That makes sense. A lot of the testimony revolved around Microsoft's efforts to destroy Netscape. I wonder if it would have made a difference if Microsoft hadn't given the ability to Firefox and the other browsers to exist on Windows. I got the feeling (from listening to the deposition) that people thought that the browser was the window into the internet and without it, all access to the internet would be lost. It was as if Microsoft held the key to the portal of the internet. I also got the feeling that Bill Gates was trying to say that it didn't work like that. I listened to an interview with Steve Jobs where he explained that the reason he went after the peripherals and devices market was that he knew that Microsoft didn't care about it. He knew that he couldn't fight Microsoft head to head, so he went in through the back door. He could put a new OS on a new device and Microsoft wouldn't fight him on it. Microsoft was too large and too committed to their existing projects to change directions quickly enough to fight Apple when the market changed direction. That's the reason I wonder whether the lawsuit was necessary. In the technology world, there's always a way to fight an existing technology because it's intellectual property, not a physical asset. Monopolies with physical assets are more difficult to break because once the ownership of all the assets is in one company's hands, it's hard to get enough resources to fight that. But with technology, it only takes another better idea for the market to shift.If I understand correctly, Microsoft agreed to open up its API such that Firefox and eventually Chrome and Opera could provide the same level of integration as Explorer. That basically allowed other browsers to exist on Windows without being rendered crippleware by Microsoft.
That Microsoft lost their massive monopoly has more to do with the clueless fucktard that is Steve Ballmer than the Microsoft anti-trust. Consider: Microsoft had, effectively, the e-reader, the smartphone, the office suite and the tablet unopposed in 2000 and by 2014 they were a joke in everything but Office, where they're fighting Google for marketshare.
Not sure how old you are, but 'round 2000 not only was Microsoft ascendant but everybody hated them for it. We're talking Clippie-era Microsoft, when pretty much every problem your computer had was related to ActiveX, Word and Excel macros would suddenly stop working because Microsoft and there was fuckall else you could run. Linux? Don't make me laugh. Apple? ...yeah, you're going to use that for business. At the time it still ran OS9, the least-loved mongrel operating system to ever grace a RISC processor. Microsoft was the Ma Bell of 2000 - a big, heinous behemoth that made money not through innovation but through stifling competition. Was the lawsuit necessary? Hard to say. Was it inevitable? Absolutely.
My first introduction to Linux was a whole issue off Boot Magazine dedicated to it, including two CDs and instructions on how to use it. I ran out of things to play with and said "cool toy but Meh." That was in I think 98?
I started with FreeBSD, having seen it mentioned on the ftp.cdrom.com MOTD while looking for Doom mods. I don't remember when that was, but looking for Doom mods was a thing people were doing so, you know, the stone age. I switched to linux relatively late, Best Buy was selling shrinkwrapped Red Hat and Suse boxes by then.