The kind of fines that are based on global revenue are at least enough to slow them down. Right now we are a bit in a phase of Whac a Mole phase of the EU doing new directives with these kinds of fines and American companies trying to find loopholes, but I don’t see how Microsoft would weasel out of this one.
Also the US is interested in busting some trusts at the moment and that sort of behavior could cost Microsoft dearly. It’s one thing to demand that your software only run on your hardware, it’s a whole other thing to pay companies to block their hardware from software you don’t own
The funny thing is, they don’t need to weasel out.
You block for competiton from working (dualbooting Linux users) for long enough they forget there is anything else, then you pull the claws back a bit to avoid the fines after the damage is already done.
Microsoft had to provide a separate edition that gave the user a browser choice for 10 years because the EU successfully called anti-trust on Windows doing IE/Edge as default.
The European Commission would appreciate the multi billion euro “donation” from Microsoft if they did something so obviously anti competitive.
I agree, but also when has a threat of a fine ever stopped a capitalist from doing what they want? They just call it the cost of doing business.
Or doing it regionally
iPhone 15 is heavily rumored to be USB-C. So… at least once?
The kind of fines that are based on global revenue are at least enough to slow them down. Right now we are a bit in a phase of Whac a Mole phase of the EU doing new directives with these kinds of fines and American companies trying to find loopholes, but I don’t see how Microsoft would weasel out of this one.
Also the US is interested in busting some trusts at the moment and that sort of behavior could cost Microsoft dearly. It’s one thing to demand that your software only run on your hardware, it’s a whole other thing to pay companies to block their hardware from software you don’t own
The funny thing is, they don’t need to weasel out.
You block for competiton from working (dualbooting Linux users) for long enough they forget there is anything else, then you pull the claws back a bit to avoid the fines after the damage is already done.
Rinse, repeat.
Microsoft had to provide a separate edition that gave the user a browser choice for 10 years because the EU successfully called anti-trust on Windows doing IE/Edge as default.