Bill Gates on the Impact of the DoJ’s Remedies

“Our company could not have created the Windows operating system if we had been prohibited from developing Microsoft Office as well.”

Microsoft is working on a handheld tablet PC that will enable people to take handwritten and dictated notes and transfer them to a PC. “Microsoft’s tablet PC simply won’t happen, because our OS and applications developers will be unable to collaborate. Almost every aspect of the tablet PC’s evolution—starting with the design of handwriting-recognition applications—requires real-time collaboration between OS and applications developers.”

Microsoft introduced “toolbars” in an early version of Office. “Had those toolbars been created elsewhere, they no doubt would have been patented and never incorporated into Windows.”

“Technical discussions to develop new versions of Windows and Office . . . would be impossible under the DoJ plan because it mandates that no technical information can be discussed that is not ‘simultaneously published’ to the entire computer industry, which would be a practical impossibility.”