Winners, Losers & Microsoft: Competition and Antitrust in High Technology

by Stan J. Liebowitz, Stephen E. Margolis, Jack Hirshleifer (Foreword by)

Overview

Few issues in high technology are as divisive as the current debate over competition, innovation, and antitrust. Analyzing famous examples of economic “lock-in” by dominant corporations of supposedly inferior products, this book makes the case that free markets in high technology industry deliver better products to consumers, at lower prices, without government intervention. This publication's careful scholarship, well-founded hypotheses, and refutations of previously accepted theories—extending far beyond the Microsoft case—make this publication a vital piece of understanding for the future of technology and economics.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780945999843
Publisher:	Independent Institute, The
Publication date:	03/01/2001
Edition description:	Second expanded edition
Pages:	302
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.74(d)

About the Author

Stan J. Liebowitz is a professor of managerial economics and the academic associate dean in the school of management at the University of Texas at Dallas. He has written on the topics of copyright and technology, broadcasting regulation, pricing practices, and mortgage discrimination. Stephen E. Margolis is a professor of economics and the head of the economics department in the college of management at North Carolina State University. His research includes work on housing markets, pricing of medical services, monopolistic competition, and economic efficiency in the law. They have jointly written numerous scholarly articles on the subjects of network effects and lock-in that have appeared in the Journal of Law, Economics and Organization; Harvard Journal of Law and Technology; and the Journal of Law and Economics. Their more popular articles have been published in the Christian Science Monitor, Investor’s Business Daily, and the Wall Street Journal.

Table of Contents

	Foreword	xi
	Preface to the Revised Edition	xv
	Acknowledgments	xvii
I	The Paradigm	1
1.	Networked World	3
2.	The Fable of the Keys	19
II	The Theory	47
3.	Theories of Path Dependence	49
4.	Network Markets: Pitfalls and Fixes	67
5.	Networks and Standards	87
III	The Real World	117
6.	Beta, Macintosh, and Other Fabulous Tales	119
7.	Using Software Markets to Test These Theories	135
8.	Major Markets--Spreadsheets and Word Processors	163
9.	Other Software Markets	201
10.	The Moral	235
Appendices
A.	Networks, Antitrust Economics, and the Case Against Microsoft	245
B.	The Trial	273
	Bibliography	309
	Index	315
	About the Authors	325

Editorial Reviews

"By a long way, it is the best single thing to read on this tangle of issues." —The Economist

"Features what appears to be the first systematic look at the real-world history of the software industry." —Wired News



"In Winners, Losers & Microsoft, economists Liebowitz and Margolis present powerful evidence that Microsoft lowered prices." —Newsweek

"Th[is] fascinating history and analysis can guide us toward a better understanding of the newer forms of competition." —Jack Hirshleifer, professor of economics, UCLA

"Everyone interested in public policy toward high technology industries will want to read this excellent book." —Sam Peltzman, professor of economics, University of Chicago

"Powerful stuff, Winners, Losers & Microsoft promises to have an important impact on the debate about the appropriate use of antitrust in high-technology markets. It does indeed exhibit a very high caliber of scholarship, addresses the key questions posed by the proponents of anti-competitive 'lock-in,' and bases its conclusions on a wealth of new empirical evidence." —William F. Shughart II, Barnard Distinguished Professor of Economics, University of Mississippi



"If only the Clinton Justice Department read Winners, Losers & Microsoft, the American economy would be spared much pain and legal expense. Stan Liebowitz and Stephen Margolis really know their stuff, and they can write too." —Wall Street Journal

From the Publisher