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Comment by criley2 | Hacker News Reader

Microsoft's crime was doing it in the 90s. What Apple has done with iOS and OSX takes Microsoft's bundling, third-party lockout and lack of consumer choice to an exponential level, and it's celebrated as a feature now. iOS literally disallows any other browser technology from running, requiring them all to use less-featured versions of the first party tool. Microsoft must be jealous seeing them get away with that.

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Microsoft's crime was doing this in the 90s when they had nearly complete control of the desktop market and there were few alternatives for getting on the internet. This was a monopoly.

Apple has about half the mobile market share in the US, and about a quarter globally. There are plenty of alternative ways to get on the internet. This is not a monopoly.

You can't just look at bundling the browser with the OS in isolation. The circumstances are significantly different.

And that's why I regard anti-trust laws as inconsistently applied cudgels and not as legal gospel. If tying (assuming there's a consistent definition of the word) is such a bad idea to begin with why does it matter whether it's done by a company at 90% or 10% of market? Equality under the law should be the measure.

> If tying (assuming there's a consistent definition the word) is such a bad idea to begin with why does it matter whether it's done by a company at 90% or 10% of market? Equality under the law should be the measure.

There is nothing inherently wrong with tying, which you might also call "bundling." Quoting from the FTC's website:

Offering products together as part of a package can benefit consumers who like the convenience of buying several items at the same time. Offering products together can also reduce the manufacturer's costs for packaging, shipping, and promoting the products. Of course, some consumers might prefer to buy products separately, and when they are offered only as part of a package, it can be more difficult for consumers to buy only what they want.

For competitive purposes, a monopolist may use forced buying, or "tie-in" sales, to gain sales in other markets where it is not dominant and to make it more difficult for rivals in those markets to obtain sales. This may limit consumer choice for buyers wanting to purchase one ("tying") product by forcing them to also buy a second ("tied") product as well. Typically, the "tied" product may be a less desirable one that the buyer might not purchase unless required to do so, or may prefer to get from a different seller. If the seller offering the tied products has sufficient market power in the "tying" product, these arrangements can violate the antitrust laws.

https://www.ftc.gov/tips-advice/competition-guidance/guide-a...

Like how Apple bundled iTunes and forced streaming competitors onto uneven playing fields with the 30% tax to dominate online music sales, bundled the App Store and banned competing stores to ensure no competition, bundled Safari and banned competing tech, bundled Podcasts to help outcompete others in an area they want more growth, etc

It's only anti-trust when companies people don't like do it.

The difference is that Apple is selling hardware with software as a single product and has done so consistently, while Microsoft attempted to exclude a new competitor by colluding with OEMs and imposing exclusionary agreements on partners as a condition of buying Windows, a product that had a dominant share in its market. If Microsoft had always included Internet Explorer in Windows and hadn't tried to later tie them together in order to crush Netscape then the outcome may have been different. Instead, Microsoft basically said "distribute our new product or we won't let you distribute Windows" and you just can't do that when Windows is dominant.

The Justice Department's complaint is an eye-opening view into what Microsoft's misconduct was: https://www.justice.gov/atr/complaint-us-v-microsoft-corp

Not trying to defend Microsoft’s behavior here by any means but the justice department clearly lost the case. The original favorable ruling splitting up Microsoft was conclusively rejected by the court of appeals on almost all points. The general consensus of the academic commentary on the case I have seen( not universal by any means) is that asserting that Windows is itself a monopoly is problematic; mainly due to the lack of evidence that demand for windows is not influenced by pricing.

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