Microsoft Accuses Google Of Unfair Competition
- by Laurie Sullivan @lauriesullivan, January 2, 2013
The boxing gloves went back on again Wednesday when Microsoft publicly accused Google of blocking its Windows Phones from accessing YouTube metadata
similar to the way it allows Google Android phones and Apple iOS iPhones.
Dave Heiner,VP and deputy general counsel at Microsoft, wrote in a blog post that "Google continues to prevent Microsoft from offering consumers a fully featured YouTube app for the Windows Phone," describing a continued lack of permission.
Microsoft said Google continues to abuse its market position and impede competition in the marketplace, even under U.S. Federal trade Commission scrutiny, by blocking users from searching for video categories, and finding favorites and ratings.
The battle, however, has been raging for years through European and U.S. antitrust investigations. "We believed then, as we do now, that the future of competition in search is at stake in these investigations," Heiner said.
Of course, a Google spokesperson doesn't see it that way. She said the two companies have worked closely for several years to help build a "great" YouTube experience on Windows phones.
"Windows phone users can access all the features of YouTube through our HTML5-based mobile Web site, including viewing high-quality video streams, finding favorite videos, seeing video ratings, and searching for video categories," according to the Google spokesperson.
Heiner's post points back to Microsoft's "scroogled" campaign alerting consumers of what it calls undermining competitive business practices and misguiding consumers. "Google dismisses these concerns as little more than sour grapes by one of its competitors," he writes. "But the reality is that consumers and competitors alike are getting "scroogled" across the Web on a daily basis from this type of misconduct."
If one would take a piece of paper; draw a line in the middle; put a name on one side of the line; another name of the other side of the line; then when each person whined about something, give that name a mark; the when the other one whined then give them a mark; “yes sounds simple,” it is!
See who throws more stones; like watching two seagulls fight over a mullet. They both get their share, but all ends up with a mess; hard to take sides; the last time as little guy in the pond, I lost service of my Linux tablets; they never never booted up again; Microsoft was not going to let some use there servers; that were using certain software; now I can go on and on about right and wrong, I just get booted off again from the server that I use for desk top; So get your pencil and paper out and do the math; I lean toward the one who Keeps me in the right place to find me.