Now that's a good rational response Lindsay! How about: Facts are facts; reality is what it is, independent of our feelings or wishes; that human reason is able to grasp what it is; that reason's tools - sense-perception, concept-formation & logic - are, contrary to many philosophers, valid. etc,etc,etc...

I dont get it....you call Lindsay to task on some of Objectivisms primary tenets in the most dismissive way, and then continue by an attempt to refute it

I Couldn't understand that until I read your bio in which you state:

"I think I am a natural born Libertarian but I would not classify myself as especially intellectually inclined in my thinking about objectivist philosophy" ...

You dont say.

Next you seemingly reveal your consideration for individual freedom with this disengenuous statement:

" I am very concerned about the extent of State involvement in society and concerned that nothing is happening with sufficient pace to redress the balance of life in favour of liberty and freedom and the rights of individuals to go about their business without interference from the looters."

And your final statement reveals that you are no more than a pretensious socialist - collectivist..."a sheep in sheeps clothing" as Winston remarked about Atlee.

"I believe we must reverse the deterioration in educational standards. Speaking as an IT manager the first thing I would do when I take the helm of my private educational institution is remove all computers from the classrooms that were not involved in specific practical computer science classes. We must get people to start thinking for themselves again!"

That statement implies that you are the first one that should start thinking for yourself again.

Next you judge Microsoft for trying to protect itself from the EU Kangaroo court

"The trial evidence exposed a long-established pattern of Microsoft seeking monopoly lock-in through false statements, intimidation and anticompetitive tactics such as tying agreements."

If they used false statements in defence against the looters I would commend them for it, as much as I would commend someone for lying to a robber to protect his property. "Anticompetitive tactics such as tying agreements "...did you notice the word "agreement" here? simply a vital part of free trade I'd say.

From being involved in the building, selling, and using of PC's since the early eighties I have come to understand that the only reason someone other than mostly pretentious 2nd handing proppellerheads neurotically seeking to establish their supposed comparative superiority by rejecting MS and opting for non-user friendly and unsupported crap was due to having a pirate copy of Windows they got from a friend or downloaded from "crack sites "

No wonder 99 % of authorised MS resellers agreed to not selling hardware without a MS OS...they also understood that it would be better to rather earn a commision on a legal suppported OS than supporting a pirated version of Windows for free.

As for standards...you may as well suggest that Toyota (since they are the leaders) be forced to manufacture all their vehicle components to be interchangeable with all other brands of vehicle on the market.

No one should be able to force "de jure" standards on any manufacturer...the market leader creates "de facto" standards by virtue of its position and market share. Others can comply or not at their own risk.

The fact that web servers other than MS IIS dont get hacked or infected by virii as often points to the other side of that coin...the fact that only a smidgeon of third party software developers operate outside of the MS sphere....as compared to me being able to go to CNET.com now and being able to download shareware or freeware for any application under the sun.

The fact that you refer to the Objectivist ethics in terms of individual freedom as "Propaganda" implies that you've never grasped it.

After watching a small snippet of reporting on this latest EU protection racket on TV, a self righteous "community conscious" little lawyer popped up and stated "that at least the consumer gains from all of this insofar as the increased competition it will bring about".

When reading the following excerpt from Ayn Rand (CUI) I can only imagine her disgust when observing the same perversion.

"The final touch on that whole gruesome farce was Judge Ganey's statement. He said: "What is really at stake here is the survival of the kind of economy under which America has grown to greatness, the free enterprise system." He said it, while delivering the most staggering blow that the free-enterprise system had ever sustained, while sentencing to jail seven of its best representatives and thus declaring that the very class of men who brought America to greatness—the businessmen—are now to be treated, by their nature and profession, as criminals. In the person of these seven men, it is the free-enterprise system that he was sentencing"

Seven executives of the electrical industry were sentenced to jail. "These seven men were martyrs. They were treated as sacrificial animals—they were human sacrifices, as truly and more cruelly than the human sacrifices offered by prehistorical savages in the jungle. If you care about justice to minority groups, remember that businessmen are a small minority—a very small minority, compared to the total of all the uncivilized hordes on earth. Remember how much you owe to this minority—and what disgraceful persecution it is enduring. Remember also that the smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights, cannot claim to be defenders of minorities"

If only Bill could lock his doors and walk away leaving all those silent envious "evil appeasing" enemies of his squirming in search of a new host and benefactor ...what a day of justice it would be

I admit that reason is a small and feeble flame, a flickering torch by stumblers carried in the starless night, -- blown and flared by passion's storm, -- and yet, it is the only light. Extinguish that, and nought remains.- - Robert Green Ingersoll

the lawsuits against Microsoft are due to Mr Gates being so rich. Nothing more.

