Audio Primer: FAQ about the Economics of the Stateless Society

[Borodog]

In an attempt to nip some of the Government of the Gaps argumentum ad ignorantium objections to anarchocapitalism (or, to use a new term I picked up from this very lecture that I really like, free market anarchy) anyone interested in the subject, even if only to argue against it, might like to take a listen to this lecture from the Mises Institute:

FAQ about the Economincs of the Stateless Society (http://www.mises.org/multimedia/mp3/MU2005/mu05-Murphy3.mp3)

[Zygote]

don't you think anti-monopoly laws are important?

[Borodog]

No. Monopolies can only arise with the aid of government.

[Zygote]

[ QUOTE ]

No. Monopolies can only arise with the aid of government.

[/ QUOTE ]

did microsoft rise as a monopoly because the government aided them in doing so?

[Bork]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

No. Monopolies can only arise with the aid of government.

[/ QUOTE ]

did microsoft rise as a monopoly because the government aided them in doing so?

[/ QUOTE ]

I imagine they would not be able to do what they did without the government enforcing copyright laws.

[Borodog]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

No. Monopolies can only arise with the aid of government.

[/ QUOTE ]

did microsoft rise as a monopoly because the government aided them in doing so?

[/ QUOTE ]

Perhaps you are unaware of the definition of "monopoly." Microsoft isn't one.

[maurile]

[ QUOTE ]
don't you think anti-monopoly laws are important?

[/ QUOTE ]
No.

Other than in the case of "natural monopolies" (e.g., utility companies), there's never been a case of an actual monopoly that existed without government support. Standard Oil had been the classic example, but that has been debunked.

(Microsoft is not a monopoly, and the antitrust case against it did not allege that Microsoft is a monopoly.)

In the case of natural monopolies, there's going to be a monopoly with or without government involvement; and whether government involvement tends to do more harm than good in such cases is a disputed question.

[jthegreat]

I'm going to assume, before listening, that this FAQ will assume that everyone behaves rationally, or at least conveniently ignore the irrational bents of prejudiced rich people.

Now I will listen and see if I'm right.

[jthegreat]

LOL in case of war, I take out an insurance premium... hilarious. Boy I sure hope the enemy leaves my insurance company in place!

[jthegreat]

Okay, well this guy doesn't ignore it. He freely admits that under AC, gross human rights violations would occur. He just says that he thinks they would be temporary.

Right.

The main problem with AC is this. Human beings don't live very long as individuals. We get about 100 years and that's it. That's not a very long time to learn everything there is to learn. We, as a species, rely on things learned long before we individuals were ever born in order to be successful. Scientific principles discovered hundreds or thousands of years ago make our lives easier today because we abide by them.

The same could be, theoretically, true for ethics and politics. The Bill of Rights are amendments based on the knowledge that individual liberty makes a society more successful. It was a discovery about human nature that we survive *better* in a system of political and social liberty. Thus we design legal systems based on these principles that apply to the entire country and therefore protect *all* citizens around the country. This system helps protects the individual from the might of the majority should the majority go apeshit.

Take integration in the South, for example. To claim that the South would have been integrated faster in an AC system than by government intervention is ridiculous. There would be no "market pressure" for it to occur. It may have happened eventually, but certainly not at as fast a pace.

Human beings are often irrational. In large groups, this is even more common. Constitutional Democracy prevents the irrationality of a large group of people hurting the smaller group *much* better than an AC system *ever* could. The whim of the majority *rules* in AC. The end result would be, in *every* case, an agglomeration of small, extremely homogenous societies in which individualism is repressed and social conformity encouraged.

Constitutional Democracy, *by nature*, limits the damage potential of irrational large groups of people better than any anarchist system ever could.

[maurile]

[ QUOTE ]
Take integration in the South, for example. To claim that the South would have been integrated faster in an AC system than by government intervention is ridiculous.

[/ QUOTE ]
Segregation depended on government. The Jim Crow laws weren't a result of free markets.

[ QUOTE ]
There would be no "market pressure" for it to occur.

[/ QUOTE ]
Are you kidding? Businesses don't want to have to turn away customers. Nor do they want to incur additional costs associated with, for example, having separate railroad cars for people of different skin colors.

[Borodog]

[ QUOTE ]
blah blah blah

[/ QUOTE ]

You know, your handwaving and assertions will never constitute an argument.

It's pretty sad, actually. Integration in the South? You do realize segregation in the South was . . . the law? Put in place by the duly elected officials of a representative, constitutional democracy? The ones who hated blacks because they were used as puppets by the military dictatorships representing the party that had plundered or destroyed 90% of Southern wealth, and killed 1 in 4 of their fathers and grandfathers? Gosh. Constitutional government sure worked out great there, didn't it!

You haven't the foggiest idea of what you're talking about. "Constitutional democracy, by nature, limits the damage potential of irrational large groups of people" ? What a joke. Since you brought up the south, Abraham Lincoln violated the Constitution in practically every particular to invade a sovereign nation, wage total war on civilians, kill 700,000 people, intern 10,000 to 15,000 northern civilians in military prisons without charges or trials, shut down hundreds of northern newspapers by military force for criticizing his administration, arrested the entire Maryland legislature so they couldn't convene to discuss secession, created an entire State out of whole cloth so that he could install a puppet government to tighten the Republican hold on Congress (West Virginia), conducted election fraud on a massive scale to secure his reelection, including turning Democrats away from the poles with bayonets and issuing different colored ballots for the two parties, so that voters with the wrong color ballot could be arrested, created an income tax in direct violation of the Constitution, discovered dictatorial "war powers" not enumerated in the Constitution to justify all of this, all for the purpose of enacting his beloved "American System" of corporate welfare ("internal improvements subsidies"), high protectionist tariffs, and centralized banking and an inflationary fiat currency (his "greenbacks") to pay for it all, schemes that had been repeatedly beaten back and found unconstitutional for decades. All of this from one man. Where was the Constitution? Why didn't it protect the people? If the Constitution can't protect us from one mad dictator, how on EARTH do you think a piece of paper will protect a minority from a majority that is out to get them? The majority that is electing all of the officials, writing all the laws, passing the constitutional ammendments, appointing all of the judges, and hiring all the police?

Come back when you can construct a logical argument.

[Zygote]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

No. Monopolies can only arise with the aid of government.

[/ QUOTE ]

did microsoft rise as a monopoly because the government aided them in doing so?

[/ QUOTE ]

Perhaps you are unaware of the definition of "monopoly." Microsoft isn't one.

[/ QUOTE ]

they were a form of monopolistic competition: "An industry which is dominated by a single firm may allow the firm to act as a near-monopoly or "de facto monopoly"" (wikipedia)

[Zygote]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

No. Monopolies can only arise with the aid of government.

[/ QUOTE ]

did microsoft rise as a monopoly because the government aided them in doing so?

[/ QUOTE ]

I imagine they would not be able to do what they did without the government enforcing copyright laws.

[/ QUOTE ]

i agree.

[Zygote]

[ QUOTE ]


No. Monopolies can only arise with the aid of government.

[/ QUOTE ]

what about irrigation systems or other monopoly dependent structures? isn't there also good chances that very few insurance companies would evolve overwhelming central power and control?

i'm no expert in this area and am only questioning to learn.

[Borodog]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

No. Monopolies can only arise with the aid of government.

[/ QUOTE ]

did microsoft rise as a monopoly because the government aided them in doing so?

[/ QUOTE ]

Perhaps you are unaware of the definition of "monopoly." Microsoft isn't one.

[/ QUOTE ]

they were a form of monopolistic competition: "An industry which is dominated by a single firm may allow the firm to act as a near-monopoly or "de facto monopoly"" (wikipedia)

[/ QUOTE ]

Everything on wikipedia is not the Gospel, you know. How would "an industry which is dominated by a single firm . . . allow the firm to act as a near-monopoly or 'de facto monopoly'" ?

By what mechanisms does Microsoft prevent me from purchasing software from a competing company? By what mechanism does Microsoft coerce me into purchasing their products?

What is "near-monopoly" supposed to mean? Is that like "near-pregnant?"

[Borodog]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]


No. Monopolies can only arise with the aid of government.

[/ QUOTE ]

what about irrigation systems or other monopoly dependent structures? isn't there also good chances that very few insurance companies would evolve overwhelming central power and control?

i'm no expert in this area and am only questioning to learn.

[/ QUOTE ]

Irrigation systems? I'm not sure what you mean? I'm pretty sure I could go to a number of competing firms and purchase irrigation systems?

There's always the chance that competing insurance companies could "take over," but I don't think the market forces are exerted in that direction, and besides, with the alternative, the state, overwhelming central power and control is already in place.

[Zygote]

[ QUOTE ]

Irrigation systems? I'm not sure what you mean? I'm pretty sure I could go to a number of competing firms and purchase irrigation systems?

[/ QUOTE ]

firms can compete for who provides the water, but the pipping systems cannot be constantly changed because of market competition.

[madnak]

You mean the company who installs the pipe system is the only company capable of maintaining that system?

If I hire a pipe installation company that has created a pipe system that no other company can figure out or maintain, I suppose I'm stuck. Although, considering that regular old hobbyists can figure out and reverse engineer complicated hardward and software assemblies, I don't believe an "exclusive" pipe system is possible. If I get tired of Company A, I will start having Company B maintain those pipes.

[Borodog]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

Irrigation systems? I'm not sure what you mean? I'm pretty sure I could go to a number of competing firms and purchase irrigation systems?

[/ QUOTE ]

firms can compete for who provides the water, but the pipping systems cannot be constantly changed because of market competition.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm confused. Why would I want to constantly change the pipes in my irrigation system, from market competition or otherwise? I search the market, choose a company, have a system installed, and probably contract with that company for maintenance. If I find a better service provider I then contract with them. If my pipes reach the end of their economic lifespan (where maintenance costs are more than the cost of financing a new system), I replace the system, from possibly a different provider altogether.

