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Microsoft breached antitrust rules by bundling Teams and Office, EU says

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Re: Microsoft breached antitrust rules by bundling Teams and Office, EU says

#21
post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is far from a novel question. There is extensive statute and case law in this area across many jurisdictions. You could start at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Competition_law

Sure, I'm well aware of antitrust laws, the Sherman Act, etc. If you want to look at it from that angle, what are the consumer concerns being violates by Teams being bundled and potentially replacing Zoom that was previously used? Teams isn't forced on Office users and Zoom isn't prevented, consumers still can choose.

Again, the answer to your question is well established. Linked from the page I linked you previously:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tying_(commerce)

""" The company doing this bundling may have a significantly large market share so that it may impose the tie on consumers, despite the forces of market competition. The tie may also harm other companies in the market for the tied good, or who sell only single components.

One effect of tying can be that low quality products achieve a higher market share than would otherwise be the case. """

> ...Zoom isn't prevented, consumers still can choose.

Only until Zoom fails because consumers who would have otherwise used Zoom were forced to pay for Teams instead because the price for Teams was bundled into the price for Office. At least, that's the argument.

To be clear, I'm not myself arguing either way. But the reason for the case is clear and it is disingenuous to pretend that it doesn't exist.

Re: Microsoft breached antitrust rules by bundling Teams and Office, EU says

#24
You could make this argument about any bundling.

All of the 365 products as well as similar from Adobe etc have been bundled in ways to lock out competition. Even Spotify is planning to.

At some point EU needs to bring clarity to their competition laws and decide what they want the landscape to look like. Because right now they are just making up the rules as they go.

Re: Microsoft breached antitrust rules by bundling Teams and Office, EU says

#25

Why is it okay for Office to include Word, Excel, or PowerPoint but not a chat application? Does the EU get to decide what is reasonably considered part of a productivity suite? Or is the only requirement that a competitor complains? This sure seems to say it's illegal to bundle any products together if a competitor for one of the products complains about it.

Teams is deeply integrated with Office (including OneDrive for file storage/sharing, Outlook for meetings), more than any other Chat App... I guess it's a good thing in general but it's also an unfair competitive advantage (using "priviledged API" I think)

Re: Microsoft breached antitrust rules by bundling Teams and Office, EU says

#27

You could make this argument about any bundling. All of the 365 products as well as similar from Adobe etc have been bundled in ways to lock out competition. Even Spotify is planning to. At some point EU needs to bring clarity to their competition laws and decide what they want the landscape to look like. Because right now they are just making up the rules as they go.

It's legal to bundle products. It's not legal to use a monopoly in one area to leverage your way into another market.

Re: Microsoft breached antitrust rules by bundling Teams and Office, EU says

#29

You could make this argument about any bundling. All of the 365 products as well as similar from Adobe etc have been bundled in ways to lock out competition. Even Spotify is planning to. At some point EU needs to bring clarity to their competition laws and decide what they want the landscape to look like. Because right now they are just making up the rules as they go.

I will be the last person to ever say Adobe is above criticism, but until Adobe creates an entire AdobeOS, I’m not sure they’re in the same league as MS here

Re: Microsoft breached antitrust rules by bundling Teams and Office, EU says

#30
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Blurry lines and gray areas in law? Absolutely, I'd rather not accidentally break a law that is only defined after the fact in court.

No do you have real problems with blurry laws in your country? (If so is this country in the EU?)

This is a really strange way to attempt to silence my opinion.

Yes I do have issues with blurry laws. My current country is not in the EU, though until recently I was a resident of an EU country also with blurry laws. Am I allowed to have an opinion now?

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