Comment by applfanboysbgon
13 hours ago
Microsoft won't get very far as a business if it starts thinking it's above the law and cuts off half the rich world as customers. Their goal, at the end of the day, is to make money. I don't know what kind of weird projection power fantasy roleplaying is going on in your head, but Microsoft is not going to cut off Australia even if they are made to honour this petty little clause that will not actually cost them anything. And even if it did, it wouldn't really matter. It's a relationship of convenience. A country can figure out an alternative if it really mattered, MS is not integral in any way, using it is just the path of least resistance. Something like ASML embargoing a country would actually be a threat, but Microsoft is very replaceable.
> Microsoft won't get very far as a business if it starts thinking it's above the law and cuts off half the rich world as customers.
People keep saying this but so far as I can tell, thinking you're above the law and punishing customers who don't like your company's behavior is a viable business model.
Maybe in the US, but not globally, which is the subject here. MS has been fined billions and made adjustments to its software due to the court cases in the EU, and it did not, in fact, decide to block the entire EU out of spite but simply adhered to the judgments.
"Microsoft won't get very far as a business if [they do what they've been doing for decades]"
Story doesn't check out.
Microsoft has been cutting off the EU and Australia for decades? That's news to me!