[bearly]

i didn't know the govt. enforced copyright laws. i thought you had to hire an attorney to argue your case.......................b

[madnak]

An attorney can't throw you in jail. Or force you to pay a fine. Only the government can do that.

[maurile]

[ QUOTE ]
firms can compete for who provides the water, but the pipping systems cannot be constantly changed because of market competition.

[/ QUOTE ]
The provision of water, like the provision of electricity, is a natural monopoly because diseconomies of scale never overtake economies of scale.

Natural monopolies are not covered by current antitrust laws, so they are not relevant to Zygote's original question ("don't you think anti-monopoly laws are important?").

Nonetheless, they are an issue that anarcho-capitalists must address. Likewise, they are an issue that statists must address. It's not immediately obvious that governments are better or worse than anarcho-capitalism at handling natural monopoly issues -- either side can make its case only by getting into the issue in some depth.

[madnak]

[ QUOTE ]
The provision of water, like the provision of electricity, is a natural monopoly because diseconomies of scale never overtake economies of scale.

[/ QUOTE ]

Why is this? If I'm in a rural community, it seems more economical for me to draw water from my own well than for me to pay a monopoly to develop an infrastructure. No?

[Borodog]

[ QUOTE ]
The provision of water, like the provision of electricity, is a natural monopoly because diseconomies of scale never overtake economies of scale.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'd like to see this expanded, because I'm pretty sure I don't agree with it, but I'd like to see where you're coming from first.

The idea of "natural monopolies" becomes more and more inapplicable with continuing technological advance.

[maurile]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
The provision of water, like the provision of electricity, is a natural monopoly because diseconomies of scale never overtake economies of scale.

[/ QUOTE ]

Why is this? If I'm in a rural community, it seems more economical for me to draw water from my own well than for me to pay a monopoly to develop an infrastructure. No?

[/ QUOTE ]
I'm not an expert on well-digging, but I strongly doubt that digging a well is cheaper than laying some pipes. So Microsoft Water Company should be able to provide you water at a cost lower than having your own well.

If not, go ahead and dig your well.

The point is that it's unlikely that Microsoft Water Company and Standard Oil Water Company would compete for your business on even footing. Whichever company already has the infrastructure built in to your neighbors' properties will have a substantial cost advantage over the company that doesn't.

For any region served by a given water source, there's probably only one provider that will survive -- namely, whoever gets his infrastructure in there first. Once he's serving a few houses, the marginal cost of serving the neighboring houses will be much less for him than for any competitor who is starting from scratch.

This is not true for widget-manufacturing since the marginal cost of producing widgets is not forever decreasing. But for a few things (like providing water or electricity), marginal costs do seem to be always decreasing (within the area served), so that the most efficient way to provide service is to have a single firm do it.

[maurile]

[ QUOTE ]
The idea of "natural monopolies" becomes more and more inapplicable with continuing technological advance.

[/ QUOTE ]
In some industries, this is likely true -- and those industries would no longer feature natural monopolies.

[madnak]

Okay. This assumes a few things, however. If my community or home is far enough removed from the existing infrastructure this advantage is severely diminished. If creating a completely new infrastructure would be more efficient than extending an existing one, it's irrelevant.

If I live miles away from any other settlement, how is laying pipes more economical than digging a well? I don't know much about well-digging either, but I know it's not that hard because my father was once in this situation.

Also, while an existing infrastructure will provide the big company with a major advantage, everyone is still free to go with another company. If, for example, Microsoft Water asked me to give up my firstborn child in exchange for their services, I would go with a competitor. MSW might have some coercive leverage, but it would be far from absolute. So it wouldn't feature the same dangerous effects that a "true" coercive monopoly might. The company is still beholden to its consumers.

[Borodog]

I think the problem diminishes when you consider a different ownership model. If rather than Hydrosoft or Standard H2O owning the pipes that run to your house, consider the case where each homeowner owns the pipes on his property, and that the Home Owner's Association Company (in which each homeowner owns a share or shares) owns the pipes within the neighborhood, and that neighboring HOAs may own shares in a company that owns the mains that feed the region, the redundant infrastructure problem is greatly reduced. The AHOA (Association of Home Owner's Associations) would then have the economic wherewithall to negotiate supply from as many water companies as are in the area to provide water. Each individual HOA could then decide on a yearly basis which service provider to contract with.

Some regions of course just won't have a large enough water supply for this to work of course, but the flip side of that is that there won't be a lot of people moving there anyway.

[maurile]

[ QUOTE ]
Okay. This assumes a few things, however. If my community or home is far enough removed from the existing infrastructure this advantage is severely diminished. If creating a completely new infrastructure would be more efficient than extending an existing one, it's irrelevant.

If I live miles away from any other settlement, how is laying pipes more economical than digging a well? I don't know much about well-digging either, but I know it's not that hard because my father was once in this situation.

[/ QUOTE ]
All of that seems correct. But if you're far enough away that no single company already has a substantial cost advantage, then that's not a case of where a natural monopoly exists, so it's irrelevant to the issue of how to handle natural monopolies.

[ QUOTE ]
Also, while an existing infrastructure will provide the big company with a major advantage, everyone is still free to go with another company. If, for example, Microsoft Water asked me to give up my firstborn child in exchange for their services, I would go with a competitor. MSW might have some coercive leverage, but it would be far from absolute. So it wouldn't feature the same dangerous effects that a "true" coercive monopoly might. The company is still beholden to its consumers.

[/ QUOTE ]
Sure, which is why the monopolist won't charge you a firstborn. It will charge less than the cost of building a well, and less than its potential competitors' costs.

The thing that statists object to is that the company will charge more than its own average or marginal costs, and will therefore earn profits (in the economic sense, not just the accounting sense). This is seen as a negative because where a good is priced above cost, a less-than-optimal amount is purchased. It's the whole "deadweight loss" thing that purports to justify antitrust laws in general.

The statists have a point here, but not a conclusive one, IMO. There will be some inefficiency (deadweight loss) in the case of a privately owned, unregulated natural monopoly. So the situation isn't perfect.

But the "solutions" involving government coercion aren't perfect, either. The alternatives are for the state to own the monopoly, or for a private company to own the monopoly but have its rates regulated by the state. This last alternative is how, for example, utility companies in the U.S. are handled. But this arrangement has its own set of problems, and it's not at all clear to me that the problems associated with government ownership/regulation are less bad than the problems associated with private, unregulated natural monopolies.

But things aren't perfect either way.

[maurile]

[ QUOTE ]
I think the problem diminishes when you consider a different ownership model. If rather than Hydrosoft or Standard H2O owning the pipes that run to your house, consider the case where each homeowner owns the pipes on his property, and that the Home Owner's Association Company (in which each homeowner owns a share or shares) owns the pipes within the neighborhood, and that neighboring HOAs may own shares in a company that owns the mains that feed the region, the redundant infrastructure problem is greatly reduced. The AHOA (Association of Home Owner's Associations) would then have the economic wherewithall to negotiate supply from as many water companies as are in the area to provide water. Each individual HOA could then decide on a yearly basis which service provider to contract with.

[/ QUOTE ]
That sounds like a good solution w/r/t water. Whether it's feasible in practice, I have no idea.

[Borodog]

Me neither. Guess we'll have to have the government do it for us. /images/graemlins/wink.gif

[madnak]

Okay, I agree with that. There are many cases in a free market where things won't be perfect (by any number of standards, including efficiency).

But coercion aside, the overhead involved in public management seems likely to be even more inefficient. And then there's coercion and corruption and all that. So I don't see this as a disadvantage to AC, or "an issue that anarcho-capitalists must address." AC seems to encourage maximal efficiency rather than perfect efficiency.

[Borodog]

Water is an interesting topic. Clearly the government model for providing water is poor, since every damn summer I have to put up with water shortages and possibly face fines if I wash my car on the wrong day of the week.

If water was actually charged at the market rate, not only would the shortages vanish (of course), but people might be incentivised to start using technologies like private filtered rain reservoirs or condensers or who knows what, which would reduce the dependence on a centralized water source. For example, one inch of rain over 1000 square feet of house is over 620 gallons of water. What if instead of pouring out onto the ground, your downspouts attached to a filtered underground reservoir? A 2000 square foot home in Durham County, North Carolina could generate 5000 gallons of freshwater per month on average.

[madnak]

Hmm. I think some people would be reluctant because they would consider the water "dirty." I have to wonder about the government filtering process and how many impurities get through. Probably quite a few. I know rain water has to be better than the public water in certain countries.

[jthegreat]

[ QUOTE ]
Segregation depended on government. The Jim Crow laws weren't a result of free markets.

[/ QUOTE ]

Hilarious. If blacks were discriminated against *despite* the existence of the Bill of Rights, what in the *world* makes you think that they would be treated fairly when there was *no* law supporting them?

[ QUOTE ]
Are you kidding? Businesses don't want to have to turn away customers. Nor do they want to incur additional costs associated with, for example, having separate railroad cars for people of different skin colors.

[/ QUOTE ]

Sure, ASSUMING THAT PEOPLE BEHAVE RATIONALLY. Goddamn it, how many times do I have to make this point? Sometimes people do things that ARE NOT in their best interest. AC encourages this more than a Constitutional Democracy does.

[jthegreat]

[ QUOTE ]
Come back when you can construct a logical argument.

[/ QUOTE ]

LOL What, like yours?

"This bad thing happened with a Constitution in place, so *obviously* having no government would be better!"

It's awfully f'ing ironic that *you* criticize the logic of *my* arguments.

