Friday, June 02, 2006

WSJ.com - Microsoft and Adobe Square Off

WSJ.com - Microsoft and Adobe Square Off: "Adobe wants Microsoft to remove the feature and offer it separately for a fee. Microsoft has agreed to remove the feature but is unwilling to charge for it, Mr. Smith said.
'Adobe has threatened antitrust action unless Microsoft agrees to raise its prices, in particular for the software that would allow Microsoft Office users to save a document in the Adobe PDF format,' he said.
...
Adobe declined to clarify its exact objections to Microsoft's use of the specifications.
Adobe offers technical specifications for PDF free, allowing other software makers to build applications that can read or write PDF files. Software from Apple Computer Inc. and open-source software called OpenOffice use the PDF technology.
Microsoft has offered the feature in test versions of the next version of Office, called Office 2007 and expected to be available by early next year. It will now have to remove the feature, Microsoft officials said."

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Not quite the whole story. This one is a bit more revealing and balanced than what you are currently presenting.

http://www.microsoftmonitor.com/archives/015754.html

pbokelly said...

Thanks for the comment and pointer to the Joe Wilcox perspective piece. I agree there's a lot more to the story.

Interesting that some people appear to assume there are no feasible permutations in which Microsoft isn't the bad guy, in this instance.

Anonymous said...

If there is "more to the story" then let's hear it. The Joe Wilcox article is just a bunch of vague insinuations.

pbokelly said...

For more on my perspective in this context see http://www.microsoft-watch.com/article2/0,2180,1971031,00.asp