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Forums - Gaming Discussion - Where do you stand on Microsoft buying Activision/Blizzard?

 

For or against the acquisition?

For 58 41.43%
 
Against 54 38.57%
 
Neutral 28 20.00%
 
Total:140
ConservagameR said:
EpicRandy said:

I also saw this on Wikipedia but it is incomplete. It looks like the only wrong thing done by the judge was inappropriate talk to the media while the thruth is that those talks were loaded with partial take against MS

The opinion was notable for its rebuke of Judge Jackson. ``The trial judge engaged in impermissible ex parte contacts by holding secret interviews with members of the media and made numerous offensive comments about Microsoft officials in public statements outside of the courtroom, giving rise to an appearance of partiality,'' the court said. ``Although we find no evidence of actual bias, we hold that the actions of the trial judge seriously tainted the proceedings before the district court and called into question the integrity of the judicial process.''

nytimes.com

Also, in the end, it doesn't really matter, the whole thing happened only because of the time it happened, OSs were only a thing to the masses for less than a decade and a great part of the reason it was seen as monopolistic was due to incompetent competition which was tripping over themselves every now and then (and yes that include Apple).

The very same behavior that got Microsoft into trouble back then is used without consequence by Google, Apple, Sony, Nintendo, Amazon, etc. and is in fact still being used by MS (all bundle their app and stores with their respective OS). So, to me, It's funny to use a 20+ years old case to paint today's MS evil all the while every other actor with the proprietary OS are depicting the exact same behavior and are just lucky they haven't been challenged and/or that the context of today is more lenient on those practices.

If what the initial judge did with the media, made the entire case against MS, then MS would've been found not guilty in the end, which didn't occur.

I'm not even going to start when it comes to all the things that have happened in the past that wouldn't happen or would be handled differently today. 

The initial post was about MS and their relationship with PC's, as to control. I never said MS is alone in this and even Big Mach alluded to that repeatedly.

MS never let it get that far because why bother when you can easily settle the case by just including the other browser.  You still have not established any real sleazy tactic.  This whole court case doesn't even come close to proving your position or what if scenarios.  You did not make that post on the court case concerning control, you were trying to establish your summary that MS could have used sleazy tactics to obtain dominance in the PC space.



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EpicRandy said:
ConservagameR said:

United States v. Microsoft Corp. - Wikipedia

On June 28, 2001, the Circuit Court overturned Judge Jackson's rulings against Microsoft. This was partly because Jackson had improperly discussed the case with the news media while it was still in progress, violating the Code of Conduct for American judges.

Ultimately, the Circuit Court overturned Jackson's holding that Microsoft should be broken up as an illegal monopoly. However, the Circuit Court did not overturn Jackson's findings of fact. The Circuit Court adopted a "drastically altered scope of liability" due to Jackson's conduct, which was favorable for Microsoft.

The Department of Justice announced on September 6, 2001, that it was no longer seeking to break up Microsoft and would instead seek a lesser antitrust penalty. Microsoft decided to draft a settlement proposal allowing PC manufacturers to adopt non-Microsoft software.

On August 5, 2002, Microsoft announced that it would make some concessions towards the proposed final settlement ahead of the judge's decision. On November 1, 2002, Judge Kollar-Kotelly released a ruling that accepted most of the proposed DOJ settlement.

Microsoft later "agreed to consent to a two-year extension of part of the Final Judgments" dealing with communications protocol licensing, and stated that if the government later wished to extend those aspects of the settlement as far as 2012, it would not object.

MS only got off initially due to the first judge making a poor and illegal move involving the media, which obviously doesn't change MS past actions leading them to court. MS still ends up guilty after appeal, just with a lesser penalty. MS accepted this, this time.

Convinced yet?