[Borodog]

You don't have arguments. You claim a process you demonstrably don't understand can't do this and can't do that without being able to explain why, therefore we need your coercive system, which demonstrably can't do the things it is supposedly designed for, and act like you've presented some sort of argument.

[maurile]

[ QUOTE ]
If blacks were discriminated against *despite* the existence of the Bill of Rights, what in the *world* makes you think that they would be treated fairly when there was *no* law supporting them?

[/ QUOTE ]
They were discriminated against by law. Note that discrimination wasn't nearly as bad in the north, where there were no Jim Crow laws.

Irrational discrimination decreases a business's profitability. Which means that, other things equal, companies that don't discriminate will gain market share from companies that do.

Unless the government gets involved to mandate discriminatory practices, which is what happened in the south.

[ QUOTE ]
Sure, ASSUMING THAT PEOPLE BEHAVE RATIONALLY. Goddamn it, how many times do I have to make this point? Sometimes people do things that ARE NOT in their best interest.

[/ QUOTE ]
And firms that don't behave rationally lose market share to firms that do.

Unless the government insulates firms from the consequences of acting irrationally.

[Borodog]

Don't forget all of the black owned businesses that cropped up to serve the black consumers that the white-owned businesses couldn't serve equitably by law. That is until the benevolent government put them out of business with occupational licensure laws.

[jthegreat]

[ QUOTE ]
You don't have arguments. You claim a process you demonstrably don't understand can't do this and can't do that without being able to explain why,

[/ QUOTE ]

Wtf? I've explained, time and time again, that AC will lead to mass discrimination of minorities because humans do not always act rationally. The very speech you POSTED in this thread AGREED WITH ME. Unless people become totally rational, 99% of AC societies will be torn apart by various forms of discrimination. You HAVE YET to explain how this will not happen. You just wave your hands and say something about "security companies" without ever at *all* acknowledging the fact that the vast power and wealth differential between the majority and minority will render any attempt at security futile.

[maurile]

[ QUOTE ]
I've explained, time and time again, that AC will lead to mass discrimination of minorities because humans do not always act rationally.

[/ QUOTE ]
There are some legitimate hard issues you can raise about whether AC might work well (e.g., national defense), but irrational discrimination is about the furthest thing from a legitimate problem you could name. When people are free to do business with whoever provides the best service at the best price, irrational discrimination gets eliminated by market forces. Only governments can keep that from happening.

Saying that you prefer governments to anarchism because of discrimination is like saying you prefer poker to chess because chess involves too much luck.

There are certainly legitimate reasons to disfavor chess, but that's not even close to being one of them.

[bobman0330]

[ QUOTE ]
There are some legitimate hard issues you can raise about whether AC might work well (e.g., national defense), but irrational discrimination is about the furthest thing from a legitimate problem you could name. When people are free to do business with whoever provides the best service at the best price, irrational discrimination gets eliminated by market forces. Only governments can keep that from happening.

[/ QUOTE ]

Just so we're clear. Your contention is that there has been no invidious discrimination in the United States since the 1960s? Or possibly that all instances of discrimination were caused by the government? Thanks for clearing that up.

[Borodog]

The free market will lead to mass discrimination because humans do not always behave rationally? What? The free market provides all kinds of stuff when people do not always behave rationally. Where do you GET this crap? Why can't you just show how your [censored] logically follows from what assumptions? Jesus H. Christ. Here I'll show you.

Try, really try, to understand this.

A) If you cannot tax the entire population to pay for your crazy schemes, your cost cost up.

B) Increasing costs of crazy schemes acts to disincentivize participation in crazy schemes.

C) As people stop participating in crazy schemes (like locking people up because they don't listen to ABBA, or whatever stupid hypothetical you want to dream up) because they have other more important uses for their scarce economic resources, like buying houses, sending their kids to college, and vacationing in Fiji, the costs for the remaining nuts goes even higher.

D) Shampoo, rinse, repeat.

E) Eventually the cost would be so prohibitive that even the most fanatical nutjob is just going to throw his hands up in frustration and quit.

In short, I don't even NEED TO POSTULATE how the ABBA-haters would defend themselves. All I have to do is take away the method of coercive funding and your stupid pathological hypothetical falls apart.

Do you have any idea why slavery was abolished peacefully in every country on the Earth (except of course your beloved Constitutional Democracy)? Because capitalism and the free market for labor made it uneconomical.

The only way your stupid scenario works is if practically the entire population is united in oppressing a small minority, so much that they would forgo their own economic wellbeing so that they can oppress someone else. And IF THAT IS THE CASE, do you really think that a piece of paper is going to stop them? What POSSIBLE difference could it make what form of government they have?

I posted a DETAILED REFUTATION of a statement of yours, that "Constitutional Democracy, *by nature*, limits the damage potential of irrational large groups of people," and you simply SNIPPED AND IGNORED IT. I'll post it again:

You haven't the foggiest idea of what you're talking about. "Constitutional democracy, by nature, limits the damage potential of irrational large groups of people" ? What a joke. Since you brought up the south, Abraham Lincoln violated the Constitution in practically every particular to invade a sovereign nation, wage total war on civilians, kill 700,000 people, intern 10,000 to 15,000 northern civilians in military prisons without charges or trials, shut down hundreds of northern newspapers by military force for criticizing his administration, arrested the entire Maryland legislature so they couldn't convene to discuss secession, created an entire State out of whole cloth so that he could install a puppet government to tighten the Republican hold on Congress (West Virginia), conducted election fraud on a massive scale to secure his reelection, including turning Democrats away from the poles with bayonets and issuing different colored ballots for the two parties, so that voters with the wrong color ballot could be arrested, created an income tax in direct violation of the Constitution, discovered dictatorial "war powers" not enumerated in the Constitution to justify all of this, all for the purpose of enacting his beloved "American System" of corporate welfare ("internal improvements subsidies"), high protectionist tariffs, and centralized banking and an inflationary fiat currency (his "greenbacks") to pay for it all, schemes that had been repeatedly beaten back and found unconstitutional for decades. All of this from one man. Where was the Constitution? Why didn't it protect the people? If the Constitution can't protect us from one mad dictator, how on EARTH do you think a piece of paper will protect a minority from a majority that is out to get them? The majority that is electing all of the officials, writing all the laws, passing the constitutional ammendments, appointing all of the judges, and hiring all the police?

So, if you cannot explain how a coercively funded government in a territory where a large majority of the people hate a minority and are out to get them can POSSIBLY protect that minority, why should we CARE that a stateless society couldn't either? How does this RIDICULOUS argument DISCRIMINATE in FAVOR of statism?

Add to this the ridiculous assertion that the free market cannot protect property or rights, which it does every day to a far larger extent than the government does, and at far lower price, and I can only conclude that you are either too stupid to understand what a logical argument is, or that you are only interested in not appearing to lose an argument rather than arrive at some idea of the truth, or that you are simply a troll.

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
The idea of "natural monopolies" becomes more and more inapplicable with continuing technological advance.

[/ QUOTE ]
In some industries, this is likely true -- and those industries would no longer feature natural monopolies.

[/ QUOTE ]

Then they aren't *natural*.

Natural monopolies are a myth.

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
There are some legitimate hard issues you can raise about whether AC might work well (e.g., national defense), but irrational discrimination is about the furthest thing from a legitimate problem [my emphasis --pvn] you could name. When people are free to do business with whoever provides the best service at the best price, irrational discrimination gets eliminated by market forces. Only governments can keep that from happening.

[/ QUOTE ]

Just so we're clear. Your contention is that there has been no invidious discrimination in the United States since the 1960s? Or possibly that all instances of discrimination were caused by the government? Thanks for clearing that up.

[/ QUOTE ]

There might be cases of individuals discriminating. But that's not a problem, because individuals have a right to associate with whoever they want to (and, conversely, to not associate with those they don't want to).

[yukoncpa]

Hi Borodog,
Please don't yell at me, I'm trying to learn about AC. How does AC prevent companies and individuals from polluting the environment?

[jthegreat]

[ QUOTE ]
Try, really try, to understand this.

A) If you cannot tax the entire population to pay for your crazy schemes, your cost cost up.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yep.

[ QUOTE ]
B) Increasing costs of crazy schemes acts to disincentivize participation in crazy schemes.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yep.

[ QUOTE ]
C) As people stop participating in crazy schemes (like locking people up because they don't listen to ABBA, or whatever stupid hypothetical you want to dream up) because they have other more important uses for their scarce economic resources, like buying houses, sending their kids to college, and vacationing in Fiji, the costs for the remaining nuts goes even higher.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yep.

[ QUOTE ]
E) Eventually the cost would be so prohibitive that even the most fanatical nutjob is just going to throw his hands up in frustration and quit.

[/ QUOTE ]

And there's the hand-waving.

If the US were an AC society, Pat Robertson would have his own private army. He could maintain it because he's rich and people give him money. I don't believe he gets much money from the government. In areas that are conservative enough, that army would be used to hurt or kill gays, atheists, abortionists, etc... Unless the populations of those minorities were big enough, they'd have no chance. They couldn't afford to defend themselves, especially if the likelihood of them being attacked was high. That'd just increase the premiums.

I don't know what more you want from a logical argument. 1) There are people who are hell-bent on hurting other people, especially on religious bases. 2) Many of these people are rich and there is no reason to believe they wouldn't continue to be rich if the US were an AC society. 3) They would have the desire and resources to wage war on those they didn't like. 4) In many areas, those they didn't like wouldn't have enough aggregate power or money to defend themselves.

There's no flaw there.

[ QUOTE ]
In short, I don't even NEED TO POSTULATE how the ABBA-haters would defend themselves. All I have to do is take away the method of coercive funding and your stupid pathological hypothetical falls apart.

