In 1998, Gates gave evidence in a video-taped deposition. His
performance was described by the then Presiding Judge, Thomas
Penfield-Jackson, as “evasive, dissembling, defiant, arrogant."
Judge Penfield-Jackson also complained that he was "offended by
Microsoft’s constant ‘spin,’ their effort to explain away
everything and admit nothing." He went on to compare Microsoft
senior management to a street gang of drug dealers and
murderers.
Yesterday, press reports indicate that Gates performed much
better. He is expected to give evidence again today.
While Microsoft has agreed settlement terms in the antitrust
case with the Department of Justice and nine of the eighteen US
states still involved in the action, the remaining states are
pushing for stiffer penalties.
Gates said the non-settling states’ proposals covered too many
product categories, straying from the subject matter of the
original action. He said that the demand to remove certain code
from Windows – most notably its internet browsing software – would
split the operating system into many different versions. He argued
that some of these versions would support some applications – but
not others, and that this would “turn back the clock on Windows
development by about ten years and effectively freeze it
there.“
Gates also described many of the proposals as vague and
ambiguous or impossible to comply with. He added that:
“[they] would undermine the Windows
platform, to the detriment of all who benefit from it, in many
different ways. In fact, the [proposals] would hobble Microsoft as
a competitor and innovator across many product categories because
many of its provisions are broadly worded to apply to any
Microsoft product, service, feature or technology.”
A
transcript of Bill Gates’ testimony
