swa66 - 9:47 am on Nov 18, 2009 (gmt 0)

I also think it's interesting that Microsoft got slammed for forcing buyers to buy systems bundled with IE (or some such thing), lost a suit in the EU over it, and was widely excoriated for being anti-competetive and violating anti-trust laws. How is this kind of infraction any less when Apple ties their hardware to their software?

Microsoft gets slammed for abusing their existing monopoly in OSes to gain unfair advantages in markets such as browsers, music players and the like where they kill the competition by "giving" away their stuff for "free", by installing their stuff along with windows etc.

Apple's got no monopoly in computers, hence nothing to worry about from that angle.