They played extraordinarily fast and loose with the 1995 consent decree. There's also the worry that an extensive consent decree will require ongoing Justice Department or judicial oversight of the company, a burden government lawyers are anxious to avoid, considering the dynamic nature of the technology industry. The discussion about remedies currently involves senior Justice Department officials, state attorneys general and economic advisers hired by the government, but eventually it could include the White House and congressional leaders. Although Justice and the states are not expected to publicly identify their preferred remedy until Jackson formally rules that the company has broken the law, many of the states already are backing either a structural remedy or a forced auction of the Windows code, sanctions that could strip the company of its dominance in the market for PC operating systems. Lawyers representing many of the states are determined not to accept any settlement offer from Microsoft that does not dilute the company's monopoly with Windows, according to sources familiar with the states' legal strategy.
Some legal specialists worry about the sheer magnitude of the challenge.
They fear that the government will simply find itself incapable of designing a remedy that prohibits conduct it finds troublesome while not overly infringing on the company's rights or creating an oversight bureaucracy. This could lead Justice and the states to scale back what they eventually ask for, opting for milder sanctions that might not address all their concerns. But that would be better than proposing a remedy that makes things worse than they are now. News Jobs AP Shopping Archives Entertain.