He lives in a Mansion, his shoes are shined by his personal valet, he flies about in his own plane...these are the real crimes of Bill Gates.

.... since there's some part of what constitutes a "coercive monopoly" you don't get. Namely, all of it. A monopoly occurs when government closes off an existing field to all but one operator. It's "coercive" because it's the law: a government gun will be trained on you if you try to enter that field. How has this happened wrt Microsoft?

A dominant player is not a monopolist.

If any player commits force or fraud, then by all means prosecute him for that. But not for being too big or too successful or using his success to compound his success.

In the story to which PC links here we read:

The European Court of First Instance ruled Monday the European Commission was correct in concluding that Microsoft used its dominance in desktop computers to muscle into server software and media players in the 1990s — and that Microsoft still poses similar threats.

"Muscle in"?? Was a gun anywhere in sight, let alone a government gun?!

There's a government gun now all right—aimed squarely at Microsoft.

From wikipedia - MSs alleged strategy of Embrace, extend and extinguish

The alleged strategy's three phases are:

1. Embrace: Development of software substantially compatible with a competing product, or implementing a public standard.
2. Extend: Addition and promotion of features not supported by the competing product or part of the standard, creating interoperability problems for customers who try to remain neutral.
3. Extinguish: When extensions become a de facto standard because of their dominant market share, they marginalize competitors that do not or cannot support Microsoft's extensions and create an obstacle to new competitors.

Blindly opposing MS because of their success is wrong.
Blindly supporting MS because of their success is also wrong.

I support the following...
MS copying the look and feel of Apples Lisa and MacOS.
MS suing Lindows for trademark violation the first time (but not the six subsequent times)
MS packaging any software they like with windows.
MS being able to make their own java engine.
Sun suing MS for "extending" java - MS were deceiving consumers by still calling it java when it no longer achieved the objective java was designed for.

And, while I dislike it, I don't oppose MS being able to "extend" (crapify) other standards, protocols, formats etc.

I also support freely interfacing without restrictions with standards, protocols, formats etc and their extensions. IMO, in most cases these things should be unpatentable.

Now that's a good rational response Lindsay! How about: Facts are facts; reality is what it is, independent of our feelings or wishes; that human reason is able to grasp what it is; that reason's tools - sense-perception, concept-formation & logic - are, contrary to many philosophers, valid. etc,etc,etc...

Regardless of what we think of the anti-trust process some of the evidence produced by Microsoft for these cases has been very revealing. Going back to the Dept Of Justice anti-trust trial in the US, long before this EU business, Microsoft were their own worst enemy; even got caught fabricating false video evidence. Bill was very embarrassed about that while appearing live on national TV. The trial evidence exposed a long-established pattern of Microsoft seeking monopoly lock-in through false statements, intimidation and anticompetitive tactics such as tying agreements.

The whole EU case would never have started if Microsoft had not tried to force authorised resellers of the Windows operating system to pay them royalties even if the hardware they supplied did not have Windows installed. Pay us even if you don't supply our product or we will take you off our reseller list! Is that not a monopolistic practice? It is carried on to the present day with laptop computers where you pay for Windows even if you don't want it. Laptop manufacturers are only just getting brave enough to buck against Microsoft and offer alternative operating systems.

Microsoft may well be this brand of objectivisms poster boy on Capitalism. Even anarcho-objectivists don't condone coercive monopolies.

But the tide is turning! Despite the myopic idealism of some members of this forum the masses are starting to wake up. The NZ Standards Authority has recently declined Microsofts application for recognition of its OOXML protocol as an open document standard. Even in the US their application for standardisation has not been successful.

Libertarian commentator Eric Raymond stated last month. "...Microsoft's behavior in the last few months with respect to OOXML has been egregious. They haven't stopped at pushing a "standard" that is divisive, technically bogus, and an obvious tool of monopoly lock-in; they have resorted to lying, ballot-stuffing, committee-packing, and outright bribery to ram it through the ISO standardization process in ways that violate ISO's own guidelines wholesale."

At least you can relax a little, though Lindsay. Your site runs on super stable and secure Debian Linux, a community project that Steve Ballmer, Microsoft CEO considered somewhere close to Communism. You are lucky that Microsoft have not managed to make Internet Information Server a mandatory web server for use with Internet Explorer or you might really have hosting problems. And no doubt you will be fully supportive of DreamHost, LLC being fully green and carbon neutral. In case you didn't know, that's where your site's hosted.

