On Friday 22 Feb 2002 3:39 am, Jim Breton wrote:

>
> > so long as the hardware vendors are forced by law to sell the
> > software with a separate, visible, sticker price.
>
> Why?  Why is it ok for hw vendors to be "forced" by one entity to
> perform a certain action, meanwhile not be (ostensibly) "forced" by
> another to perform some other action?
>
> I don't see any greater respect for free will in that statement
> than I do in the accusations of behavior being leveled at MS.
>

Manufacturing, Production, Retail .. Business what every you want to 
call such activities has far less rights and freedom than a citizen 
of a democratic society and rightly so. These restrictions are their 
to protect the customer, or consumer, and thus ultimately the citizen.

I am not just talking about Health and Safety issues here but I think 
they illustrate the point nicely. Ford did not want to fix a fuel 
tank design error on one of its models because the recall costs would 
be higher then the "value" of the human lives that would be lost to 
the fault. In they end the courts made it much more expensive for 
them but the point is in Business everything has a cost and a value, 
which all effects their primary goal of making profits.

In business profit is the be all and end all. Where as in society 
such things as Health, Knowledge, Recreation, Procreation and 
"Freedom" (what ever that is) are ends in their own right. Corporate 
profit can often come into ethical conflict with the goals of 
society, corporates certainly do need their "Freedom" restricted so 
that their Goals DO NOT impinge on the goals of Society.

However the issue of bundling software with hardware as a hidden cost 
is a complex one. The American case law would say that it should be 
sold separately, well at least they forced IBM to do so back in the 
70's.

--Sean