:A study of the privacy and competitiveness implications of an annuity model for licensing Microsoft Windows 2000
A study of the privacy and competitiveness implications of an annuity model for licensing Microsoft Windows 2000 Mar 10, 1999, 11 :37 UTC (5 Talkback[s]) (4580 reads) (Other stories by Jason Catlett)
"...concludes that allowing Microsoft to make the switch in a manner that
apparently maximizes its short-term gains would significantly compromise
both consumer privacy and the competitiveness of electronic commerce."
"By using its monopoly of the Windows OS to coerce identification of
consumers, Microsoft would obtain considerably more information about
individual online consumers than any of its competitors in application
software, web media, and electronic commerce."
"Since 1997 it has been working with First Data Corp. in a joint venture on
electronic bill presentment, previously named MSFDC and now named
Transpoint. First Data maintains a database of more than than 160 million
individuals and 10 million businesses across the USA. The same year
Microsoft also entered into an agreement to exchange unspecified
information with Metromail, a major vendor of demographic, psychographic
and behavioral information, the world's largest letter shop (junk mail
factory), and now a subsidiary of Experian, one of the three US credit
reporting agencies."
"Microsoft has indicated in posted policies that it may sell information
about consumers to other companies, a common and profitable practice in the
direct marketing industry. What is unparalleled is the breadth of this
information, and its potential depth if Microsoft puts its OS users under a
virtual compulsion to identify themselves."
