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PayPalWell, the results are here. In the USA the FTC was trying to block Microsoft from acquiring Activision Blizzard but Microsoft has won the fight. Now Microsoft are one big step closer to actually properly closing the deal, and a rather big consolidation of the gaming industry given how big Activision Blizzard are.
As per the decision:
Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision has been described as the largest in tech history. It deserves scrutiny. That scrutiny has paid off: Microsoft has committed in writing, in public, and in court to keep Call of Duty on PlayStation for 10 years on parity with Xbox. It made an agreement with Nintendo to bring Call of Duty to Switch. And it entered several agreements to for the first time bring Activision’s content to several cloud gaming services.
This Court’s responsibility in this case is narrow. It is to decide if, notwithstanding these current circumstances, the merger should be halted—perhaps even terminated—pending resolution of the FTC administrative action. For the reasons explained, the Court finds the FTC has not shown a likelihood it will prevail on its claim this particular vertical merger in this specific industry may substantially lessen competition. To the contrary, the record evidence points to more consumer access to Call of Duty and other Activision content. The motion for a preliminary injunction is therefore DENIED.
This means the temporary restraining order against the acquisition will be removed on July 14th, unless the FTC obtains a "stay pending appeal from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals".
Microsoft still have a fight ahead in the UK though, since the CMA (Competition and Markets Authority) blocked the deal but naturally Microsoft is appealing the decision with a hearing set to begin on July 28th. So they're not completely out of the woods yet but it's probable Microsoft will end up winning there too. Update 16:21 UTC - Brad Smith, Vice Chair and President Microsoft, put a statement on Twitter:
After today's court decision in the U.S., our focus now turns back to the UK. While we ultimately disagree with the CMA’s concerns, we are considering how the transaction might be modified in order to address those concerns in a way that is acceptable to the CMA. In order to prioritize work on these proposals, Microsoft and Activision have agreed with the CMA that a stay of the litigation in the UK would be in the public interest and the parties have made a joint submission to the Competition Appeal Tribunal to this effect.
What do you think to this outcome?
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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Liam Dawe 11 Jul 2023
ObsidianBlk 11 Jul 2023
It sucks. More consolidation is bad. I have no fondness for Activision Blizzard, but then I'm not a big fan of Microsoft either and neither of those is the main point. Corporate behemoths are too big; in general they should be getting chopped into smaller pieces, not allowed to stitch together into even gianter Frankenstein leviathans.
I feel most countries (USA especially) have long ago abandoned even the pretense of fighting against monopolistic behavior. I cannot say how bad this merger will be over time. I fear, in maybe a decade, it will be bad for people not on Windows or XBox... then again, I have a very negative bias against Microsoft and A/B (especially the Activision potion), so take what I said with a grain of salt, I suppose.
What do you think to this outcome?Most concerning. Activision alone was already powerful enough that it could refuse to support the biggest-selling console of the current generation [External Link] and then just shrug it off later, for example (in the console space, this is something that can harm the outcome for a platform). This isn't going to turn out well.
StalePopcorn 11 Jul 2023
Microsoft really have some good games, they seem to release stable and solid games. I also hope this can change the culture in blizzard and bring them back to not just be about money and greed as activision like.
And there is still plenty of competition on the gaming market and I also hope we get to see blizzard games on steam :)
But Only one can! TUX!Our mascot against the M$ conspiracy!!
Eh nice. Honestly I don't know if this is a good for game industry even if MS give some concessions. I don't like the idea of concentration of money here either. it can be bad in the long run. But We'll see what happens next
On the other? Activision/Blizzard is so badly managed, so hostile and so much of a "let's pay Bobby to be the worst human" company (Kotick's salary is north of 125 MILLION USD) that I'm fine with Microsoft taking over, ejecting him, and forcing an actual corporate culture into the bloody thing instead of having a game development company operate completely out of spite.
