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Novell Settles One Antitrust Claim with Microsoft for $536 Million

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Novell has announced an agreement with Microsoft to settle potential antitrust litigation related to Novell's NetWare operating system in exchange for $536 million in cash. Novell also announced that by the end of this week it will file an antitrust suit against Microsoft in the United States District Court in Utah seeking unspecified damages in connection with alleged harm to Novell's WordPerfect application software business in the mid-1990s. (Thanks to Stuart Cunningham)
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Novell Settles One Antitrust Claim with Microsoft for $536 Million

Posted Nov 8, 2004 22:18 UTC (Mon) by thompsot (guest, #12368) [Link]

Nice to see Microsoft finally contributing to the development of Linux. It warms the heart. :)

Novell Settles One Antitrust Claim with Microsoft for $536 Million

Posted Nov 10, 2004 7:56 UTC (Wed) by stock (subscriber, #5849) [Link]

Think again :

"R.I.P. SuSE GMBH"
http://groups.google.com/groups?as_umsgid=pan.2004.11.01....

So how good a company is Novell actually? Try reading this :

"Digital Research The Untold Story"
http://www.ctyme.com/dri.htm

For me the pattern here is clear : The big US Software Corporations have
seen Linux emerge from Finland, QT/KDE from Trolltech in Norway. They are
on a mission, and for me one thing is clear now : Linux, OSS and the
possible rise of a global European Software Valley is inside their
cross-hairs.

Robert

Novell Settles One Antitrust Claim with Microsoft for $536 Million

Posted Nov 9, 2004 2:50 UTC (Tue) by AnswerGuy (subscriber, #1256) [Link]

I have mixed feelings on this. On the one hand Microsoft is a convicted
monopolist and the half Bil. that they're forking over to settle is a
relatively small portion of their ill-gotten gains. Novell was injured
by Microsoft's use of their desktop monopoly to leverage into file
and print servers.

However, filing another lawsuit on WordPerfect before the ink is dry on
this settlement. It's obviously queuing up for seconds at the feeding
trough. It's just plain piggish.

What irks me more is the certaintly that there are dozens, perhaps
hundreds of other products which were equally harmed by Microsoft's
anti-competitive practices who will never see a time for it. It takes
multi-million dollar retainers to stand a chance of eking a settlement
out of it.

However, it is some comfort to know that Novell's current interests
will assuredly put some of that money into the wallets of some fine
open source developers, and that the Linux community will be bolstered
by some of those developments.

JimD

Novell Settles One Antitrust Claim with Microsoft for $536 Million

Posted Nov 9, 2004 4:53 UTC (Tue) by dlang (subscriber, #313) [Link]

I think that each lawsuit that's won makes it easier for the next (if nothing else lawyers become more willing to work on retainer when they see others winning what's essentially the same case)

it's still going to be a while before cases of this size make a noticable dent in microsoft, the the changeing perception of them as they keep being convicted of misdeeds is good

Novell Settles One Antitrust Claim with Microsoft for $536 Million

Posted Nov 9, 2004 8:05 UTC (Tue) by Wol (guest, #4433) [Link]

We have loads of evidence that MS engages in dirty tricks. What's wrong with calling them on it? If MS fought fair, then they might have a fair claim that Novell are playing foul. But as I see it, Novell are simply fighting back with exactly the same sort of trick that MS would have used in their position. Sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander.

And it's my firm belief that, just as many other programs were harmed, WordPerfect were destroyed by MS's "dirty tricks" department. I know people say WP5.2Win was a dog - we used it extensively and never had much trouble. But we had nightmares with WP6.

Somewhat "by coincidence", we ran 5.2 on Win3.1, and 6.0 on WFWG ... when we ran 6.0 on Win3.1 it was fine ... I think you can lay pretty much all the trouble with both 5.2 and 6.0 at the feet of WFWG.

And what about 6.1 with MS Office 95? If you installed Office 95 over 6.1, WordPerfect just stopped working. The only way I ever found to get it working again was to "treedel c:\windows" and re-install. Do you *really* believe MS would not have spotted something like that in QA?

Cheers,
Wol

Novell Settles One Antitrust Claim with Microsoft for $536 Million

Posted Nov 9, 2004 11:21 UTC (Tue) by petegn (guest, #847) [Link]

Do you *really* believe MS would not have spotted something like that in QA?

Almost certainly do there aint a bug in windBloZe that thry are not aware of
and if there is they are few and far between it is all engineered to continue the extraction of moneys from the gullable masses of the computer using world .

That is why the ones that have gotten in touch with there brains are all dumping windBloZe and switching to Linux .

The more cases that can be built against M$ Corp the better if they are in the courts 24/7 all the better they will be broke one way or another and if people dont like the idea then basically tough ..

Pete .

Novell Settles One Antitrust Claim with Microsoft for $536 Million

Posted Nov 9, 2004 14:25 UTC (Tue) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]

Almost certainly do there aint a bug in windBloZe that thry are not aware of
So what you're saying is that MS's software developers are all-knowing ultra-brilliant programmers?

Sorry, but the generally low quality of MS's software indicates strongly that this argument is hogwash. :)

Novell Settles One Antitrust Claim with Microsoft for $536 Million

Posted Nov 9, 2004 16:54 UTC (Tue) by maney (subscriber, #12630) [Link]

However, filing another lawsuit on WordPerfect before the ink is dry on this settlement. It's obviously queuing up for seconds at the feeding trough. It's just plain piggish.

So what do you think they should do? Accept the token payment for the part of the legal issues - the whole of which they've been trying to settle out of court, it says in the article - that MS was willing to settle for and piss off the rest of it? That you think it piggish for Novell to stand up to MS for the latter's anticompetitive actions says more about you than about Novell, I have to think. What's next - blaming WordPerfect for being such a juicy target for Microsoft's dirty tricks?

Pfui.

Novell Settles One Antitrust Claim with Microsoft for $536 Million

Posted Nov 9, 2004 14:34 UTC (Tue) by greve (subscriber, #8385) [Link]

I have to say that I am fairly sure that Microsoft knew who it was giving so much money to and that they have calculated that the benefit outweighs the price.

It clearly weakens the European Commission case at an important point in time and -- should they lose it -- would leave the EC much weakened to enforce antitrust ruling the next time, as there would be too much precedence against them.

Novell Settles One Antitrust Claim with Microsoft for $536 Million

Posted Nov 9, 2004 15:02 UTC (Tue) by dmantione (guest, #4640) [Link]

Yes, however, the court will decide soon about suspension of the penalties. It's likely too late to interfere here. I do not expect very positive news for Microsoft. In that case there is no point for Microsoft to continue the case.

However, if he rules in favour of Microsoft, the EU will have a few years of proceedings without much support ahead.

Novell Settles One Antitrust Claim with Microsoft for $536 Million

Posted Nov 10, 2004 12:56 UTC (Wed) by greve (subscriber, #8385) [Link]

> It is too likely to interfere here.

True. The timing is -- as usual for Microsoft -- perfect.

Just before the judge is to announce the decision and with not enough time to do anything about it. But there are still those in the case that have been influencing it quite a bit before and will keep doing what they can:

http://mailman.fsfeurope.org/pipermail/press-release/2004...

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