I also saw this on Wikipedia but it is incomplete. It looks like the only wrong thing done by the judge was inappropriate talk to the media while the thruth is that those talks were loaded with partial take against MS

The opinion was notable for its rebuke of Judge Jackson. ``The trial judge engaged in impermissible ex parte contacts by holding secret interviews with members of the media and made numerous offensive comments about Microsoft officials in public statements outside of the courtroom, giving rise to an appearance of partiality,'' the court said. ``Although we find no evidence of actual bias, we hold that the actions of the trial judge seriously tainted the proceedings before the district court and called into question the integrity of the judicial process.''

nytimes.com

Also, in the end, it doesn't really matter, the whole thing happened only because of the time it happened, OSs were only a thing to the masses for less than a decade and a great part of the reason it was seen as monopolistic was due to incompetent competition which was tripping over themselves every now and then (and yes that include Apple).

The very same behavior that got Microsoft into trouble back then is used without consequence by Google, Apple, Sony, Nintendo, Amazon, etc. and is in fact still being used by MS (all bundle their app and stores with their respective OS). So, to me, It's funny to use a 20+ years old case to paint today's MS evil all the while every other actor with the proprietary OS are depicting the exact same behavior and are just lucky they haven't been challenged and/or that the context of today is more lenient on those practices.

 

Indeed, I guess he missed how Sony in 2019 stopped other stores from being able to sell Digital Codes for games and was sued in a Class Action lawsuit but the judge threw the case out. I guess going by his way of thinking the Judge only threw the case out since he must of been paid off .

ConservagameR said:
EpicRandy said:

I also saw this on Wikipedia but it is incomplete. It looks like the only wrong thing done by the judge was inappropriate talk to the media while the thruth is that those talks were loaded with partial take against MS

The opinion was notable for its rebuke of Judge Jackson. ``The trial judge engaged in impermissible ex parte contacts by holding secret interviews with members of the media and made numerous offensive comments about Microsoft officials in public statements outside of the courtroom, giving rise to an appearance of partiality,'' the court said. ``Although we find no evidence of actual bias, we hold that the actions of the trial judge seriously tainted the proceedings before the district court and called into question the integrity of the judicial process.''

nytimes.com

Also, in the end, it doesn't really matter, the whole thing happened only because of the time it happened, OSs were only a thing to the masses for less than a decade and a great part of the reason it was seen as monopolistic was due to incompetent competition which was tripping over themselves every now and then (and yes that include Apple).

The very same behavior that got Microsoft into trouble back then is used without consequence by Google, Apple, Sony, Nintendo, Amazon, etc. and is in fact still being used by MS (all bundle their app and stores with their respective OS). So, to me, It's funny to use a 20+ years old case to paint today's MS evil all the while every other actor with the proprietary OS are depicting the exact same behavior and are just lucky they haven't been challenged and/or that the context of today is more lenient on those practices.

If what the initial judge did with the media, made the entire case against MS, then MS would've been found not guilty in the end, which didn't occur.

I'm not even going to start when it comes to all the things that have happened in the past that wouldn't happen or would be handled differently today. 

The initial post was about MS and their relationship with PC's, as to control. I never said MS is alone in this and even Big Mach alluded to that repeatedly.

Why even start in the first place?. Clearly your post and posts after in no way proofs your point and by continuing to single out MS for "Things that happened in the past" that every company gets away with today isnt helping your case at all and you know it judging by what i bolded as you dont seem to want to talk about it when it comes to other companies who isnt MS.



zero129 said:
EpicRandy said:

I also saw this on Wikipedia but it is incomplete. It looks like the only wrong thing done by the judge was inappropriate talk to the media while the thruth is that those talks were loaded with partial take against MS

The opinion was notable for its rebuke of Judge Jackson. ``The trial judge engaged in impermissible ex parte contacts by holding secret interviews with members of the media and made numerous offensive comments about Microsoft officials in public statements outside of the courtroom, giving rise to an appearance of partiality,'' the court said. ``Although we find no evidence of actual bias, we hold that the actions of the trial judge seriously tainted the proceedings before the district court and called into question the integrity of the judicial process.''

nytimes.com

Also, in the end, it doesn't really matter, the whole thing happened only because of the time it happened, OSs were only a thing to the masses for less than a decade and a great part of the reason it was seen as monopolistic was due to incompetent competition which was tripping over themselves every now and then (and yes that include Apple).

