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America's antitrust laws were born out of the Industrial Revolution. Opponents of the antitrust laws argue that whatever merit the antitrust laws may have had in the past they have no place in a digital economy. Rapid innovation makes the accumulation of market power practically impossible. Markets change too quickly for antitrust actions to keep up. And antitrust remedies are inevitably regulatory and hence threaten to `regulate business'.
A different view - and, generally, the view presented in this volume - is that antitrust law can and does have an important and constructive role to play in the digital economy. The software business is new, it is complex, and it is rapidly moving. Analysis of market definition, contestibility and potential competition, the role of innovation, network externalities, cost structures and marketing channels present challenges for academics, policymakers and judges alike. Evaluating consumer harm is problematic. Distinguishing between illegal conduct and brutal - but legitimate - competition is often difficult.
Is antitrust analysis up to the challenge? This volume suggests that antitrust analysis `still works'. In stark contrast to the political rhetoric that has surrounded much of the debate over the Microsoft case, the articles presented here suggest neither that Microsoft is inherently bad, nor that it deserves a de facto exemption from the antitrust laws. Instead, they offer insights - for policymakers, courts, practitioners, professors and students of antitrust policy everywhere - on how antitrust analysis can be applied to the business of making and marketing computer software.
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Table of contents (13 papers)
Editors and Affiliations
Bibliographic Information
Book Title: Competition, Innovation and the Microsoft Monopoly: Antitrust in the Digital Marketplace
Book Subtitle: Proceedings of a conference held by The Progress & Freedom Foundation in Washington, DC February 5, 1998
Editors: Jeffrey A. Eisenach, Thomas M. Lenard
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-4407-0
Publisher: Springer Dordrecht
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eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive
Copyright Information: Springer Science+Business Media New York 1999
Hardcover ISBN: 978-0-7923-8464-9Published: 31 March 1999
Softcover ISBN: 978-94-010-5894-0Published: 05 November 2012
eBook ISBN: 978-94-011-4407-0Published: 06 December 2012
Edition Number: 1
Number of Pages: X, 297
Number of Illustrations: 1 b/w illustrations
Topics: Industrial Organization, Economic Growth, Innovation/Technology Management, Law and Economics