[/ QUOTE ]

No, it doesn't. People voluntarily support Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell.

[ QUOTE ]
The only way your stupid scenario works is if practically the entire population is united in oppressing a small minority, so much that they would forgo their own economic wellbeing so that they can oppress someone else.

[/ QUOTE ]

If it's practically the entire *local* population, then yes. That's all that's needed. And yes, that's happened before. Look at the American South and Nazi Germany. The South couldn't have passed Jim Crow laws if a majority of white voters didn't support them.

[ QUOTE ]
And IF THAT IS THE CASE, do you really think that a piece of paper is going to stop them?

[/ QUOTE ]

It can. It happened in the South.

[ QUOTE ]
I posted a DETAILED REFUTATION of a statement of yours, that "Constitutional Democracy, *by nature*, limits the damage potential of irrational large groups of people," and you simply SNIPPED AND IGNORED IT. I'll post it again:

[/ QUOTE ]

No, you brought up one example of where one Constitutional Democracy went wrong. That's not an indictment of Constitutional Democracy in general. You don't seem to understand that differentiation.

[ QUOTE ]
So, if you cannot explain how a coercively funded government in a territory where a large majority of the people hate a minority and are out to get them can POSSIBLY protect that minority

[/ QUOTE ]

But they did. Sure, a lot of black people were lynched, but if lynching had been legal, how many more would have been? And remember the pictures of the police protecting the black students entering the white school? I'm sure you've seen it.


[ QUOTE ]
Add to this the ridiculous assertion that the free market cannot protect property or rights, which it does every day to a far larger extent than the government does, and at far lower price, and I can only conclude that you are either too stupid to understand what a logical argument is, or that you are only interested in not appearing to lose an argument rather than arrive at some idea of the truth, or that you are simply a troll.

[/ QUOTE ]

Boy, what a strawman. I'm not arguing that the free market can't protect property or rights at *all*. I'm arguing that it can't protect *certain* groups of people in *certain* locations. To ensure their safety, minority groups would all have to try to live in the same areas. This would lead to the entire country breaking down into different factions.

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
If the US were an AC society, Pat Robertson would have his own private army. He could maintain it because he's rich and people give him money.

[/ QUOTE ]

You're either vastly underestimating the cost of an army (and note, this particular army would generate no revenue at all, only consume resources) or else your vastly overestimating how much money Pat Robertson has and/or gets in donations. Vastly.

If you really think he can afford this (and that people would actually continue to send him money to pay for it if he engaged in it), then *why isn't he already doing it*? This scary force you describe would have to be so large (it would have to overwhelm any force its opponets could afford) that it would have no problem brushing aside the US military.

[ QUOTE ]
3) They would have the desire and resources to wage war on those they didn't like.

[/ QUOTE ]

Desire, yes. Resources, no. Or, at least, you haven't shown that. Lots of people are all for waging war as long as they can make someone else pay for it. When they have to pay directly, enthusiasm drops significantly.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
In short, I don't even NEED TO POSTULATE how the ABBA-haters would defend themselves. All I have to do is take away the method of coercive funding and your stupid pathological hypothetical falls apart.

[/ QUOTE ]

No, it doesn't. People voluntarily support Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell.

[/ QUOTE ]

The support their (relatively inexpensive) current activities. That doesn't imply they *will* fund a war machine. Or that they *could* fund it *sufficiently*.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I posted a DETAILED REFUTATION of a statement of yours, that "Constitutional Democracy, *by nature*, limits the damage potential of irrational large groups of people," and you simply SNIPPED AND IGNORED IT. I'll post it again:

[/ QUOTE ]

No, you brought up one example of where one Constitutional Democracy went wrong. That's not an indictment of Constitutional Democracy in general. You don't seem to understand that differentiation.

[/ QUOTE ]

One example of a Constitutional Democracy doing something right is not a proof that it's better than anything else, either.

The ONLY examples of the type of large-scale activity you fear have been results of *government* activity.

[ QUOTE ]
Sure, a lot of black people were lynched, but if lynching had been legal, how many more would have been?

[/ QUOTE ]

Wait, are you trying to argue that AC would *legalize* lynching? A new low.

[ QUOTE ]
Boy, what a strawman. I'm not arguing that the free market can't protect property or rights at *all*. I'm arguing that it can't protect *certain* groups of people in *certain* locations.

[/ QUOTE ]

I will go even further. The market does not (and cannot) protect ANY rights. Only individuals can do that.

Governments explicitly *violate* rights.

As I asked (you, specifically) in another thread:

"So to protect rights, you have to violate them?"

[jthegreat]

[ QUOTE ]
If you really think he can afford this (and that people would actually continue to send him money to pay for it if he engaged in it), then *why isn't he already doing it*?

[/ QUOTE ]

Umm... because atheists, gays, and abortionists have the US justice system on their side?

[ QUOTE ]
This scary force you describe would have to be so large (it would have to overwhelm any force its opponets could afford) that it would have no problem brushing aside the US military.

[/ QUOTE ]

Uh... no. It'd just have to brush aside whatever the atheists/gays/etc could pay for. That's why I said that this would only occur in certain low-atheist/gays/etc-population areas.

[ QUOTE ]
Desire, yes. Resources, no. Or, at least, you haven't shown that. Lots of people are all for waging war as long as they can make someone else pay for it. When they have to pay directly, enthusiasm drops significantly.

[/ QUOTE ]

Actually, they wouldn't even need their own army. They'd just have to offer a bounty to anyone who would kill atheists/gays/etc and provide proof.

[ QUOTE ]
One example of a Constitutional Democracy doing something right is not a proof that it's better than anything else, either.

[/ QUOTE ]

No, but I'm arguing for it theoretically, not empirically. Borodog is arguing against it empirically, not theoretically.

[ QUOTE ]
The ONLY examples of the type of large-scale activity you fear have been results of *government* activity.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah, it's kinda funny. "large-scale" activities are only possible in large societies, and those all have governments. Go figure.

[ QUOTE ]
Wait, are you trying to argue that AC would *legalize* lynching? A new low.

[/ QUOTE ]

No. Can you go two posts without a strawman?

[ QUOTE ]
Governments explicitly *violate* rights.



[/ QUOTE ]

I assume you're referring to taxation, in which case I've already stated that I don't believe taxation is absolutely necessary.

[Borodog]

Dude. Insurance companies have hundreds of billions of dollars worth of holdings. Do you honestly think "Pat Robertson" and his "persoanl army" of kooks would stand a chance against the security forces that could be deployed in defense of their policy holders? Not to mention the fact that the group he would be trying to persecute would have policies with many different companies, each with hundreds of billions of dollars in assets.

The richest man on Earth couldn't do what you want done without coercive funding and monopoly control of military forces.

You're getting more and more ridiculous with this.

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Wait, are you trying to argue that AC would *legalize* lynching? A new low.

[/ QUOTE ]

No. Can you go two posts without a strawman?

[/ QUOTE ]

What, then, were you trying to say?

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Governments explicitly *violate* rights.



[/ QUOTE ]

I assume you're referring to taxation, in which case I've already stated that I don't believe taxation is absolutely necessary.

[/ QUOTE ]

OK, I must have missed that. I'm listening.

[behemoth2006]

[ QUOTE ]
Dude. Insurance companies have hundreds of billions of dollars worth of holdings. Do you honestly think "Pat Robertson" and his "persoanl army" of kooks would stand a chance against the security forces that could be deployed in defense of their policy holders? Not to mention the fact that the group he would be trying to persecute would have policies with many different companies, each with hundreds of billions of dollars in assets.

The richest man on Earth couldn't do what you want done without coercive funding and monopoly control of military forces.

You're getting more and more ridiculous with this.

[/ QUOTE ]

I only quoted this post to show who Im posting at, not to respond to this particular post.

FWIW, I almost completely agree with you. However, you stated that Microsoft wasn't a monopoly by asking "Does microsoft coerce me into using their products?"

Well no, there is no gun to your head, and now thanks to me and my fellow GNU programmers, you have competitive open-source software. However, before the dev of such software, it absolutely could be considered a monopoly. You could not reasonably interact with the software world at large without a pc, and without a windows pc, all you have is the (relatively) new and ...'illegal' windows emulations.

Yes it was a monopoly, in all ways but the legal one.

This is from a programmer's standpoint so feel free to correct me if Im wrong. However I just wanted to throw that in.

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
Well no, there is no gun to your head, and now thanks to me and my fellow GNU programmers, you have competitive open-source software. However, before the dev of such software, it absolutely could be considered a monopoly. You could not reasonably interact with the software world at large without a pc, and without a windows pc, all you have is the (relatively) new and ...'illegal' windows emulations.

Yes it was a monopoly, in all ways but the legal one.

[/ QUOTE ]

No.

A monopoly exists when competition is prohibited. Not when competition does not exist.

You don't have a *right* to have alternatives to any particular vendor. You do have a right to be free from restrictions that prevent others from competing with a particular vendor.

[behemoth2006]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Well no, there is no gun to your head, and now thanks to me and my fellow GNU programmers, you have competitive open-source software. However, before the dev of such software, it absolutely could be considered a monopoly. You could not reasonably interact with the software world at large without a pc, and without a windows pc, all you have is the (relatively) new and ...'illegal' windows emulations.

Yes it was a monopoly, in all ways but the legal one.

[/ QUOTE ]

No.

A monopoly exists when competition is prohibited. Not when competition does not exist.

You don't have a *right* to have alternatives to any particular vendor. You do have a right to be free from restrictions that prevent others from competing with a particular vendor.

[/ QUOTE ]

While I will freely admit you are more learned in this area obviously, this really doesn't deviate from my point as far as I can see.

