[normhead]

Consumers won't need receipts to benefit from one of Canada's largest class-action settlements | CBC News

117 million in legal fees. Microsoft finally got stuck by a company that could wait them out. They've dragged this out since 2005 hoping the plaintiffs would run out of money. Exactly what everyone has always accused them of.

[Belcik]

wow....
"The class-action lawsuit alleged that Microsoft and Microsoft Canada were involved in a conspiracy to illegally increase prices for the company's products. "

This means that the OEM was more expensive than boxes? It will hit their P&L

[shyrsio]

Wow, this could start a chain reaction effect all around the world

[gavinhw]

Consumers won't need receipts to benefit from one of Canada's largest class-action settlements | CBC News

117 million in legal fees. Microsoft finally got stuck by a company that could wait them out. They've dragged this out since 2005 hoping the plaintiffs would run out of money. Exactly what everyone has always accused them of.

That law firm has been very successful winning these class-action lawsuits (Activia Yogurt, Samsung, etc.). A high school friend of mine’s husband is one of the firm’s partners. If it applies to you, put in a claim.

[Prince Harbinger]

Too bad it won't hurt MS.

[Belcik]

Too bad it won't hurt MS.

Why? It definatelly will, as ins other countries might also try to investigate pricing models.

[Mooncatt]

Why? It definatelly will, as ins other countries might also try to investigate pricing models.

The downside is unless the lawsuit basically puts them out of business (unlikely), they will continue to sell their products and the end consumer pays for the settlements via increased prices and/or reduced quality. When it comes to something like this, there is no magic fund. All bills owed by the corporation are paid by individuals.

[luftfluss]

The settlement, which is capped at $517 million, amounts to an estimated $400 million for consumers after legal fees and expenses are deducted.

Coins between the cushions for M$.

[Lord Lucan]

The downside is unless the lawsuit basically puts them out of business (unlikely), they will continue to sell their products and the end consumer pays for the settlements via increased prices

So if your electricity company overcharged you (eg by mistake - it has happened to me several times, and no doubt to others) you would not claim your money back because they would increase the rate to make it up?

Microsoft is immensely rich. They do not need to increase prices to cover this, it is pocket money to them. That does not mean they will not increase prices, they can do that any time, anyway, according to what they believe [most] people will stand for at the time. And software is peculiar in that the maker's costs bear no direct relationship to the amount they sell because each additional sale involves them in zero work except the admin cost of collecting the money. This is unlike a company making physical widgets.

As with many other software companies, Microsoft's real focus now is to get users onto rental. Then they don't need the effort to come up with something new to sell every couple of years, like in the Win 95/98/ME/XP days. They can just lean back and count the steady rent coming in, while a much smaller development team covers security updates and does the occasional cosmetic makeover. The beauty of it is that rental software is self-policing, no need for bailiffs, they can just stop it working or downgrade it with a signal from the mothership.

[RobA_Oz]

MS isn’t as dominant as it once was, as its share of the market has declined, along with Apple’s growth:



Nonetheless, MS still has around 80% of the market and is profitable (nett profit last noted was around 31% of revenue), so they can afford to absorb the hit to their bottom line, if they choose to. However, with Apple’s continued growth of their MacOS sales, they have to consider the matter of reputation, even if they have the major corporate and institutional sectors currently in their corner.

The intrusion of increasingly-powerful tablets into the PC market is further confusing the issue, with Windows tablets consistently well below iPad and Android sales.

[Lord Lucan]

MS isn’t as dominant as it once was, as its share of the market has declined, along with Apple’s growth:

They have been impacted, like camera makers, by the growth of smartphones. Many of my acquaintances, who used to buy a new PC every couple of years (when they got clogged and slowed up with Windows-related junkware) have ditched their PC for a phone. Although in the Covid lockdown PCs have made some recovery.

I don't know much about Apple PCs, but Apple are in the smartphone market anyway. In the web server market Linux has made big inroads and is about level with Windows now.

[RobA_Oz]

They have been impacted, like camera makers, by the growth of smartphones. Many of my acquaintances, who used to buy a new PC every couple of years (when they got clogged and slowed up with Windows-related junkware) have ditched their PC for a phone. Although in the Covid lockdown PCs have made some recovery.

I don't know much about Apple PCs, but Apple are in the smartphone market anyway. In the web server market Linux has made big inroads and is about level with Windows now.

That chart was about market share, but I take your point. Apple’s move to their own CPUs will only hasten the blurring of tablet/phablet crossover with desktop and laptop computers. The next move has to be Microsoft’s, though, as their Windows tablet strategy seems to have stalled (again, proof that advertising and market dominance isn’t always a guarantee of sales success).

We digress, however.

[Mooncatt]

So if your electricity company overcharged you (eg by mistake - it has happened to me several times, and no doubt to others) you would not claim your money back because they would increase the rate to make it up?

Not quite a valid comparison. If the electric company was supposed to charge $100 and budgeted as such for their expenses, but a computer glitch charges me $150, they repay my $50 overage and they are still financially where they would've been anyway. With MS, this sounds like they intentionally made these choices, and did so long term. So one can infer they planned their budgeting around that inflated income and expected it. To pay out for this judgement puts them in a worse, not equal, financial position.

Then they don't need the effort to come up with something new to sell every couple of years, like in the Win 95/98/ME/XP days. They can just lean back and count the steady rent coming in, while a much smaller development team covers security updates and does the occasional cosmetic makeover.

I'm guessing you haven't been following the patching news for Windows lately. I doubt they are saving money with a smaller team due to a disturbing and record breaking number of patches coming out weekly. Many of them critical.

[normhead]

The downside is unless the lawsuit basically puts them out of business (unlikely), they will continue to sell their products and the end consumer pays for the settlements via increased prices and/or reduced quality. When it comes to something like this, there is no magic fund. All bills owed by the corporation are paid by individuals.

Here in we have one of the fallacies of Capitalism. A company like Micosotft cannot charge unlimited amounts of money or anything. They are held in check only by market forces. Trust me, if they could charge a lot more, they would. Not only that, they make billions. What changes is the amount they can pay court to share holders and exec. salaries. In a monopoly ,market capitalism like the U.S. and Canada, all companies are almost required by their shareholder to maximize profit, and that means charging as much for product as possible. Companies like Microsoft make so much money you can argue the ridiculously small fines with no penalties for bad behaviour, ideally with a case like this, Microsoft would pay 4 or 5 Billion, the 400 million they owe their customers and 10x penalty, just because for every time these guys get caught, there are probably 10 times they didn't get caught.

But, saying they can just raise prices to cover the cost is unlikely. What's more likely is that this year their profit goes does 517 million, and that affects no one but Microsoft investors.

[Mooncatt]

What's more likely is that this year their profit goes does 517 million, and that affects no one but Microsoft investors.

That still falls under my last line that it's paid by individuals. In this case, it could make investors pull out because they are being harmed for things they had no control over.