The WSJ story talked about how Apple had designed a variant already, but were unhappy that so much design was being sold to other companies. It looks like they want to design their own extension of the ARM and gain a real competitive advantage. Certain aspects include better power consumption, network interface, handwriting recognition, and more horsepower. There is some speculation that it will also bleed over to the desktop design. Maybe they are getting tired of using commodity hardware and want to differentiate themselves from Dell.

Wow. Just wow. When I used influence in my post, I was using it in a particular sense, covered in both the OED and Black's, that was clear in context. The fact that you had to use an adjective in front of the word to change its meaning should clue you in. I was also referring to price setting, not bundling, which are two entirely different concepts in US antitrust law. If you had read the opinion, you would know that bundling is what got MS in trouble. There was little to no discussion on price. As far as how courts use influence, you may want to be careful about assuming courts have any single meaning of a word in mind at any time. They rarely do. Anyway, I'll quit now.

There is a limit to what people are willing to pay, even for a monopoly product. Monopoly rents aren't infinite.

Influence does not mean dictate. As I clearly explained in my post, influence by offering the same product directly at a lower price. I'm also curious if you ever read the court of appeals opinion? Or are you parroting summaries from the internet?

No. The harm is generally the conversion of consumer surplus into monopoly rent. It has nothing to do with any rights in any Hofeldian or legal sense. It has more to do with the economic theory of monopolies and efficient markets. And, depending on your theory of rights (the one you seem to be trying to assert was valid under Lochner, but has been frowned upon since the 1940's), there will always be a conflict somewhere. Congress decided that the more efficient solution in this case is the best solution, and that's why we look at the harm to consumers.

Right, I read the article. That still doesn't answer the question, who got hurt? What is the economic theory underlying that statute?

It seems equally absurd that MS can't influence the price between the store and end consumer. They can certainly do it indirectly by selling through their website directly to consumers. So why not allow them to coordinate broad promotional rates?

I don't understand what the theory of harm here is. MS was obviously attempting to capture more of its monopoly rent, but there are other ways to do so that aren't illegal, so I'm not sure what point this particular law serves. Why is it bad for retailers and suppliers to set prices? Don't large internet retailers help set market prices in a de facto sense, anyway? If MS sells the suite directly from its website, doesn't that cap what a retailers can charge? European antitrust law is confusing. I wonder what the additional compliance costs are? Is Germany's desire to protect small retailers worth how those costs?

In the United States, anti-trust law usually will look at harm to consumers. Harm to competition is good. Of course, a monopoly makes things a little different. Even with a monopoly and predatory pricing, though, you have to show how that will monetize the harm later on down the road. Predatory pricing is rarely effective because it is so hard to make more money in the long run. This case isn't predatory pricing per se, but I think the theory of harm is generally the same. Anyways, European countries generally have a very different view of antitrust law and the US does, and are much more willing to use it to accomplish abstract concepts of fairness and social justice, as opposed to regulating a market for the benefit of consumers.

I stop cold turkey for awhile, so that my tolerance isn't so high. I like getting some effect from one cup, and I can definitely build up quite a tolerance. If I can find some time where nothing critical is due, I'll go without and take tylenol to fight the symptoms. Drinking lots of water seems to help, too.

It was a 12B6, so they didn't rule on anything as a matter of fact, just a matter of law, right? This ruling was just that a legal claim had been stated, but there hasn't been any discovery or fact finding, has there?

There are critics out there for Linux. But how many of them offer quality criticism, instead of complaining? And there are developers out there who are willing to listen to quality criticism, but how many of the few critics out there comment on any specific piece of software that goes into a complete Linux system? Both sides could do more- critics could write white papers with suggested corrections. Developers could take the "Linux sux" as an indication that they need a top down audit of their project. But both of those solutions are asking too much of either side. There should be better practices on both sides. And of course, this all ignores the good work on both sides that are being done, where there is constructive criticism and receptive developers. You can always use more of both, so there is never enough of either.

for Congress re-writing the law in a comprehensive matter. If Congress does so, courts have to defer to the new laws. With the USPTO doing it, every rule change will be heavily scrutinized by courts, and it will take years of start and stop rule making to come up with an ad hoc, disjointed rule set. But at least someone is doing something.

It's good to see that the White House thinks cyber security is important enough to move it into the Whitehouse, where they will be closer to the President and better prepared for power struggles. On the other, wasn't DHS supposed to cut through all the bullshit of turf wars to make us secure, or at least more so? If they can't do so, what justifies the new cabinet position and the accompanying increase in government size?

I'm really enjoying Safari 3, but I can't use IE 8, so I don't know how they compare. However, for the things I actually use a browser for, I'm not sure IE 8 matches Safari. Speed, standards compliance, etc. I like some of the new things Safari offers, like the preview of your most visited sites when you open a new tab, but for me the most important things are speed and stability. Obviously, using a beta I'm giving up a bit of stability, but I love how fast it works. Maybe when MS changes its rendering engine there will be a more accurate comparison.