What Im saying is that while competition wasn't legally prohibited... well I guess the only way to say it is that competition was "implied"... Im sorry I can't do any better than that, but if you dont understand what I mean I'll elaborate later.

What I mean by this is that Microsoft was so embedded into the corporate workplace that not having microsoft or microsoft "sponsored" software was a death sentence for companies, especially in the communication fields. Microsoft built their software, and "encouraged" other software companies to build their software dependant upon microsoft products.

Such actions make an "implied" (again, sorry) monopoly.

Again I am obviously out of my league against you guys on this one, but I have yet to see direct refutation of this point.

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
What I mean by this is that Microsoft was so embedded into the corporate workplace that not having microsoft or microsoft "sponsored" software was a death sentence for companies, especially in the communication fields. Microsoft built their software, and "encouraged" other software companies to build their software dependant upon microsoft products.

[/ QUOTE ]

Why is this necessarily a problem?

Assuming it is actually a problem, what is the remedy? Are you going to round up some programmers, force them to create an alternative product, then force some other companies to buy and use that product?

[madnak]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Dude. Insurance companies have hundreds of billions of dollars worth of holdings. Do you honestly think "Pat Robertson" and his "persoanl army" of kooks would stand a chance against the security forces that could be deployed in defense of their policy holders? Not to mention the fact that the group he would be trying to persecute would have policies with many different companies, each with hundreds of billions of dollars in assets.

The richest man on Earth couldn't do what you want done without coercive funding and monopoly control of military forces.

You're getting more and more ridiculous with this.

[/ QUOTE ]

I only quoted this post to show who Im posting at, not to respond to this particular post.

FWIW, I almost completely agree with you. However, you stated that Microsoft wasn't a monopoly by asking "Does microsoft coerce me into using their products?"

Well no, there is no gun to your head, and now thanks to me and my fellow GNU programmers, you have competitive open-source software. However, before the dev of such software, it absolutely could be considered a monopoly. You could not reasonably interact with the software world at large without a pc, and without a windows pc, all you have is the (relatively) new and ...'illegal' windows emulations.

Yes it was a monopoly, in all ways but the legal one.

This is from a programmer's standpoint so feel free to correct me if Im wrong. However I just wanted to throw that in.

[/ QUOTE ]

In the first place, windows emulation technology would not be illegal under AC. That's very important. Very. That would allow a company to use alternative software to create products that are compatible with Windows software. It's likely IP rights wouldn't exist at all under AC, but they would certainly not be viable in this case. Microsoft could still do some bullying; they could refuse to offer their product to retailers unless those retailers agreed not to carry the competitor's product. But that would put Microsoft in a dangerous situation. To some degree, that is exactly what Apple tried to do with software vendors early on, and it is arguable the main reason they couldn't compete with IBM.

Without copyright law and legal exclusion, Microsoft doesn't have the leverage to maintain their monopoly. They have market share and workplace integration and such, which gives them a market advantage, but that's all it is. Their advantages don't allow them to force others out, or to apply force in general, at best they just make it an uphill battle for large competitors.

And Linux is reasonably popular particularly in the server market. A lot of Linux folks seem to think that without a monopoly Microsoft wouldn't stand a chance. That is a naive view, IMO. I've run some Linux distributions in the past, and while they are "fun" they are also extremely counterintuitive and bug-prone. The customer service is often horrible and most users refuse to help (RTFM, anyone?). Drivers tend to be unreliable and some hardware doesn't even have Linux-compatible drivers. I know these issues are being worked on, but bloat and security are not the main concerns of most users. Compatibility, ease of access, and usability are much more important.

[behemoth2006]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Dude. Insurance companies have hundreds of billions of dollars worth of holdings. Do you honestly think "Pat Robertson" and his "persoanl army" of kooks would stand a chance against the security forces that could be deployed in defense of their policy holders? Not to mention the fact that the group he would be trying to persecute would have policies with many different companies, each with hundreds of billions of dollars in assets.

The richest man on Earth couldn't do what you want done without coercive funding and monopoly control of military forces.

You're getting more and more ridiculous with this.

[/ QUOTE ]

I only quoted this post to show who Im posting at, not to respond to this particular post.

FWIW, I almost completely agree with you. However, you stated that Microsoft wasn't a monopoly by asking "Does microsoft coerce me into using their products?"

Well no, there is no gun to your head, and now thanks to me and my fellow GNU programmers, you have competitive open-source software. However, before the dev of such software, it absolutely could be considered a monopoly. You could not reasonably interact with the software world at large without a pc, and without a windows pc, all you have is the (relatively) new and ...'illegal' windows emulations.

Yes it was a monopoly, in all ways but the legal one.

This is from a programmer's standpoint so feel free to correct me if Im wrong. However I just wanted to throw that in.

[/ QUOTE ]

In the first place, windows emulation technology would not be illegal under AC. That's very important. Very. That would allow a company to use alternative software to create products that are compatible with Windows software. It's likely IP rights wouldn't exist at all under AC, but they would certainly not be viable in this case. Microsoft could still do some bullying; they could refuse to offer their product to retailers unless those retailers agreed not to carry the competitor's product. But that would put Microsoft in a dangerous situation. To some degree, that is exactly what Apple tried to do with software vendors early on, and it is arguable the main reason they couldn't compete with IBM.

Without copyright law and legal exclusion, Microsoft doesn't have the leverage to maintain their monopoly. They have market share and workplace integration and such, which gives them a market advantage, but that's all it is. Their advantages don't allow them to force others out, or to apply force in general, at best they just make it an uphill battle for large competitors.

And Linux is reasonably popular particularly in the server market. A lot of Linux folks seem to think that without a monopoly Microsoft wouldn't stand a chance. That is a naive view, IMO. I've run some Linux distributions in the past, and while they are "fun" they are also extremely counterintuitive and bug-prone. The customer service is often horrible and most users refuse to help (RTFM, anyone?). Drivers tend to be unreliable and some hardware doesn't even have Linux-compatible drivers. I know these issues are being worked on, but bloat and security are not the main concerns of most users. Compatibility, ease of access, and usability are much more important.

[/ QUOTE ]

Okay, Im gonna ask a question: Are you a CS person? I mean able to look at registries, look at processes, understand what is happening behind the scenes? If not, then A) I can understand your misgivings, but B) You should try linux again.

Look up Ubuntu, they'll send you a free cd with the complete OS on it, even my 11 yr-old cousin could use it without any technical help.

If you are a CS guy, then I have to call bullcrap. As a programmer, the lack of unity found in the Windows OS's is apalling (one or two p's? /images/graemlins/confused.gif). They are programmed in modules, wizards and such (not unusual) but then shoddily thrown together in a very haphazard and unstable way.

These programs aren't "user friendly", they don't tell you what is going on with your computer. Do you consider a mechanic, who uses ambiguous laymen's terms and hides the whole truth from you because he thinks you wont understand, user-friendly? Microsoft keeps users ignorant of the way their computer works because it's good business. Linux in every which way is a superior package.

Yes Linux is gaining popularity, but you'll notice an exponential rise in its popularity following the Anti-Trust lawsuit against Microsoft.

And to the poster who said that this situation wouldn't have arisen in AC, I agree, all I was dissenting was the fact that ... I think PVN, said it wasn't a monopoly.


And no, you don't have to force people to program an alternative, but you have to let people know that such an alternative is viably used in the workforce... not to mention that a new generation of programmers are out there who dont like the way Windows operates.


Uhh, if you can't tell Im super passionate about my open-source software, haha, I could pander on for days.

[madnak]

[ QUOTE ]
Do you consider a mechanic, who uses ambiguous laymen's terms and hides the whole truth from you because he thinks you wont understand, user-friendly?

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes. I don't know about cars, and if I ever learn I will do it from the ground up. I don't need a mechanic telling me that the "adhesion belt in my suspension assembly is worn" or some such thing. I wouldn't have the first clue what he was talking about. My goal with a mechanic is simple. If I have a car that doesn't work I take it to a mechanic and come back assuming it works.

And I am a smart and curious person. I've done some tech support, so I know 90% of the populace can't install Linux (or anything else for that matter). As soon as they're prompted whether to create an NTFS or a FAT partition, they break down in sobs and seek someone like me out. I think you (like most Linux hackers) overestimate the average person. Your cousin is irrelevant.

Also I personally didn't have any trouble installing Linux. I installed it so I could set up Apache/PHP/MySQL thinking of perhaps running my own web server. It turns out remote hosting was cheaper anyhow so I abandoned the project. But the OS was definitely very counterintuitive. I was running Debian about 4 years ago - possibly it has changed since then but there is no doubt in my mind it was harder than Windows installation.

[ QUOTE ]
Yes Linux is gaining popularity, but you'll notice an exponential rise in its popularity following the Anti-Trust lawsuit against Microsoft.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't debate this, but I still think Windows will be the best choice for gamers and average users.

[ QUOTE ]
Uhh, if you can't tell Im super passionate about my open-source software, haha, I could pander on for days.

[/ QUOTE ]

I like the idea myself, because I hate IP and think community projects are important. But I also think money creates certain incentives that are hard to manage otherwise. I also consider the OSS community to be quite abrasive and exclusive.

[behemoth2006]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Do you consider a mechanic, who uses ambiguous laymen's terms and hides the whole truth from you because he thinks you wont understand, user-friendly?

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes. I don't know about cars, and if I ever learn I will do it from the ground up. I don't need a mechanic telling me that the "adhesion belt in my suspension assembly is worn" or some such thing. I wouldn't have the first clue what he was talking about. My goal with a mechanic is simple. If I have a car that doesn't work I take it to a mechanic and come back assuming it works.

