Microsoft's most important innovation has been to treat fines, judgements and settlements as costs of doing business. They have yet to suffer any penalty that has really hurt, and they have always made more money from their illegal activities than they have paid in penalties. They won't change their behavior because they have no reason to.

I suspect the EU fines will just end up being paid by Microsoft's EU customers in the form of higher prices, and nothing will change.

"The antitrust fees total $2.6 billion, more than any other company has ever been charged for ignoring EU rulings."

No other company has lost a case, lost it on appeal, and even then continued to violate the Commission's order. That is why they got hammered... that said they stopped this infringement in October, so they will not be fined on this one.

However, the European Commission is empowered under Art. 23(2) of Regulation 1/2003 to fine a company up to 10% of the total worldwide sales of the company, not just the sales that were the subject of the infringements of EU competition law (see Pioneer, ECJ June 7, 1983, 1983 ECR 1825 para 113-121; Tipp-Ex, ECJ Feb 8. 1990, 1990 ECR-I261, paras 37-39 -- the 10% provision was carried over from the earlier Council Regulation No 17 of 6 February 1962.) That means that the maximum fine could be as much as $5 billion (10% of $51 Billion.)

$5 billion fines would definitely get Microsoft's attention.

"The antitrust fees total $2.6 billion, more than any other company has ever been charged for ignoring EU rulings."

No other company has lost a case, lost it on appeal, and even then continued to violate the Commission's order. That is why they got hammered... that said they stopped this infringement in October, so they will not be fined on this one any more.

However, other cases are pending and the European Commission is empowered under Art. 23(2) of Regulation 1/2003 to fine a company up to 10% of the total worldwide sales of the company, not just the sales that were the subject of the infringements of EU competition law (see Pioneer, ECJ June 7, 1983, 1983 ECR 1825 para 113-121; Tipp-Ex, ECJ Feb 8. 1990, 1990 ECR-I261, paras 37-39 -- the 10% provision was carried over from the earlier Council Regulation No 17 of 6 February 1962.) That means that the maximum fine could be as much as $5 billion (10% of $51 Billion.) The Commission says that in this instance they fined about 60% of what they could have -- if the next fine was also 60% that would be $3 billion

$3-5 billion fines would definitely get Microsoft's attention, and it would hit worldwide turnover.

This is a nitpick, but Samba is software. Samba is an open source implementation of Microsoft's SMB (later CIFS) network protocol.

Are you kidding? Microsoft is getting exactly what they deserve. I have no sympathy for a company that made its billions on bullying, stealing, and railroading others. They've never had a single original idea. Their products are crap, they use the consumer as a free research population, and we have to spend years finding all the bugs in their shoddy products. They never learn from their mistakes, instead they simply run roughshod over those they're supposedly servicing. Nope, no a single tear shed.

Karma's a bitch, as they say. Fuck 'em.

"If you've observed the tech business at all recently, you've likely developed a soft spot for Microsoft. How could you not?"

Easily. Try writing kernel drivers for the bloated hack they're selling as an operating system.

Microsoft should just say, hmmm, we are not going to pay this extortion. Then they should withdraw support for all new licenses for their products from the countries involved, fire all their European employees and depart the Continent.

Yes, the corporation would lose tremendous sales. But they would probably have fewer stickup guns pointed at their head from around the world in the future.

"Our company and our products are evil? Okay, we won't polute you any longer, we're taking our toy and going home." I guess Europe could then exist on apples and penguins.

However, Bill Gates is not a real Capitalist and won't do it; he's proven to be a conciliatory, not a radical.

John Donohue