Microsoft doesn't budge
Yahoo | at | by Mike
In a surprising end to the Microsoft antitrust hearings, Microsoft lawyers refused to comply with a judge's request that they offer possible concessions to the nine states suing the company. During closing arguments Wednesday, Microsoft lawyer John Warden refused to give any ground. "This proposed decree is fundamentally flawed," Warden said of the state penalties. "We can't remedy any of this by changing a few words here and there." The judge, who had asked both sides to find middle ground, smiled slightly through Warden's statements. Kollar-Kotelly has to decide whether to institute the states' harsh sanctions against Microsoft as punishment for breaking antitrust law. She is also weighing a much less demanding federal settlement made last year.