And I am a smart and curious person. I've done some tech support, so I know 90% of the populace can't install Linux (or anything else for that matter). As soon as they're prompted whether to create an NTFS or a FAT partition, they break down in sobs and seek someone like me out. I think you (like most Linux hackers) overestimate the average person. Your cousin is irrelevant.

Also I personally didn't have any trouble installing Linux. I installed it so I could set up Apache/PHP/MySQL thinking of perhaps running my own web server. It turns out remote hosting was cheaper anyhow so I abandoned the project. But the OS was definitely very counterintuitive. I was running Debian about 4 years ago - possibly it has changed since then but there is no doubt in my mind it was harder than Windows installation.

[ QUOTE ]
Yes Linux is gaining popularity, but you'll notice an exponential rise in its popularity following the Anti-Trust lawsuit against Microsoft.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't debate this, but I still think Windows will be the best choice for gamers and average users.

[ QUOTE ]
Uhh, if you can't tell Im super passionate about my open-source software, haha, I could pander on for days.

[/ QUOTE ]

I like the idea myself, because I hate IP and think community projects are important. But I also think money creates certain incentives that are hard to manage otherwise. I also consider the OSS community to be quite abrasive and exclusive.

[/ QUOTE ]

I do not by any means overestimate the intelligence of the end-user, as I've also done helpdesk. What I will concede is that I likely overestimate their willingness to learn. I, like you, am a very curious person, I seek to learn how everything works, maybe that's abnormal.

FWIW, I think your attitude would change at least a bit if you tried Ubuntu, they call it linux for the people, it's very user friendly, but can also be used very technically. I didn't remark upon my cousin out of smugness, but to show that this OS is extremely user friendly.

I agree that the OSS world can be elitist, and I agree that it is a total turn-off. Perhaps making people pay for software creates a friendlier programmer... if that's how you'd say it... but it also creates deceptive programs.

I will be making money off of my video-games, but they will be freely downloadable. I will be making people pay for server access. The difference there is that they can take a look at the entire game, try it out for a while before they decide to pay for it, and can pay less or more (over time) depending on how much they like it.

It's a marriage of both worlds.

[madnak]

I think it's important that different people have different alternatives. With a free market I think you'd probably have a different ideal OS for gaming, for servers, for art, for casual use. And I like to think they'd be very interoperable, using similar file systems and protocols. It's happening to a large degree already, but it seems that the laws and copyrights and rules are holding it back a bit.

What kinds of games are you making?

[behemoth2006]

Honestly the way you described would be best, although interoperability might be asking too much from a Capitolist society, not sure about AC.

Right now, since Im still in school, Im programming modules for an RPG that's a baby project. I could tell you about it in more detail but I've already hijacked enough, so I'll try to sum it up:

It's an RPG called "Terra", where basically you get to play as your hero, or villain, and when the story finishes, you skip ahead, to see what became of the world you just played in. You could play in the time of your first hero's great-grandson, for instance. It builds an actual world history.

The stories will be technically infinite since Im building the story module with randomness, or users can create their own stories and trade them over the internet.

There's more to it than that, but thats a basic summation.

[madnak]

Well, let me know when you if you need beta testers!

[jthegreat]

[ QUOTE ]
Not to mention the fact that the group he would be trying to persecute would have policies with many different companies, each with hundreds of billions of dollars in assets.

[/ QUOTE ]

Would they? If Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell put out bounties on all gays, atheists, and abortionists, how much would I have to pay in insurance given that I live in middle Georgia, which is extremely conservative? Would I be able to afford it? I kinda doubt it. Would the companies even insure me at all? Who knows.

[ QUOTE ]
You're getting more and more ridiculous with this.

[/ QUOTE ]

You just continue to wave your hands. Any request for you to explain how something might work, or how some problem may be avoided, is simply met with "The free market provides everything else better, so why not that?" which just isn't an argument.

[jthegreat]

[ QUOTE ]
What, then, were you trying to say?

[/ QUOTE ]

Boro said "So, if you cannot explain how a coercively funded government in a territory where a large majority of the people hate a minority and are out to get them can POSSIBLY protect that minority", which is what I was refuting. The coercively funded government DID protect that minority by making it a crime to hurt or kill them. It wasn't perfect protection, but it did work.

[ QUOTE ]
OK, I must have missed that. I'm listening.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't have anything else to add on that. I don't think mandatory taxes are necessary to fund the government.

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
You just continue to wave your hands. Any request for you to explain how something might work, or how some problem may be avoided, is simply met with "The free market provides everything else better, so why not that?" which just isn't an argument.

[/ QUOTE ]

Why is that not an argument? If you're going to claim something is an exception to a widely-accepted rule, isn't the burden of proof on *you*?

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
What, then, were you trying to say?

[/ QUOTE ]

Boro said "So, if you cannot explain how a coercively funded government in a territory where a large majority of the people hate a minority and are out to get them can POSSIBLY protect that minority", which is what I was refuting. The coercively funded government DID protect that minority by making it a crime to hurt or kill them. It wasn't perfect protection, but it did work.

[/ QUOTE ]

The laws were not to specifically protect minorities, as far as I can tell (i.e. there wasn't a "don't lynch minorities" law). The *exact same* government was also specifically prosecuting those minorities (i.e. "it is illegal to do XYZ with a minority).

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
OK, I must have missed that. I'm listening.

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't have anything else to add on that. I don't think mandatory taxes are necessary to fund the government.

[/ QUOTE ]

OK, I agree. Mandatory taxes to fund government are not necessary. If you get rid of government, you don't need the mandatory taxes to fund it.

[jthegreat]

[ QUOTE ]
Why is that not an argument? If you're going to claim something is an exception to a widely-accepted rule, isn't the burden of proof on *you*?

[/ QUOTE ]

I could write that exact same sentence in support of my side, since it's a widely-accepted rule that a government monopoly on the legitimate use of force is a good thing.

You guys are advocating that we use a social system that essentially hasn't existed in human history. I think the the burden of proof lies with you.

[jthegreat]

[ QUOTE ]
The laws were not to specifically protect minorities, as far as I can tell (i.e. there wasn't a "don't lynch minorities" law). The *exact same* government was also specifically prosecuting those minorities (i.e. "it is illegal to do XYZ with a minority).


[/ QUOTE ]

That's entirely beside the point. Boro was arguing that the government wasn't protecting them, but it was. It was persecuting them at the same time, yes, but it *was* protecting them.

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Why is that not an argument? If you're going to claim something is an exception to a widely-accepted rule, isn't the burden of proof on *you*?

[/ QUOTE ]

I could write that exact same sentence in support of my side, since it's a widely-accepted rule that a government monopoly on the legitimate use of force is a good thing.

You guys are advocating that we use a social system that essentially hasn't existed in human history. I think the the burden of proof lies with you.

[/ QUOTE ]

OK, then.

We have two inputs:

1) Lots of people like making other people pay for their stuff, and there have been systems to make other people pay for it for a long time.

2) Overwhelming empirical evidence shows that central planning of resource allocation is inefficient and leads to undesired results.

One of these has to yield to the other.

BTW, I'm interested in how you think a force monopoly can be voluntarily funded and still provide an acceptable service. You say you're concerned with free riders, but in this situation the incentive to pay is extremely low.

When there is only one provider, that provider has no incentive to improve quality of service.

When there is only one provider, that provider has no incentive to keep costs low.

When there is only one provider, that provider has no incentive to service the low-end market since that provider can spend less effort going after wealthy clients that can absorb monopoly prices.

When there is only one provider, corruption flourishes.

Given the fact that my voluntary payment to a force monopoly will have near-zero return, why would I pay?

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
That's entirely beside the point. Boro was arguing that the government wasn't protecting them, but it was. It was persecuting them at the same time, yes, but it *was* protecting them.

[/ QUOTE ]

What a deal. I'm sure people will be lining up to voluntarily purchase this type of "protection".

[Borodog]

[ QUOTE ]
I only quoted this post to show who Im posting at, not to respond to this particular post.

FWIW, I almost completely agree with you. However, you stated that Microsoft wasn't a monopoly by asking "Does microsoft coerce me into using their products?"

Well no, there is no gun to your head, and now thanks to me and my fellow GNU programmers, you have competitive open-source software. However, before the dev of such software, it absolutely could be considered a monopoly. You could not reasonably interact with the software world at large without a pc, and without a windows pc, all you have is the (relatively) new and ...'illegal' windows emulations.

Yes it was a monopoly, in all ways but the legal one.

This is from a programmer's standpoint so feel free to correct me if Im wrong. However I just wanted to throw that in.

[/ QUOTE ]

a) What you are claiming is demonstrably not true, not to mention vague. I notice you threw the word "reasonably" in there. Microsoft has always had competition in every niche they occupy, and in fact I am unaware of any software niche that Microsoft has ever competed in where they were even the first company to enter the market.

b) Your statement belies their status as a monopoly. Not only do they have competitors in all niches, but they had no coercive means to prevent competition from entering those markets.

The following is typed in by hand, so forgive the inevitable typos; I'm not going to bother tracking them down and correcting them.

