the customer is NOT free to buy someone else's product. That is exactly what it means if a company has a monopoly position in a market.

How come millions of people use Linux, BSD, Mac OS X and every other operating system on the planet if they "NOT free to buy someone else's product"? Is there a secret police that will punish you if you refuse to use Microsoft's OS?

These are the definitions that I was using in my post:
Monopoly: when a company, by convincing people that it is in their self-interest to buy the company's product, comes to dominate a market. A monopoly in a free market is still subjected to market forces because if it tries to abuse their customers, it will become profitable for others to invest in building a competing product. Microsoft is an example.
Coersive Monopoly: when a company, usually by leveraging a government, physically forces all competition to stop competing. Free from market forces, it is can exploit as much as it pleases, and people must either put up with the abuse or do without the product. Examples include: The Dutch and British East India Companies, AT&T, Government -sponsered Power companies.

Once they have nearly the entire market there is no motivation to "get more of the market". The company no longer cares what the customer wants. Now their motivations are (A)maximizing how much the existing customers pay, (B)preventing customers from leaving, and (C)taking over new markets.

A company's motivation is never "to get more of the market." It is always a company's goal to make a profit; otherwise no one would invest in that company. I bet a company that charged $5.00 for a quality car that cost $10,000 to make would very quickly "get more of the market"; however, this would not be very good business sense. "But," you say, "Once they have driven all the other auto manufacurers out of business, they will be free to exploit up the wazoo!" On the contrairy, although it would be stupid for anyone to try to compete with someone who sold new cars for $5.00, as soon as that person raises prices at or above previous levels, it will become profitable for other people to invest that market. The more they try to "exploit", the quicker they will loose their monopoly position. Having a (non-coersive) monopoly does not protect a company from market forces; if the value they provided people turns to harm, people will turn to other choices, which will rapidly be created if they do not exist already (people with capital are always looking for ways to make a profit). A corollary to making a profit is satisfying the customer; if you cannot suite his needs, he will seek another way to get what he wants (creating an opportunity for profit and competition).

When Internet explorer came out Netscape was considered by most people to be the better browser.

Also, when Internet Explorer came out, not many people used it. IE began to pull even (or ahead, depending on who you ask) at about v4.0, which, coincidentally, is when Netscape began to loose the war.

Microsoft has carefully kept prices maintainably inflated, hiding the costs in the price of hardware purchases...

If Microsoft's "price inflation" is not enough to make people care about it, then, on the whole, how could you claim that it is harming consumers? I do not consider Window's price ($100-$200) inflated because it provides me great value--reasonable stability, speed, and ease of use and access to software created by Windows developers. If I was not satisfied with what I was getting for my money, I would choose another product and so would nearly every other consumer.

-Andrew