Just to keep the discussion on a technical level, consider these questions if you wanted to run on a Microsoft web server:

How many Linux machines have been zombied by Netsky, Sasser, MyDoom, or similar worms? Do your Windows TCO estimates include administrator time spent cleaning up after these infestations?

Can you explain why Windows IIS websites are cracked or defaced more often than Apache ones, despite the fact that IIS runs less than a third the number of sites Apache does?

By all means lets be objective and deride the anti-trust farce for the travesty that it is. But lets not eulogise the defendant too much lest they start to believe their own and George Reismans propaganda.

TF

Microsoft business practices are genuinely monopolistic and cause a great deal of injury to the software consumer even if the majority of the public who buy their often fundamentally flawed products don't know any better.

Did I imagine this?!

Peter and Mark have a point though. There is more than enough anti-Microsoft sentiment out there without adding to it. And no where near enough outrage at the EU ruling.

It's not like there is a need to point out Microsoft's failings because no one else is. There's plenty of folks around to do that.

It would be totally wrong for the anti trust legislators to try and force Microsoft to open up its API codebase to anybody for public perusal.

It is every bit as wrong for Libertarians to argue that Microsoft and specifically Bill Gates should be canonised as some sort of Roarkian hero battling the evils of statism. That is bullshit.

Microsoft business practices are genuinely monopolistic and cause a great deal of injury to the software consumer even if the majority of the public who buy their often fundamentally flawed products don't know any better.

Libertarians who do not condemn monopolistic behaviour are doing objectivism a grave disservice by teaching non Libertarians that we cannot be relied upon to condemn behaviour that is clearly wrong.

We should be condemning both the EU anti trust legislators and Microsoft. The fact that one party is representative of everything that is wrong with the collectivist mentality does not make the other party some sort of saint that needs to be put up on a pedestal and bowed down to.

Publicly taking a position condemning both antitrust law and Microsoft could provide Libertarians with a valuable opportunity to set a moral example and educate the public about our values.

But I may be as obstructive as I wish with what is mine. After all, if it it's mine, I may do with it what I please.

And however obstructive you claim Microsoft to have been with their property, that doesn't alter one whit the observation that people still buy their stuff in large numbers, and if they weren't buying their stuff in such large numbers then the courts wouldn't be bothering them, would they.

Cheers, Peter Cresswell

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ORGANON ARCHITECTURE
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There's a subtle difference between actually inventing something (property) and just being an obstructive ass.

Asses, is what they is.

Note: I am not anti MS, they have some good and some bad products and I often use Bill Gates as a positive example for the kids.

They're property, is what they is.

Allow people to hack and publish MS protocols.

They're not advances in technology just barriers to competition so should not be patentable.

You wrote:

My biggest gripe with Microsoft is that it seems to believe that because of its' market size it has the right to circumvent standards agreed to by members of International Standards Organisations that it is also a member of and then to try and impose its own version of that protocol on the organisation, with the avowed intention of further locking individuals and companies into being dependent on Microsoft products. I.e. making the Microsoft version the standard. You might argue that this could be a good thing if the Microsoft option was the best technical solution to implement but as the old song goes 'it ain't necessarily so"! There are many examples where the commercial secrecy surrounding Microsoft Application Programming Interface specifications prevents access to the PC marketplace by otherwise technically superior competitive products. Many highly regarded network and security professionals with Libertarian leanings e.g. Bruce Schneier, chief technology officer for network-monitoring service BT Counterpane Internet Security http://www.schneier.com/ and Eric Raymond, http://www.catb.org/~esr/ , a leading architect of the open source philosophy are on record criticising Microsoft attempts at lock-in.

And I am thinking on it: best I can do for now. (Although my initial thought is, in this context, Microsoft would need to be honourable and either play ball to the expectations of the organisations it has voluntarily joined up to, OR, leave and go on its own. How much politicking goes on in these organisations, however, and against Microsoft? ... But thinking, thinking.)

Mark

I hope you recovered your composure sufficiently last night to get a good nights sleep. I will ignore Peters' response to this thread because the subject of his post was specifically Microsoft and the EU anti-trust case and not a generic anti-trust debate. The justification for Anti-trust regulation as an issue is anathema to an objectivist and has been hacked to death over the last hundred years anyway. As far as I am concerned the Microsoft case is far more interesting than almost any other anti-trust issue.