[ QUOTE ]
THE GATES/ROCKEFELLER MYTH
<font color="white"> . </font>
The government restricts free-market capitalists not just through its thousands of regulations and its extortionate tactics but also by going after the most successful capitalists. Nothing demonstrates this more clearly than the federal government's handling of Bill Gates, founder and chairman of the Microsoft Corporation. Gates rose to political prominence in the 1990s and was referred to--often disparagingly--as a :new John D. Rockefeller,: and like Rockefeller he would be attacked despite the many benefits he brought to Americans.
<font color="white"> . </font>
Gates dropped out of college to create what is arguably the most successful corporation in American history, and in so doing he bacame the richest man in the world. He devoted almost no time and money to playing the game of Washington, D.C., politics, which generated great resentment among the political elite. The Federal Trade Commission investigated Microsoft's business practices for four years in the early 1990s but eventuall determined that his company had not violated any antitrust laws. Nevertheless, the antitrust division of the U.S. Justice Deparment began its own investigation, and after several more years the federal government filed an anti-trust lawsuit against Microsoft.
<font color="white"> . </font>
Once the lawsuit was filed, the attack on Gates began in earnest. Even the federal judge assigned to the case, Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson, compared Gates to the gangster Al Capone in public interviews. For such obvious bias, the judge was eventually taken off the case by the same panel of three federal judges that had appointed him. More common was the comparison to Rockefeller, an analogy that became a staple of media reports. It is a good analogy, but the mainstream media and the anticapitalist intellectuals whon generally made the comparisons were doing so for the wrong reasons; they meant to inform the public that, like ROckefeller, Gates was a monopolist. As seen in earlier chapters, Rockefeller was no monopolist but an entrepreneur who provided tremendous benefits to consumers, employees, and society in general by reducing the price and expanding the supply of petroleum products for decades. Gates can be considered the information-age version of John D. Rockefeller. He and a few other entrepreneurs literally created the information age. His products are so popular that hundreds of millions of people all over the world use them. All of those who have bought Microsoft products have done so voluntarily, on the free market; not because they were coerced into buying the products.
<font color="white"> . </font>
The federal government never did make a case that Microsoft harmed consumers--supposedly the primary reason for all antitrust laws. Instead, it made the dubious argument that the company's expenditure of some $2.5 billion annually on innovation somehow stifled innovation by other companies, and that perhaps, someday, maybe, the result would be that consumers would be harmed. In the end, good sense and justice for the most part prevailed: unlike Rockefeller's Standar Oil, Gates' Microsoft was not broken up.
<font color="white"> . </font>
This was the proper ruling, for as economists Stan Liebowitz and Stephan Margolis reveal, the various theoretical arguments made against Microsoft were unconvincing. In ther book Winners, Losers, and Microsoft--perhaps the most impressive scholarly analysis of Microsoft's impact on competition in high-technology markets--Liebowitz and Margolis dismantle all the arguments that Microsoft acted as a monopoly. Their most telling evidence of Microsoft's innocence is that without exception, whenever Microsoft entered a market, it caused the prices in that market to decline, as competitors were froced to cut their costs and prices. Examining fourteen different products, Liebowitz and Margolis find that "in those categories where Microsoft participates, directly or indirectly, prices have declined by approximately 60 percent, a far more dramatic drop than the 15 percent drop in markets completely devoid of Microsoft's influence." They find similar results in many other markets that Microsoft competed in, from word processing and spreadsheet software to personal finance software to desktop publishing to Web browsers. Typically, Microsoft continued to cut its prices even in markets where is was clearly dominant because there were (and are) literally hundreds if not thousands of competitors in those markets and because a number of other competitors could arise if Microsoft actually did charge monopolistic prices. Liebowitz and Margolis conclude that the explanation for Microsoft's success is very simple:
<font color="white"> . </font>
Microsoft produces good products at low prices. Some, including the Department of Justice, have suggested that Microsoft did not earn its large market shares in [software] applications. Our data are at a complete variance with this claim. Our data show that when Microsoft moved from a low to a high market share, its products were always of higher quality that the market leader's. When its products were not superior, it did not make inroads against the market leader. Our data . . . disprove the claim that Microsoft has used its monopoly position to keep prices high. As a matter of fact, we found that after Microsoft becomes dominant in a product category, prices in the market begin to fall . . . In short, Microsoft's effect on the software markets has been to lower prices and improve product quality.[/i]
<font color="white"> . </font>
So Microsoft has only helped consumers. But the federal government's lengthy case against Microsoft has ahd a profound and damaging effect. American consumers are almost always the losers with antitrust regulation, for even when a company is found innocent it usually has spent large sume--millions--on lawyers and has diverted thousands of hours away from its primary business of producing better and cheaper products for its consumers to responding to all the demands and requests of government lawyers. The company inevitably becomes less competitive as a result.
<font color="white"> . </font>
THE ANTI-MICROSOFT CONSPIRACY
<font color="white"> . </font>
If the claim that Microsoft acted as a monopoly was unfounded, how did the antitrust case originate? In fact, the case against Microsoft' was similar to almost all other antitrust cases in that it was instigated not to protect consumers but at the request of less successful rivals. These rivals could not, or would not, compete with Microsoft,either because they could not lower their costs and prices or because their products were inferior. Therefore they attempted to recruit the government to punish their most successful rival for their own benefit, at the expense of the consumers.
<font color="white"> . </font>
The true anticompetitive (and anticapitalist) nature of the government’s persecution of Microsoft was revealed in a book by journalist John Heilemann entitled Pride Before the Fall. In the book Heilemann shows that although Microsoft was sued by the U.S. Justice Department, the lawsuit was a direct result of a plot by Microsoft’s competitors, who had a simple objective: “Decapitalizing Microsoft.” Various Microsoft rivals, including Sun Microsystems and Novell, hatched the conspiracy in August 1997 during a two-day meeting in Silicon Valley, California. At the meeting the general counsels and publicists for the Microsoft competitors sat down with Senator Orrin Hatch—who represents Novell’s home state, Utah—as well as staff members of the Senate Judiciary Committee. They initiated an anti-Microsoft lobbying and public relations effort at the meeting, giving it the Orwellian name of ProComp. The conspirators then invested some $3 million in comething called Project Sherman, which recruited a bevy of $700-per-hour consultants to construct a mock legal case against Microsoft to be presented to Justice Department lawyers. The “political sensitivity” of the scheme was so high, say Heilemann, that the plot was “conducted in utmost secrecy.” For if word got out that the Justice Department’s case originated not with Justice but with Microsoft’s rivals, the public would surely smell a rat, and it would be much more difficult to garner political support for the continued persecution of Microsoft.
<font color="white"> . </font>
The mock-trial case that Project Sherman presented was essentially the case that the government eventually put on. In his preliminary “finding of fact,” after the trial had ended, Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson adopted the conspirators’ claim that Microsoft was a “monopoly” even though in some markets, such as software applications, it had literally thousands of competitors. He claimed that Microsoft “coerced” its customers but did not explain what power Bill Gates had—or any businessperson has—to achieve such coercion on the free market. Judge Jackson also claimed, absurdly, that consumers were somehow harmed because Microsoft gave its Web browser away for free. In addition, he concluded that, although there was no evidence presented at trial of consumer harm, Microsoft could in theory harm consumers in the future if it decided to raise prices. Under this theory, every business in America could potentially be found guilty of violating the antitrust laws. Finally, he argued that impeding Microsoft’s ability to spend billions annually on innovation would somehow increase computer industry innovation.
<font color="white"> . </font>
After issuing his irrational and counterfactual “finding of fact,” Judge Jackson proposed a remedy that the anti-Microsft conspirators had recommended ot the Justice Department—and that gives a clear idea of how the U.S. government thinks capitalism in America ought to be structured. Among other things, the “remedy” would have prohibited Microsoft from offering “terms more favorable” to its biggest clients, a common business practice. It would have compelled Microsoft to offer all computer manufacturers “equal access” to discounts, technical support, license terms, and more. It would have created a paperwork nightmare for the company by requiring a report to be sent to the government after each and every agreement made with any software applications business.
<font color="white"> . </font>
Judge Jackson wanted to create a colony of spies among Microsoft employees by ordering the company to establish a means by which employees could report “potential violations” of the government agreement to the federal regulators. Government regulators would have been given the right to storm onto Microsoft’s property during business hours to inspect all of its files, messages, and other documents. And the company would have been forced to share its computer source code with all of its rivals. This would be the equivalent of forcing Coca-Cola to publish the secret formula for Coke on the Internet. Finally, the judge wanted to break Microsoft up into at least three separate companies—again, the preferred position of Microsoft’s rivals.
<font color="white"> . </font>
All of these “remedies” would have crippled Microsoft, which of course was their purpose. Thankfully, Judge Jackson was dropped from the case because of the gross bias he exhibited in media interviews. His “finding of fact” was mostly discarded, and his proposed “remedy” never came into fruition. His successor, Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, approved a much more reasonable settlement between Microsoft and the Department of Justice that did not break the company up, Standard Oil-style, or cripple it, as Microsoft’s Project Sherman competitors would have preferred.
<font color="white"> . </font>
The moral of the Microsoft antitrust story is that very few federal politicians have any respect for capitalism or capitalists despite all their “pro-business” rhetoric. Whenever the opportunity arises, they will threaten to ruin any corporation if they think such a crusade can help their political careers. Senator Orrin Hatch was merely the political arrand boy for Novell, one of the largest corporations in the state of Utah. He was attempting to use the coercive powers of the U.S. Justic Department to protect a wealthy constituent from competition, with little or no regard to the effects of his efforts on the economy and the nation as a whole.
<font color="white"> . </font>
The Microsoft case also reinforces the point that certain capitalists are capitalism’s worst enemies. The Novells and the Sun Microsystems of the world are neomercantilists who, when faced with stiff competition, lobby the government to cripple their rivals rather than going to work producing better and cheaper products for consumer. – Thomas J. DiLorenzo, How Capitalism Saved America, p. 232-239

[/ QUOTE ]

[jthegreat]

[ QUOTE ]
OK, then.

We have two inputs:

1) Lots of people like making other people pay for their stuff, and there have been systems to make other people pay for it for a long time.

2) Overwhelming empirical evidence shows that central planning of resource allocation is inefficient and leads to undesired results.