The very same behavior that got Microsoft into trouble back then is used without consequence by Google, Apple, Sony, Nintendo, Amazon, etc. and is in fact still being used by MS (all bundle their app and stores with their respective OS). So, to me, It's funny to use a 20+ years old case to paint today's MS evil all the while every other actor with the proprietary OS are depicting the exact same behavior and are just lucky they haven't been challenged and/or that the context of today is more lenient on those practices.

Indeed, I guess he missed how Sony in 2019 stopped other stores from being able to sell Digital Codes for games and was sued in a Class Action lawsuit but the judge threw the case out. I guess going by his way of thinking the Judge only threw the case out since he must of been paid off .

ConservagameR said:

If what the initial judge did with the media, made the entire case against MS, then MS would've been found not guilty in the end, which didn't occur.

I'm not even going to start when it comes to all the things that have happened in the past that wouldn't happen or would be handled differently today. 

The initial post was about MS and their relationship with PC's, as to control. I never said MS is alone in this and even Big Mach alluded to that repeatedly.

Why even start in the first place?. Clearly your post and posts after in no way proofs your point and by continuing to single out MS for "Things that happened in the past" that every company gets away with today isnt helping your case at all and you know it judging by what i bolded as you dont seem to want to talk about it when it comes to other companies who isnt MS.

Where do you stand on Microsoft buying Activision/Blizzard?

The OP must have meant to include Sony and Nin in the title, I guess?

XB Series S sales mean nothing since they wouldn't have sold the same if launched today.

XB 360 RROD means nothing since they would have designed and manufactured it differently today.

In the end, they don't really matter, they only happened because of the time they happened, apparently.

Don't forget to include Sony and Nin in this as well. Can't leave them out since we're wiping the slate clean.

Feel free to disagree. All the consensus here is getting boring.



Machiavellian said:
ConservagameR said:

If what the initial judge did with the media, made the entire case against MS, then MS would've been found not guilty in the end, which didn't occur.

I'm not even going to start when it comes to all the things that have happened in the past that wouldn't happen or would be handled differently today. 

The initial post was about MS and their relationship with PC's, as to control. I never said MS is alone in this and even Big Mach alluded to that repeatedly.

MS never let it get that far because why bother when you can easily settle the case by just including the other browser.  You still have not established any real sleazy tactic.  This whole court case doesn't even come close to proving your position or what if scenarios.  You did not make that post on the court case concerning control, you were trying to establish your summary that MS could have used sleazy tactics to obtain dominance in the PC space.

That's because it's been about control the entire time.

Do I hear a Hiss?



ConservagameR said:

Where do you stand on Microsoft buying Activision/Blizzard?

The OP must have meant to include Sony and Nin in the title, I guess?

XB Series S sales mean nothing since they wouldn't have sold the same if launched today.

XB 360 RROD means nothing since they would have designed and manufactured it differently today.

In the end, they don't really matter, they only happened because of the time they happened, apparently.

Don't forget to include Sony and Nin in this as well. Can't leave them out since we're wiping the slate clean.

Feel free to disagree. All the consensus here is getting boring.

There's a lot of hypocrisy in the console wars. When 'your' side does crappy stuff on their platform, it's all fine, just business. Or never as bad as a competing business. You can never discuss MS, Sony or Nintendo alone, and if that's not enough, drag Google Amazon and Apple into it as well.

Microsoft still does it with the way they tie Edge further and further into the Windows OS and forcing people to use over encompassing MS accounts to use Windows and their games.



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SvennoJ said:
ConservagameR said:

Where do you stand on Microsoft buying Activision/Blizzard?

The OP must have meant to include Sony and Nin in the title, I guess?

XB Series S sales mean nothing since they wouldn't have sold the same if launched today.

XB 360 RROD means nothing since they would have designed and manufactured it differently today.

In the end, they don't really matter, they only happened because of the time they happened, apparently.

