Now that Avie has left the stand, it's time to move on to the next sideshow in the "Redmond Justice" Cavalcade of Antitrust™. Let's see, where were we... Microsoft bullied Netscape, Microsoft bullied AOL, Microsoft bullied Apple... oh yes, now we come to "Microsoft bullied Intel." Those are the latest allegations made by the government in the trial that continues to be your best entertainment value in the court system today. The New York Times has some great coverage of this latest accusation.

This time it's Intel vice president Scott McGeady on the stand, testifying that in 1995, Bill Gates became "enraged" when he discovered that Intel had over seven hundred engineers working on Internet software products. Those products would directly compete with Microsoft's own Internet software. If you've been following the trial at all, Gates' next move is entirely predictable and yet still gloriously entertaining: he threatened to withdraw Windows support from Intel's new processors. McGeady characterizes the threat as "both credible and fairly terrifying," since a lack of Windows support would render Intel's new chips essentially worthless in a Microsoft-dominated marketplace. Gates backed up his threat by announcing a "major program" to support DEC's Alpha chip, one of Intel's biggest competitors. Faced with such a prospect, Intel disbanded its architecture labs and ceased all further development on Internet software.

Of course, that's not how Gates sees things, and in fact, McGeady's testimony directly contradicts Gates' videotaped deposition, in which he plainly states that Microsoft never threatened to withold Windows support from Intel, and never demanded that Intel cease any software development. So on this point, it all comes down to whom you believe. McGeady's testimony paints a compelling (and downright familiar) portrait, though; just as Avie claimed that Microsoft was willing to cede the "content creation" side of multimedia software to Apple, McGeady states that Microsoft told Intel to work on "servers for the high-end business market." In other words, Microsoft allegedly routinely "strongly suggests" that competitors work on "something useless that would not interfere with Microsoft," which translates roughly into "go play in traffic." We can't wait to see where things go from here.