One of these has to yield to the other.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm arguing that the nature of a justice system makes it much different than any other commodity or service. The protection of rights is very much different than having your lawn maintained. If you recognize that all human beings should be granted the same basic human rights, then everyone deserves to have these rights respected. The extent to which your rights are protected should not depend on how much money you have. As Rand said, government justice is a system designed to make "right" more powerful than "might". It's not easy and it's not perfect, but it's the only way to do it. An AC justice system is still a "might makes right" system, which philosophically is diametrically opposed to the idea that all humans deserve certain rights based *solely* on the fact that they are human beings.

[ QUOTE ]
BTW, I'm interested in how you think a force monopoly can be voluntarily funded and still provide an acceptable service. You say you're concerned with free riders, but in this situation the incentive to pay is extremely low.

[/ QUOTE ]

It'd have to be funded on a fee-for-service basis. Much like health insurance, where you can pay month-by-month, or choose not to have it and pay costs as they arise. I'd imagine a fee based on your capital assets or something similar would be fair. The more you have, the more you pay to have it protected.

[ QUOTE ]
When there is only one provider, that provider has no incentive to keep costs low.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is what the election process is for. A lot of people were happy about Bush's tax cuts, for example.

[ QUOTE ]
Given the fact that my voluntary payment to a force monopoly will have near-zero return, why would I pay?

[/ QUOTE ]

I don't agree that it would have near-zero return.

[jthegreat]

[ QUOTE ]
What a deal. I'm sure people will be lining up to voluntarily purchase this type of "protection".

[/ QUOTE ]

I said it wasn't perfect, but it did work. In an AC system, they'd have been screwed over much worse.

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
If you recognize that all human beings should be granted the same basic human rights,

[/ QUOTE ]

Wait. Who's "granting" these rights? I only have rights because someone else was nice enough to grant them to me?

[ QUOTE ]
then everyone deserves to have these rights respected.

[/ QUOTE ]

OK.

[ QUOTE ]
The extent to which your rights are protected should not depend on how much money you have.

[/ QUOTE ]

Maybe. I think a better way of saying this is that the extent to which your rights are protected should be determined by your own personal preferences.

BTW, do you really think that everyone gets equal protection from current monopoly forces? Defense lawyers are certainly part of your arsenal when it comes to defense of your rights. A guy with more money can hire better lawyers. Should poor people get "free" top-notch lawyers? Who's paying for that, since you don't have any coercive funding? Should private attorneys be outlawed?

[ QUOTE ]
It'd have to be funded on a fee-for-service basis. Much like health insurance, where you can pay month-by-month, or choose not to have it and pay costs as they arise. I'd imagine a fee based on your capital assets or something similar would be fair. The more you have, the more you pay to have it protected.

[/ QUOTE ]

Wait, I thought it shouldn't depend on how much money you have.

If this is going to be funded "like insurance" why can't it be delivered "like insurance" - i.e. by multiple competing vendors?

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
When there is only one provider, that provider has no incentive to keep costs low.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is what the election process is for. A lot of people were happy about Bush's tax cuts, for example.

[/ QUOTE ]

But there are *no* taxes in your system. Is this government coercively funded or not? I'm really confused.

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
What a deal. I'm sure people will be lining up to voluntarily purchase this type of "protection".

[/ QUOTE ]

I said it wasn't perfect, but it did work. In an AC system, they'd have been screwed over much worse.

[/ QUOTE ]

Wait, not being subjected to institutionalized, unavoidable legal discrimination would have been *worse*?

[behemoth2006]

I would like you, borodog, to tell me of these viable competitors to microsoft, we'll say starting with windows 3.0.

And the word "reasonable" absolutely belongs in this discussion because as I said in later posts, 99% of the business world went Windows, and since windows was built to be exclusive to only microsoft and microsoft "sponsored" programs, none of these competitors would be viable or a reasonable approach to achieving the solutions sought.

[Borodog]

Name one instance where consumers were harmed and I might bother. Name one instance where Microsoft entered a market and prices went up. If you can't do that, what's the point?

[behemoth2006]

[ QUOTE ]
Name one instance where consumers were harmed and I might bother. Name one instance where Microsoft entered a market and prices went up. If you can't do that, what's the point?

[/ QUOTE ]

have you ever heard of trusted computing? of this bs unstable windows update? If you were to take a look at what is really happening when you update, I dont think you'd do it. They harm the consumer by regulating what you can and can't have on your own damn computer!!

Gee, lets look at the price differences:
Linux Redhat plus GNU license software such as OpenOffice: $50
Free Linux (Ubuntu et al) and GNUsoft: $0

Windows XP + Office: $150-$300. If you get corporate editions $200-500

There, have I fulfilled your requests?

[Borodog]

Not at all. Your point seems to be that Microsoft has cheaper competitors. So that makes them a monopoly how? Again, can you show me an example of Microsoft entering a market and prices going up?

[behemoth2006]

[ QUOTE ]
Not at all. Your point seems to be that Microsoft has cheaper competitors. So that makes them a monopoly how? Again, can you show me an example of Microsoft entering a market and prices going up?

[/ QUOTE ]

OMG dude, no. Linux became widely optainable, and a viable option, after companies stopped making windows exclusive products, AFTER THE ANTITRUST CASE.

there were no viable contenders before then. And how can you say they dont dictate prices? They are the only choice! Go take a look at the Windows OS prices, match their rising prices against inflation, and BOOM! There ya have it... rising prices.

[Borodog]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Not at all. Your point seems to be that Microsoft has cheaper competitors. So that makes them a monopoly how? Again, can you show me an example of Microsoft entering a market and prices going up?

[/ QUOTE ]

OMG dude, no. Linux became widely optainable, and a viable option, after companies stopped making windows exclusive products, AFTER THE ANTITRUST CASE.

[/ QUOTE ]

OMG dude, no. Companies never made "windows exclusive products." Rather, they made products that were profitable to make. At all times Microsoft had competition, in all markets, for all products. Furthermore, how would an anti-trust case against Microsoft, which was essentially won by Microsoft, change whether other companies chose to make or not make products? Microsoft never had any power to coerce customers into choosing their products
or to prevent competitors from entering the market.

[ QUOTE ]
there were no viable contenders before then.

[/ QUOTE ]

"viable contenders" ? What you're essentially saying is that all of Microsoft's competitors couldn't compete. And Microsoft is supposed to be the bad guys becuase of this?

[ QUOTE ]
And how can you say they dont dictate prices? They are the only choice!

[/ QUOTE ]

You just quoted me prices from their competition. Prices that are lower than Microsoft's. WTF are you talking about?

[ QUOTE ]
Go take a look at the Windows OS prices, match their rising prices against inflation, and BOOM! There ya have it... rising prices.

[/ QUOTE ]

You clearly didn't read what I posted. In every case, for every product, Microsoft entering a market forced prices down, by an average of 60%, compared to a 15% drop in the prices of products where Microsoft did not have a product in competition. All software prices have dropped, simply due to the nature of competitive markets in general, but Microsoft forces prices to drop 4 times as far in markets it enters.

In short, Microsoft has always had competitors (often times thousands), drives consumer prices down, has never coerced a single person into buying a piece of software, has never coerced a competitor or would-be competitor, and has gained market share by the voluntary actions of its customers, and has improved the productivity of the planet by an incalculable amount (Microsoft products have easily added trillions of dollars worth of productivity to the world economy), making the whole world wealthier.

None of this even remotely resembles "monopoly."

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
OMG dude, no. Linux became widely optainable, and a viable option, after companies stopped making windows exclusive products, AFTER THE ANTITRUST CASE.

[/ QUOTE ]

Correlation is not causation.

What changed in the antitrust case that suddenly made these Linux viable?

Linux was only created in 1992. How could it have possibly been viable before the antitrust case?

[ QUOTE ]
there were no viable contenders before then.

[/ QUOTE ]

Netware?
OS/2?

If I remember correctly, both of these are still commercially available (well, OS/2 was still available during the antitrust trial). In addition, there are (and have been) countless commercial Unix operating systems.

Where's the monopoly?

[behemoth2006]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
OMG dude, no. Linux became widely optainable, and a viable option, after companies stopped making windows exclusive products, AFTER THE ANTITRUST CASE.

[/ QUOTE ]

Correlation is not causation.

What changed in the antitrust case that suddenly made these Linux viable?

Linux was only created in 1992. How could it have possibly been viable before the antitrust case?

[ QUOTE ]
there were no viable contenders before then.

[/ QUOTE ]

Netware?
OS/2?

If I remember correctly, both of these are still commercially available (well, OS/2 was still available during the antitrust trial). In addition, there are (and have been) countless commercial Unix operating systems.

Where's the monopoly?

[/ QUOTE ]

Well guys, I give up. You're not understanding what Im trying to get across, maybe because of the way Im wording my statements. I knew this would happen, like I said I am nowhere nearly as learned as you in this area, and I can not seem to get my point across.

You win, Im done, although I still disagree.

Well argued guys.

Cheers.

[pvn]

[ QUOTE ]
You're not understanding what Im trying to get across, maybe because of the way Im wording my statements.

[/ QUOTE ]

No, we understand perfectly.

[behemoth2006]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
You're not understanding what Im trying to get across, maybe because of the way Im wording my statements.

[/ QUOTE ]

No, we understand perfectly.

[/ QUOTE ]

Well based on the arguments that you're throwing back at me you don't. Im willing to get back into it now though, not so damn frustrated, so expect an eloquently worded and lengthy post as to the exact meaning of my earlier posts.

[Borodog]

I'm waiting to see how a company with thousands of competitors, that cannot coerce customers into choosing its products, nor coerve its competition or would-be competition, and that causes prices to fall in markets it participates in at 4 times the normal rate, is a monopoly.

[Riddick]

[ QUOTE ]
Stateless Society

[/ QUOTE ]

You can't put the toothpaste back in the tube. Debate over.