Don't forget to include Sony and Nin in this as well. Can't leave them out since we're wiping the slate clean.

Feel free to disagree. All the consensus here is getting boring.

There's a lot of hypocrisy in the console wars. When 'your' side does crappy stuff on their platform, it's all fine, just business. Or never as bad as a competing business. You can never discuss MS, Sony or Nintendo alone, and if that's not enough, drag Google Amazon and Apple into it as well.

Microsoft still does it with the way they tie Edge further and further into the Windows OS and forcing people to use over encompassing MS accounts to use Windows and their games.

Edge integration into Windows is no different then Safari within Mac OS, neither browser can just be taken out of the OS because of the integration and backend services each rely on.  The thing is, neither OS require you to actually use those browsers so you really cannot say they are strong arming you.  There is no doubt that every company that has an advantage within their section of business will continue to push for that advantage, that is what business do.  Its another thing to suggest they need to resort to sleazy tactics to accomplish the task.

As for an OS is concerned if you are looking to get away from a business leveraging their software on their platform, then only Linux fills that spot but even still you probably cannot get the paid distros as you then just move from one master to another.



Machiavellian said:
SvennoJ said:

There's a lot of hypocrisy in the console wars. When 'your' side does crappy stuff on their platform, it's all fine, just business. Or never as bad as a competing business. You can never discuss MS, Sony or Nintendo alone, and if that's not enough, drag Google Amazon and Apple into it as well.

Microsoft still does it with the way they tie Edge further and further into the Windows OS and forcing people to use over encompassing MS accounts to use Windows and their games.

Edge integration into Windows is no different then Safari within Mac OS, neither browser can just be taken out of the OS because of the integration and backend services each rely on.  The thing is, neither OS require you to actually use those browsers so you really cannot say they are strong arming you.  There is no doubt that every company that has an advantage within their section of business will continue to push for that advantage, that is what business do.  Its another thing to suggest they need to resort to sleazy tactics to accomplish the task.

As for an OS is concerned if you are looking to get away from a business leveraging their software on their platform, then only Linux fills that spot but even still you probably cannot get the paid distros as you then just move from one master to another.

You're just proving my point, thanks.



ConservagameR said:
zero129 said:

Indeed, I guess he missed how Sony in 2019 stopped other stores from being able to sell Digital Codes for games and was sued in a Class Action lawsuit but the judge threw the case out. I guess going by his way of thinking the Judge only threw the case out since he must of been paid off .

ConservagameR said:

If what the initial judge did with the media, made the entire case against MS, then MS would've been found not guilty in the end, which didn't occur.

I'm not even going to start when it comes to all the things that have happened in the past that wouldn't happen or would be handled differently today. 

The initial post was about MS and their relationship with PC's, as to control. I never said MS is alone in this and even Big Mach alluded to that repeatedly.

Why even start in the first place?. Clearly your post and posts after in no way proofs your point and by continuing to single out MS for "Things that happened in the past" that every company gets away with today isnt helping your case at all and you know it judging by what i bolded as you dont seem to want to talk about it when it comes to other companies who isnt MS.

Where do you stand on Microsoft buying Activision/Blizzard?

The OP must have meant to include Sony and Nin in the title, I guess?

XB Series S sales mean nothing since they wouldn't have sold the same if launched today.

XB 360 RROD means nothing since they would have designed and manufactured it differently today.

In the end, they don't really matter, they only happened because of the time they happened, apparently.

Don't forget to include Sony and Nin in this as well. Can't leave them out since we're wiping the slate clean.

Feel free to disagree. All the consensus here is getting boring.

Well when you are using pretty bad takes against one company while ignoring others clearly people are going to point out your bad takes and let you know how your fav company isnt much different.

SvennoJ said:
ConservagameR said:

Where do you stand on Microsoft buying Activision/Blizzard?

The OP must have meant to include Sony and Nin in the title, I guess?

XB Series S sales mean nothing since they wouldn't have sold the same if launched today.

XB 360 RROD means nothing since they would have designed and manufactured it differently today.

