Welcome!

Cloud Expo Authors: Liz McMillan, John Treadway, Greg Schulz, Jeremy Geelan, Marilyn Moux

Related Topics: Linux

Linux: Article

Microsoft Blocks Desktop Linux in the Netherlands

Microsoft Blocks Desktop Linux in the Netherlands

A press release issued this morning by Lindows.com contends:

A judge in the Netherlands today granted Microsoft a preliminary injunction against desktop Linux vendor Lindows.com Inc., a decision Lindows.com plans to appeal. The ruling will deny the Netherlands the cost- savings that desktop Linux currently offers to approximately 18 million people worldwide, leaving vulnerable and expensive Microsoft software as the only option for computer consumers in the Netherlands.

Michael Robertson, CEO of Lindows.com Inc, made no bones about it, as usual: "It's clear that Microsoft is using their army of hundreds of attorneys and billions of dollars as a battering ram to destroy any company that promotes desktop Linux," he said .

"They were unsuccessful in the U.S. with this tactic," Robertson continues, "so now they're resorting to picking countries where they will find a sympathetic court."

"Today," he concluded, sounding a warning note to Dutch consumers, "U.S. customers can purchase computers pre-installed with desktop Linux and are saving millions of dollars when compared with expensive, virus-prone software from Microsoft. This ruling may delay the day when Dutch customers receive those same savings, but I can assure you that we will continue to battle to bring the benefit of choice to the Netherlands."

The official statement by Lindows.com Inc states:

Lindows.com will abide by the terms of the ruling, but will appeal the decision that deprives Dutch consumers of the cost-savings that desktop Linux users worldwide have experienced. Lindows.com products have enabled $199 PCs and $699 laptops to be widely available in the United States, where courts twice denied Microsoft's requests for a preliminary injunction against Lindows.com ( www.lindows.com/msftdenied ). The exclusivity of Microsoft products in the Dutch computer market results in consumers paying inflated prices for vulnerable software.

Despite the March 1, 2004 trial scheduled in the United States, Microsoft has been opening multiple fronts in Europe in an attempt to drain the resources of competitors. The software giant has threatened resellers and brought legal action against Lindows.com in several countries of the European Union, including France, Sweden, and Finland. The moves prompted the launch of ChoicePC, a rallying point for supporters of choice in European countries that was met with overwhelming support ( www.lindows.com/choicesuccess ).

Details of the continuing litigation between Microsoft and Lindows.com are available here. And those interested in attending or receiving updates on the March 1, 2004 trial in Seattle, Washington, are invited to register at www.lindows.com/attend.

 

More Stories By Linux News Desk

SYS-CON's Linux News Desk gathers stories, analysis, and information from around the Linux world and synthesizes them into an easy to digest format for IT/IS managers and other business decision-makers.

Comments (3) View Comments

Share your thoughts on this story.

Add your comment
You must be signed in to add a comment. Sign-in | Register

In accordance with our Comment Policy, we encourage comments that are on topic, relevant and to-the-point. We will remove comments that include profanity, personal attacks, racial slurs, threats of violence, or other inappropriate material that violates our Terms and Conditions, and will block users who make repeated violations. We ask all readers to expect diversity of opinion and to treat one another with dignity and respect.


Most Recent Comments
beng 03/04/04 04:54:50 AM EST

Well it's a bad decision from the court,
but . . . NOT a "block"
because Linux on the desktop has plenty of options
example fedora is easy to install, cheap and has
all the usual applications you'd expect on a desktop.
imho: don't waste time on just a name or a button,
it's the application tha matters.
Suggestion to lindows team:
Just change the name in holland to ramen-os
Ramen is dutch word for glass windows to look throug.

Leo Gruijters 02/02/04 04:00:17 PM EST

I am sorry to have to admit that I am Dutch...
Holland will always lag behind in new technologies.
The Dutch are traders and manipulators, not innovators.
Don't expect courage and rapid acception of new technologies in the Netherlands. The new countries (Brazil, China etc.) will lead the Linux revolution.

Tom Britton 02/02/04 02:41:53 PM EST

What an appallingly bad piece of reporting! The Dutch court decision to grant Microsoft its injunction is bad news for Dutch consumers, true, but it doesn't "[leave] ... Microsoft software as the only option for computer consumers in the Netherlands.". Apple still sells there, and Suse, Red Hat, Mandrake etc are all still available. I didn't think Linuxworld engaged in tabloid-like exaggeration and misrepresentation.