Last edited by cybik on 11 Jul 2023 at 5:21 pm UTC
walther von stolzing 11 Jul 2023
https://www.suse.com/news/SUSE-Preserves-Choice-in-Enterprise-Linux/ [External Link]
Then go and push UWP again and so long WINE/Proton/Steam Deck (Unless that executable situation isn't as hopeless as everything I've read before).I don't have a good memory for acronyms; what's a UWP?
On one side, consolidation is bad, yes.
On the other? Activision/Blizzard is so badly managed, so hostile and so much of a "let's pay Bobby to be the worst human" company (Kotick's salary is north of 125 MILLION USD) that I'm fine with Microsoft taking over, ejecting him, and forcing an actual corporate culture into the bloody thing instead of having a game development company operate completely out of spite.
I still think Microsoft it's going to keep Bobby, Microsoft is just to busy to replace anyone important to keep the company going and making that big money. Just let see what happen next even if I don't agree Microsoft buying Blizzard.
Last edited by Lomkey on 11 Jul 2023 at 5:38 pm UTC
https://www.thebignewsletter.com/i/131506734/all-rise-a-conflicted-judge-gets-to-run-the-economy [External Link]
Universal Windows Platform - Windows store applications are UWP. Basically a different SDK. They've allowed some non-UWP applications into the store since, but UWP apps don't run on Wine since there is nowhere to download them fromThen go and push UWP again and so long WINE/Proton/Steam Deck (Unless that executable situation isn't as hopeless as everything I've read before).I don't have a good memory for acronyms; what's a UWP?
MisterPaytwick 11 Jul 2023
Consolidation is such a nightmare. Well, I'm going indies all the way down for years now, I guess there is no redemption for that kind of structure anyway.
Speaking of a$$hole companies, did you all see this?
https://www.suse.com/news/SUSE-Preserves-Choice-in-Enterprise-Linux/ [External Link]
Last edited by MisterPaytwick on 11 Jul 2023 at 6:23 pm UTC
so why bother replacing him?
Because he's not worth 125+ million dollars.
At best, maybe 30. 125 is just insulting.
Last edited by cybik on 11 Jul 2023 at 5:58 pm UTC
Linux_Rocks 11 Jul 2023
Outside of that, this is shit. I don't trust Microsoft. Whether it's this, or their "<3" Linux crap. I know it might sound paranoid. But I feel that the latter is just them trying to ruin Linux from the inside. I remember the old Microsoft and their practices. They're back at it buying whatever they can. Though if they do somehow managed to ruin Linux. At least there's still FreeBSD.
I only use Microsoft products and services when I absolutely need to. Then when it comes to gaming I'm not an anti-fanboy. So if a game is on Xbox that I want. I'm not gonna miss out on it. Plus my pirating of most of my OG Xbox games cancels that out anyways. XD
The Judge's son works at Microsoft. Hopefully the appeals court can fix this
That's similar to how Microsoft got in in the first place... Gate's mother was on the IBM board of directors. There's no way they'd have chosen that mickey mouse operating system on its own merits. DOS (well, CP/M at the time) was utter garbage, it was sold for a song and Gates stayed up a few nights porting some essentials like a Basic interpreter and then chummed BBS's and lists with open letters urging people that they need to pay for software.
"Oh, but look at how much Microsoft has done for the computing industry!" I counter that with who knows what we could have had, if not for those bloody creeps throughout the history of PC computing.
Even what WE have now (our Linux and software environment and yes, especially our gaming technologies now), is geared towards interoperating with them.
Last edited by Grogan on 11 Jul 2023 at 6:19 pm UTC
"Oh, but look at how much Microsoft has done for the computing industry!" I counter that with who knows what we could have had, if not for those bloody creeps throughout the history of PC computing.
Next time someone says that, tell them that multics (in the 60s, before unix) was multi user. First actually multi-user windows was vista. That's a set back of ~40 years. If DOS had file permissions like Unix did, we wouldn't be in a world of rampant viruses. That's a 30-year set back too.
Yeap, they _have_ done much for computing, mostly in the form of ruining it.
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