Re: [Fsfe-uk] [ALUG] Microsoft and schools (fwd)

[ian]

On Fri, 2003-12-05 at 18:35, Tom Coady wrote:
> ian said the following on 05/12/2003 17:18:
> 
> >We had a customer yesterday who rang up asking how to get off MS
> >schools agreement and if we could help them use older machines to run
> >thin client Linux. I think they have a problem doing this, but one that
> >will provide more evidence to the Office of Fair Trading that MSSA is
> >breaking competition law.
> >  
> >
> 
> Is this an ongoing case?

Yes, there is an investigation in progress. Probably about time I
checked up to see if I can find out where its up to as it now 1 year
since I first contacted the OFT and they said it would take 18 months to
two years.

>  I cannot find anything of interest regarding 
> this type of issue at http://www.oft.gov.uk although they have some 
> references to the case brought in the USA.

Not sure whether they publicise the investigation. The person
responsible at the OFT is Edward Anderson.
address@hidden

If you have evidence eg you know a school on MS Schools Agreement that
says it is not worth putting free software machines in because they
would have to pay MS anyway, or you have or know a company that looked
at the education market for supplying Linux machines but decided that it
wasn't worth it because MSSA would make it impossible to get into the
market. That sort of thing, but it needs to be tangible real evidence
rather than just hypothetical.

-- 
ian <address@hidden>