Cloud Expo Breaking News
Whether your company is large or small, you are probably exploring Big Data solutions and using cloud services and will need to integrate with other enterprise workloads. In his session at the 10th International Cloud Expo, Gwyn Clay, CEO of Stonebranch, will share detailed information about how their customers are already integrating Workload Automation with tools like Hadoop, and running workloads completely in the cloud using a modern enterprise-wide workload automation solution that is 100...
What do the CTOs of the CIA and the U.S. Dept. of Justice and the CIO of the National Reconnaissance Office have in common with the CEOs of Eucalyptus, GoGrid, ActiveState, Appcara, OpSource and Nortonworks, the CTOs of Rackspace, SoftLayer, SOA Software and AppZero, the Founder & General Manager of Dell Boomi, the VP of Big Data & Streams at IBM and the Chief Strategy Officer at Pacific Controls? Answer: all are shortly to present breakout sessions as members of the distinguished Speaker Facul...
As a Platinum Plus Sponsor of Cloud Expo New York, Rackspace Hosting is offering special passes to SYS-CON's 10th International Cloud Expo, which will take place on June 11–14, 2012, at the Javits Center in New York City, New York. Rackspace Hosting is the service leader in cloud computing, and a founder of OpenStack, an open source cloud operating system. The San Antonio-based company provides Fanatical Support® to its customers and partners, across a portfolio of IT services, including Manage...
The move to cloud-based applications has undeniably delivered tremendous benefits. However, the associated distribution creates various challenges from the quality perspective: End-to-end tests need to pass through multiple dependent systems, which are commonly unavailable, evolving, or difficult-to-access for testing. Accessing such systems often involves transaction and bandwidth fees. Teams need to test and tune the system under test against a realistic and broad range of performance and ...
In this CTO Power Panel at the 10th International Cloud Expo, moderated by Cloud Expo Conference Chair Jeremy Geelan, industry-leading CTOs & VPs of Technology will discuss such topics as: Which do you think is the most important cloud computing standard still to tackle? Who should and shouldn’t be using a PaaS product today, and why? Can a public cloud ever be truly secure? How important is open source to cloud computing and Big Data? "Mission-critical apps are now safe in the cloud." Tr...
For many of the same reasons that Software-as-a-Service is catching on with enterprise buyers, delivering web services on top of Infrastructure-as-a-Service architectures is appealing to the SaaS developers. Operational agility, lower CapEx, and a broad array of tools and services are on tap that make both public and private IaaS clouds a great platform to build on. But how do you do this securely, especially in the public cloud where you have no access to the network or hypervisor your servers ...
“Big Data eliminates the data silos that formerly existed, improving the depth and quality of analysis that can take place,” observed Scott Kinka, Chief Technology Officer at Evolve IP, in this exclusive Q&A with Cloud Expo Conference Chair Jeremy Geelan. “Without these barriers, Kinka continued, “we gain access to information that was never before available. We can see where there are underserved markets, opportunities, problems that need to be addressed.” Agree or disagree? – "While the IT sa...
With Cloud Expo 2012 New York (10th Cloud Expo) now just three weeks away, what better time to introduce you in greater detail to the distinguished individuals in our incredible Speaker Faculty for the technical and strategy sessions at the conference...
In this CEO Power Panel at the 10th International Cloud Expo, moderated by Cloud Expo Conference Chair Jeremy Geelan, leading executives in the Cloud Computing and Big Data space will be discussing such topics as: Is it just wishful thinking to depict the Cloud as more than just a technology solution? If not, then what concrete examples best demonstrate cloud computing as an engine of business value? Big Data has existed since the early days of computing; why, then, do you think there is such...
If your organization already uses virtualized infrastructure, you are well on your way to providing IT as a Service. But as businesses demand faster results in today’s competitive market, organizations look to gain more benefits from cloud computing than just virtualized infrastructure. Learn how to extend & ensure your private cloud investment with a private Platform as a Service (PaaS) and provide on-demand availability, flexibility, control, and ultimately, faster time-to-market for your deve...