Perhaps I should amend my previous post statement to more properly reflect my view.

"Wouldn't it be grand if 'my' idealistic concept of capitalism really worked?"

I don't think we have any great disagreement on the principle involved here. What I expect from Capitalism is that it generate not only economic growth, and not only competitive markets but also that it stimulate creativity and ideas that enhance the marketplace through that competition. I don't support regulation by any political body but I do support the creation of industry standards, created by voluntary associations to define the ground rules for protocols and principles of operation that enable effective competition within a common platform. This of course is already the case throughout the engineering world and certainly networking standards are critical to the operational success of the Internet.

My biggest gripe with Microsoft is that it seems to believe that because of its' market size it has the right to circumvent standards agreed to by members of International Standards Organisations that it is also a member of and then to try and impose its own version of that protocol on the organisation, with the avowed intention of further locking individuals and companies into being dependent on Microsoft products. I.e. making the Microsoft version the standard. You might argue that this could be a good thing if the Microsoft option was the best technical solution to implement but as the old song goes 'it ain't necessarily so"! There are many examples where the commercial secrecy surrounding Microsoft Application Programming Interface specifications prevents access to the PC marketplace by otherwise technically superior competitive products. Many highly regarded network and security professionals with Libertarian leanings e.g. Bruce Schneier, chief technology officer for network-monitoring service BT Counterpane Internet Security http://www.schneier.com/ and Eric Raymond, http://www.catb.org/~esr/ , a leading architect of the open source philosophy are on record criticising Microsoft attempts at lock-in.

As far as 'common sense' is concerned I agree that this is a subjective statement. I certainly don't subscribe to the Peter Dunne school of thought. I fully intended that statement to mean my version of common sense regarding this emotive topic. I also have what I consider a common sense approach to global warming and organized religion. Perhaps reasonable and rational might be a better description of my admittedly personal view. One that is like many objectivist pillars not shared by the majority of people on the planet.

There are many examples I could give from daily experience where Microsoft deviation from industry accepted standards creates unnecessary technical obstruction e.g. lack of support for TLS encryption or Outlooks aversion to self-signed SSL certificates on an Intranet. Most recently Microsoft Vista has withdrawn support for tunnel mode Ipsec VPN connectivity even though there is a worldwide consensus of its merit in comparison to transport mode and an installed base of many thousands of non Microsoft VPN servers working well with Windows XP. What do the owners of those servers do when Windows XP is no longer available? There are other ways but they should not be necessary.

In my ideal world view, freedom would prevail in every aspect of our society provided it does not cause harm to any third party. Microsoft has adopted predatory marketing practices that are undeniably injurious to the free market for computer technology.

Far from being a iconic example of Capitalism working, I believe Microsoft gives Capitalism a bad name.

Tony Farrell

However, okay, apparently its shit - well then make better shit and sell me that.

That's kinda the point I was trying to make about the decision by Dell et all to sell pre-installed Linux systems. GNU/Linux OSs are better shit than Windows. They don't compete with Windows in part because of Microsoft's dominance in the decisions of PC hardware manufacturers. But with big companies seeing a potential market for Linux systems, hardware manufacturers will respond to market pressures. The consequence is that the 'ease of use' perception (one of Windows big advantages) of Linux improves because complicated hardware compatibility fixes become unnecessary. I was providing an example of how much better the market can cope when not interfered with.

Frankly, that is addressing the issue. I've shown that the supposed 'problem' being addressed by the ruling does not in fact exist. And if it did, I've provided examples of the market sorting itself out.

OH this dreadful: 'the EU action is awful, BUT Ms make crappy shit, ergo ... and on and on'. You're missing the point, and it's the techies out there who are the worst, because you are as blinded by your 'emotion' on this issue, as I have professed to be over animals in the Vick thread.

Okay, it's shit, this Microsoft stuff (well apparently, personally, it allows me to make a handsome income, I've never had a computer crash since I went to XP, and I love their shit - I find it easy to use, and it does everything I, as a businessman, require of it). However, okay, apparently its shit - well then make better shit and sell me that. But don't go justifying the seeking out and destruction by central government agencies of an innovative company such as Ms just because they're not making the shit that you like. Make your own shit. And can I say there are many forms of innovation, including in marketing, including product type - Word: brilliant, etc. Microsoft is an innovative company, one of the best.

But no one, no one, is holding a gun to your head and making you use their shit. End.

(Jesus you guys, I'm drowning in shit here. Enough of this shit.)