In the end, they don't really matter, they only happened because of the time they happened, apparently.

Don't forget to include Sony and Nin in this as well. Can't leave them out since we're wiping the slate clean.

Feel free to disagree. All the consensus here is getting boring.

There's a lot of hypocrisy in the console wars. When 'your' side does crappy stuff on their platform, it's all fine, just business. Or never as bad as a competing business. You can never discuss MS, Sony or Nintendo alone, and if that's not enough, drag Google Amazon and Apple into it as well.

Microsoft still does it with the way they tie Edge further and further into the Windows OS and forcing people to use over encompassing MS accounts to use Windows and their games.

Are you really agreeing with his bad takes here?.



zero129 said:
ConservagameR said:

Where do you stand on Microsoft buying Activision/Blizzard?

The OP must have meant to include Sony and Nin in the title, I guess?

XB Series S sales mean nothing since they wouldn't have sold the same if launched today.

XB 360 RROD means nothing since they would have designed and manufactured it differently today.

In the end, they don't really matter, they only happened because of the time they happened, apparently.

Don't forget to include Sony and Nin in this as well. Can't leave them out since we're wiping the slate clean.

Feel free to disagree. All the consensus here is getting boring.

Well when you are using pretty bad takes against one company while ignoring others clearly people are going to point out your bad takes and let you know how your fav company isnt much different.

SvennoJ said:

There's a lot of hypocrisy in the console wars. When 'your' side does crappy stuff on their platform, it's all fine, just business. Or never as bad as a competing business. You can never discuss MS, Sony or Nintendo alone, and if that's not enough, drag Google Amazon and Apple into it as well.

Microsoft still does it with the way they tie Edge further and further into the Windows OS and forcing people to use over encompassing MS accounts to use Windows and their games.

Are you really agreeing with his bad takes here?.

Not 100% nor 0%. But it's impossible to discuss anything since fingers always start pointing in different directions. 
He's right this thread started about Microsoft, but everything gets countered with, but Sony, but Google, but Apple, that's in the past, and so on.

The idea that somehow MS having Acti/Blizz/King is somehow better instead of Sony, Google or Apple is not something I agree with nor really relevant to the question. Just a smokescreen to avoid talking about what the consequences can be.

I can see some parallels between GoG to how CP2077 ended up, and Gamepass and the Halo Infinite mess up. Now grow gamepass further and add a lot more IPs, yeah I'm slightly worried about this acquisition. Personally I don't have much stake in it anyway, Blizzard and Activision have been unwelcome in my house for a long time now. So imo, that 69 billion is better spend elsewhere! But for MS it's a good deal, lot of old stuff to throw on gamepass including new cash cows, while getting an inroad to mobile gaming to spread gamepass there.

Anyway you know how fond I am of subscriptions, mobile gaming and streaming, not at all. MS is heading away from my interests.



ConservagameR said:

Where do you stand on Microsoft buying Activision/Blizzard?

The OP must have meant to include Sony and Nin in the title, I guess?

Focusing on the title and while ignoring that the OP mentioned Sony by name and that he also invited discussion on Regulatory bodies findings which are mostly fueled by Sony's argument. Yeah the OP meant to include those hence why it is in the gaming discussion section not MS discussion.

ConservagameR said:

XB Series S sales mean nothing since they wouldn't have sold the same if launched today.
XB 360 RROD means nothing since they would have designed and manufactured it differently today.
In the end, they don't really matter, they only happened because of the time they happened, apparently.

Willfully ignoring that the argument was specifically referring to MS monopoly's court case and trying a equate this to something else ain't really working. 

ConservagameR said:

Don't forget to include Sony and Nin in this as well. Can't leave them out since we're wiping the slate clean.

Tell that to the regulatory bodies, which the OP invited us to talk about, cause they ain't shying away from referring to both.
Also one can say: Don't forget to include a 20+ years old court case about a behavior that is totally accepted today in this as well. Can't leave them out since we're wiping the slate clean.

Last edited by EpicRandy - on 28 January 2023