Microsoft isn't offering open source a new opportunity, it's offering open source a trap. - Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols

Excellent! One step closer to honest competition. Will the big money, monopolism and dirty trics win (as usual)?