[Edit: ah, yes, what Peter said below me. Bet me to the draw. That's good shit Peter.] 

I had a private bet with myself that instead of discussing the immorality of antitrust, the pathetic idealist chimera of "pure and perfect competition," and the hatred of success manifested in this and decisions like it, we'd instead see discussion quickly degenerate into irrelevant bitching about Microsoft vs Linux vs etc., etc., etc.,

Perhaps I really should have put money on people's ability to avoid the issue right in front of their nose.

Cheers, Peter Cresswell

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'NOT PC.'
**Setting Brushfires In People's Minds**

ORGANON ARCHITECTURE
**Integrating Architecture With Your Site**

I was up until 0300 today debugging an installer failure on Windows Vista. The self-same installer was built on Vista using the WiX toolkit, and works fine on every version of Windows I've tried it on except Vista, even going back as far as Windows ME.

It should go without saying that no-one should be subject to anti-trust action, and that the EU officials crowing about MSs loss of market share should be strung up from the nearest tree. But I have to say that the fact that some people hold up MS as a shining example of innovation still boggles my mind ...

---
Buy and wear InfidelGear - 100% of all InfidelGear profit goes to SOLO!

Anthony, your post below really irked me by the time I'd taken myself off to bed, on a deeper level than my initial retort (below) to it would imply. Here's why.

Firstly, to round out my final argument below: quoting from your post:

No freedom loving individual would support the actions of the EU anti-trust legislators

and,

Wouldn't it be grand if the idealistic concept of capitalism really worked?

I took your first statement to mean that you include yourself in the set of 'freedom loving individuals', but, I take your last comment as a very real condemnation of capitalism: you do not believe it can work as an economic system. Thus the nub of my conundrum with you: these two statements fundamentally contradict one another on the level of basic premises, which has the result of knocking out any further of the arguments you raise, for me, which I took to be pronouncements from a bed of shifting sand. (I'm still thinking on Reed's statements, but moving away from his position also).

However, (back to tfar), it was not so much this that got under my skin. That started with your statement:

In an ideal world common sense would prevail

Taking the second part first, I have grown to be very wary of anybody who starts throwing arguments at me based on 'common sense'. We have a politician in NZ, Peter Dunne, who got himself and his party elected on this entire nebulous concept, but what does it mean? Well in his case it means taking money from my wallet to institute on me and NZ society 'his' version of common sense - it is by its very nature, regulatory. An economy governed by 'common sense' is an economy 'governed': this starts moving dangerously toward arguments of subjectivity over an objectively viewable, real world, but I will let this stand for now.

Your first statement above is the one that presses all the wrong buttons in me; 'in an ideal world'. And you talk again in your last sentence of the idealistic concept of capitalism. There is something in this akin to my 'common sense' concerns above, but also something much more basic to do with premises again. I don't believe in an 'ideal' world as I think you mean it, as there is no such thing as an ideal world that we can all share: for example, in my ideal world, my wife does all the chores, needless to say, however, in my wife's ideal world ... To use 'ideal' the way you have used it against Microsoft, you inevitably mean to regulate Microsoft to 'your' conception of an ideal Microsoft, making the products that you want, and by doing so you deny the freedom of markets. Again, there is a huge amount of capital sweeping around the world: there is nothing to stop a company using this to create a completely different concept of computing, and using this to beat Microsoft at its own marketing game.

But my point is, I don't want someone's conception of an 'ideal world' legislated for at a government level imposed on me: I want a 'free world' in which I can strive for my 'ideals', and to be a free world, returning this whole argument back to where it started, basic premises, for me it must be unregulated, laissez-faire capitalism, (which denotes a justice system to enforce contract, etc). Any alternative to this involves regulation, and thus someone pulling 'my' strings.

I extend industry standards with value-added functionality.
You make proprietary changes to the standard.
He 'subverts the ... standard'.

tfar, I find your post to be very confusing, and contradictory.

Microsoft works tirelessly to influence the freedom to survive of any alternative technology. Its' actions are not competitive, they are destructive. In an ideal world common sense would prevail and the virtual monopoly that Microsoft enjoys on the computer desktop would be the result of informed choice. Just look at the recent effort to subvert the process of creating an open XML document standard for office applications to see how desperate the battle has become to stifle competition and prevent good alternative technologies from rising up in the marketplace.

