Legal Questions Dog Microsoft Acquistion
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With the ink barely dry on Microsoft&#39;s acquisition of anti-spyware vendor Giant Company Software, questions have arisen about the ownership of the anti-spyware code Microsoft bought.
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Microsoft&#39;s big move into the anti-spyware business has hit an immediate speed bump, with questions swirling around a Florida company&#39;s claim that it co-owns the Giant AntiSpyware codeâand all future definition updatesâthat Microsoft purchased earlier
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The Department of Justice and state attorneys general are raising questions about changes Microsoft wants to make in the schedule set out for its antitrust compliance.
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InfoWorld - SANTA CLARA, CALIF. -- Noting two evolving areas of software licensing, Microsoft is pondering how to license when multiple instances of an application are run on a single computer, but is not eyeing a plan for utility-based computing, in which charges are based on individual usage.
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Mapuche Indians in Chile are  trying to take global software giant Microsoft  to  court in a legal battle which raises the question of whether  anyone can ever "own" the language they speak.
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Does Microsoft's official trademark application for Excel signal an infringement crackdown?
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After EU antitrust ruling, company questions whether Microsoft's patent arrangement is compatible with open-source licensing.
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Nov. 10, 2004. Microsoft is extending the policy that currently protects some of its business customers from potential legal costs associated with intellectual-property disputes to all of its customers, including consumers.
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Company says U.K. Internet service provider selling a 'streaming' version of Office is infringing on Microsoft license regulations.
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The European Commission has opened two new antitrust investigations of Microsoft&#39;s activities.The first case is in response to a complaint from the European Committee for Interoperable Systems, a Brussels-based trade group of which Opera Software is a member, and concerns the interoperability of Windows with other software, the Commission said Monday.The second investigation is looking into Microsoft&#39;s tactic of bundling software products with its Windows operating system. This follows a complaint to the Commission by Opera, a Norwegian browser developer.Both issues featured in the Commission&#39;s landmark March 2004 antitrust decision against Microsoft, which the company unsuccessfully challenged in court.(More to come.)
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Surprise, surprise. Microsoft apparently uses its operating system software monopoly to dominate new markets. That, at least, is what European courts have just determined.
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Was the Novell/Microsoft deal a worthwhile well-meaning effort between renegade open-source geeks at Microsoft and geeks at Novell that got derailed by salespeople and management, after which it was turned into a nightmare deal with the devil?  I raise this question because I know someone with ties to people at both Microsoft and Novell.  He has a credible story to tell about what really happened, and how much it differs from what we now know about the Novell/Microsoft deal.  Unfortunately, I haven't been able to get him to write up the history - yet.  While I continue to pester him, here's the short version, third hand.
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Like many, I was pretty shocked by the recent Microsoft-EU deal to settle the long-running investigation into interoperability issues.  This was not so much because of the way Microsoft has used every kind of delaying tactic it could before eventually agreeing (for the nth time) to try harder in the future.  My real dismay was provoked by the gap between appearance and reality â a chasm that I think bodes ill for the future of open source. read more
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LUXEMBOURG -- Microsoft Corp., which was ruled an illegal monopolist by the European Union in March, will learn next month whether it can wait years before complying with an EU order to sell a stripped-down version of Windows and disclose information on
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Microsoft's attempt to get EU antitrust penalties against it suspended turns to the question of its media player.
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(InfoWorld) - The latest status report on Microsoft Corp.'s compliance with an antitrust settlement in the U.S. has cleared the company of a separate accusation of not complying with orders to disclose information to make its products more interoperable. An expert witness in a class-action suit filed in Iowa, Comes v. Microsoft, testified that the company had not documented APIs (application programming interfaces) as required by the 2002 settlement with the Justice Department and states. The plaintiffs from the 2002 settlement met with the expert witness in the Iowa case and examined material, concluding that "there is no evidence that Microsoft has not fully disclosed the APIs." The conclusion was tucked away in the report, published on Tuesday, by the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, which monitors Microsoft's compliance with the settlement. Microsoft reached a settlement in February in the Comes case, filed in Polk County District Court, after plaintiffs argued the company overcharged them for software. In April, a judge gave preliminary approval to a settlement that calls for Microsoft to pay up to US$179.95 million to individual users and businesses that bought Microsoft software between May 18, 1994, and June 30, 2006. The case is due for a final review on Aug. 31. If approved, eligible Iowans will be able to receive $16 for OSes; $29 for Office, $25 for Excel and $10 for Word. Individual users will get cash, while volume buyers will get vouchers for products from Microsoft, its competitors and others. Microsoft estimates the cost of Iowa settlement, as well as settlements reached with Arkansas and Wisconsin in March, plus an outstanding case in Mississippi, could cost the company between $1.7 billion and $1.9 billion, according to an April 26 filing with the U.S. Security and Exchange Commission. Â
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Despite numerous out-of-court settlements with various state governments around the country, it appears Microsoft&#39;s legal woes aren&#39;t over yet.