This wasn't even a market carve-up. It was a proposal for IBM to single-source from Intel and Microsoft. That's perfectly legal for a new product that's starting out with 0% market share.
It was legal for Microsoft to single-source the CPU for the Surface from Nvidia. And it would have been similarly legal for IBM to single-source the OS for the PC from Microsoft.
What's more, Microsoft had 0% share of the OS market -- thus, no market power. And it had already agreed to produce BASIC for the IBM PC -- thus, no tying. Ipso facto, Microsoft could not possibly have been guilty of an antitrust violation in 1980 for offering to single-source DOS to IBM.
Only the Register could come up with such an illogical conclusion like that. But then, the Register is so virulently anti-Microsoft that they could probably criticize Altair BASIC on antitrust grounds.
Having heard Wharton's story directly from him, I can assure you that was being proposed as told by Wharton was in fact a three-way market carve-up.
• IBM would get business.
• Intel would get embedded devices (Wharton's own work was largely on an embedded controller that's used in automobiles, more units of it have been created than there are humans on Earth).
• Microsoft would get the hobbyist market ("home computing").
Your ad hominem on The Register (El Rag as I like to call it) doesn't address the fact that the source of the story is in fact John Wharton, and he has IIRC publicly discussed it elsewhere. I've got my own beefs with the Register (its irrational opposition to anthropogenic global warming comes to mind). And while long critical of Microsoft, that stance seems to have softened markedly in recent years. The stance of the site is pretty aggressively confrontational -- it's not "biting the hand that feeds IT" for nothing.
That's an interesting anecdote. But that still isn't an antitrust violation.
You need market power in order to restrain trade. Otherwise, you're just fantasizing about seizing control of a market without actually having the power to do so. For example, if you and I get together and divided the smartphone market 50/50 between the two of us, that would simply be laughable, not anti-competitive.
But if you do have market power, then your actions could actually be anti-competitive. If IBM had reached an agreement with, say, DEC to split the mainframe and minicomputer market between them, then that would have been an "unreasonable restraint of trade."
But Microsoft held 0% of the operating system market in 1980. In fact, in 1980, Microsoft had market power only in BASIC interpreters. As long as Microsoft didn't try to tie BASIC interpreters to some other product, it would've been very hard for Microsoft to violate antitrust law, even if it tried.
> Your ad hominem on The Register (El Rag as I like to call it) doesn't address the fact that the source of the story is in fact John Wharton, and he has IIRC publicly discussed it elsewhere.
An ad hominem is when someone claims that an argument is false simply because it originated from a certain source. That's not what I did. I attacked the Register after addressing the argument directly. That's not an ad hominem, that's just an attack on the Register.
P.S. Since the information came from John Wharton, it would be best if we could see what he actually said. Right now, Googling for "John Wharton IBM Microsoft Intel" gives only three relevant hits: two articles in the Register, and your original comment.
First off: that's not what the statute says. And again you've failed to provide any documentation for your claims (as adventured has also failed to do).
So I'll leave it there.
As for Wharton's making statements elsewhere: it's my recollection that he had. I haven't looked for them ... and no, don't see anything that's a specific match, though you can certainly place Wharton at Intel and having met with Gates while there.
> First off: that's not what the statute says. And again you've failed to provide any documentation for your claims (as adventured has also failed to do).
As for sources, see any textbook in antitrust law. Or just Google for the words "market power" and "restraint of trade.
" These are not controversial concepts in antitrust law. You don't need a citation to say that the sky is blue.
There are such things are per se violations, but the courts have chipped away at this concept. For example, vertical segmentation used to be a per se violation, but today it is subject to the rule of reason.
> As for Wharton's making statements elsewhere: it's my recollection that he had. I haven't looked for them ... and no, don't see anything that's a specific match, though you can certainly place Wharton at Intel and having met with Gates while there.
It's certainly ironic that you don't provide a citation for this, when you're so aggressive about demanding citations from other people.
It was legal for Microsoft to single-source the CPU for the Surface from Nvidia. And it would have been similarly legal for IBM to single-source the OS for the PC from Microsoft.
What's more, Microsoft had 0% share of the OS market -- thus, no market power. And it had already agreed to produce BASIC for the IBM PC -- thus, no tying. Ipso facto, Microsoft could not possibly have been guilty of an antitrust violation in 1980 for offering to single-source DOS to IBM.
Only the Register could come up with such an illogical conclusion like that. But then, the Register is so virulently anti-Microsoft that they could probably criticize Altair BASIC on antitrust grounds.