I don't understand this argument at all. Why should Microsoft have to produce a product that is open for competing products to build on or profit from? It might benefit you as a customer that this were so, but that doesn't mean Microsoft has to bind itself to your convenience or that of its competitors, unless it sees profit in it, and thus does so voluntarily. Competing products have the full freedom to market their own 'complete' systems, and they do so, as you later admit: on your x86 laptop, you can remove Windows - ergo, by your own admittance, Microsoft does not have a monopoly. The market, left alone, will ultimately see the solution that best serves Microsoft's customerbase, otherwise it will not go on retaining their business.

In the context you argue from, your 'ideal world', can only be a State controlled world, in this case controlled by the jackboot of the EU.

I don't like the EU approach but I don't like the Microsoft philosophy either. Wouldn't it be grand if the idealistic concept of capitalism really worked?

With your lack of belief in capitalism, of course you will opt for control over freedom. And, that, sadly, is the problem. For me, I believe that capitalism is the economic system consistent with freedom: as you seem to be a freedom lover, what are you advocating? Where does the state control in 'your' system stop?

No freedom loving individual would support the actions of the EU anti-trust legislators and jurists prosecuting Microsoft. The overwhelming competitive success that Microsoft has enjoyed is in many ways synonymous with the success that Al Gore has had selling man made global warming.

The masses don't know any better and as long as they don't mind paying they should be allowed to continue to do so.

However to paint the picture that Microsoft is some sort of capitalist icon, working to produce the finest products at the fairest free market prices for the ultimate benefit of the informed computer buying public is even more of a fantasy than Mark Hubbards daydream.

Microsoft works tirelessly to influence the freedom to survive of any alternative technology. Its' actions are not competitive, they are destructive. In an ideal world common sense would prevail and the virtual monopoly that Microsoft enjoys on the computer desktop would be the result of informed choice. Just look at the recent effort to subvert the process of creating an open XML document standard for office applications to see how desperate the battle has become to stifle competition and prevent good alternative technologies from rising up in the marketplace.

Have you tried to buy an x86 laptop without Windows recently? In my case it's the first thing to be removed so obviously they don't have a monopoly as far as I'm concerned. For many others it's not so easy. If it was a truly fine quality product instead of the cosmetically enhanced version of the quick and dirty operating system it started off as I wouldn't mind keeping it.

Let's not forget that if it was up to Microsoft this site would not exist in it's current form. We would all be paying Bill and Steve a client licence fee for the privilege of airing our views. There would be no Google and certainly no Wikipaedia. Steve Balmer was very clear in his condemnation of a software development philosophy like Open Source that allows products like the Apache web server; the Mysql database and the Drupal CMS to compete with his arguably mediocre offerings.

I don't like the EU approach but I don't like the Microsoft philosophy either. Wouldn't it be grand if the idealistic concept of capitalism really worked?

If Msoft truly had a monopoly then there wouldn't be an iMac an iBook and a triple boot (XP/Ubuntu/custom LinuxFromScratch distro) PC in my house.

I stand by my evaluation of Msoft's product Windows being an inelegant, clunky, bloated, disgrace. The most commonly cited reason for Windows current popularity is 'ease of use'. Ha! It's not Windows itself that makes it 'easy to use' it's their business success (and yes, good on them ra ra ra!).

The most common complaint about Linux is hardware compatibility, hardware manufacturers just don't give a fig if their product works with Linux or not. And why should they? It is worth expending effort and resources ensuring compatibility with Windows because otherwise no one would want to buy their hardware, but Linux is such a tiny market that it isn't currently feasible. Getting some types and brands of hardware to work with Linux is a nightmare (ATI video cards for instance) that could be easily solved at the hardware manufacturers end, but for now there is no incentive for them.

The thing is though, this is changing, albeit slowly. Without any government intervention; HP, Dell, and IBM have seen potential profits in selling pre-installed Linux machines. The flow on effect is that they in turn put pressure on hardware manufacturers by only using components that support Linux out of the box, if hardware manufacturers want their product to be used in those machines they need to ensure compatibility, and there's the incentive. All of a sudden it becomes economically viable to expend effort and resources making Linux friendly hardware.

So what happens now? Linux systems overcome the hardware hurdle because companies like IBM Dell and HP (bless their socks) have responded to a small but growing consumer demand for Linux. Linux is now an easy to use, stable and secure OS. Msoft might respond with some low down dirty tactics (patent trawling, buying off standards votes, but hey business isn't meant to be friendly), but they are also likely to work hard to improve their product, lower its pricing or completely alter their business model, who knows?

But it will be capitalism in action, and will deliver better results than any government interference.