NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #31/NN_1992_31.iso/spool/comp/os/os2/advocacy/11380

Text File | 1993-01-01 | 2.5 KB | 54 lines

Newsgroups: comp.os.os2.advocacy
Path: sparky!uunet!gatech!destroyer!cs.ubc.ca!news.UVic.CA!spang.Camosun.BC.CA!dbarker
From: [e-mail] (Deryk Barker)
Subject: Re: FCC will proclaim Microsoft is run by Communists! :)
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Organization: Camosun College, Victoria B.C, Canada
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL4
References: <[e-mail]>
Date: Fri, 1 Jan 1993 19:23:46 GMT
Lines: 42

[e-mail] (Steve Hastings) writes:
> In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Jay Maynard) writes:
> >It's OK for the FTC to force MS to change its marketing because this is force
> >in response to force...our net.libertarians will universally agree that the
> >initiation of force is wrong, but using force in response to someone else's
> >first use of force is good and necessary. MS initiated the use of force.
>
> Any libertarian will tell you that selling a product for a small amount of
> money is not and never can be force.
>
> It is force if the government says "Do as we say or we'll charge you huge
> fines.  If you don't pay the fines we will shut you down and/or imprison
> you."  You are advocating force in response to low prices, which is
> clearly not a libertarian concept.
>
> A libertarian will tell you that if a company can afford to sell a product
> very cheaply and does so, that company is doing nothing wrong.  Hard-core
> libertarians even approve of "dumping", where someone sells a product at a
> loss.  (Why do they approve of "dumping"?  Selling at a loss doesn't hurt
> the customer at all, only the seller.)

Well this is total nonsense. Dumping, in the sense of selling below
cost, can damage the competition and hence the sacred marketplace.

Thomas Watson, in his early life, was a salesman for NCR. In those
days their tactics were to set up business in a new town, sell at a
loss and undercut the local competition until said competition went
under, and then jack up prices. This is where Watson learnt the
predatory practises which for so long kept IBM in front.

> So what happens if MS gets 100% of the market share?  Either MS keeps
> selling DOS cheap (no harm to customers) or MS tries to jack up the
> price.  If MS tries that, DR-DOS will appear on the market again, or Macs
> will start selling more, or OS/2 will sell more.  Or all of the
> above.

But not if the companies producing them have been driven out of business.

--
Real:  Deryk Barker, Computer Science Dept., Camosun College, Victoria B.C.
Email: ([e-mail])
Phone: [phone]