Wisconsin participated with a number of states in the Microsoft anti-trust trial. The state DOJ, under then Attorney General and now Governor Jim Doyle settled the case.
Robert X. Cringely wonders if Wisconsin and other states left money on the table, given the the latest court documents that were unsealed by Judge Frederick Motz in Burst.com’s suit against Microsoft.
John Lettice:
These files paint a picture of Microsoft document handling procedures which destroyed the very emails that were likely to be most relevant to several antitrust actions, Burst’s included. According to Burst’s lawyers Microsoft’s status as “a defendant in major antitrust cases since at least 1995” means that it has a duty to preserve potentially relevant evidence. But “Microsoft adopted policies that, to put it mildly, encouraged document destruction from 1995 forward.”