We know some of you out there are tired of all the antitrust drama on AtAT, and we can understand that. Sometimes it's easy to forget just how deeply Apple is involved in the whole "Redmond Justice" imbroglio. Let's recap, shall we? At issue in the case is the way that Microsoft allegedly threatened to kill the Mac version of Office unless Apple made Internet Explorer the default web browser on the Mac. There's also the way in which Microsoft tried to strong-arm Apple into ceasing development of QuickTime-- to "knife the baby." Avie Tevanian, Steve's right-hand man, testified on the stand about these actions, as one of the government's ten trial witnesses. And it's even been reported that, way back when, Steve Jobs himself offered to donate millions of dollars of his own money to help the cause if the Justice Department would get off its kiester and go after Microsoft. Yup-- in a way, Steve himself is the producer of "Redmond Justice."

So what's Apple's official reaction to Judge Jackson's conclusions of law? According to MacWEEK, it's a simple "no comment." Personally, though, we wish we'd heard that "no comment" ourselves, because we bet we could have learned a lot from the tone of voice with which it was delivered. Not to mention the party hat being worn by the giddy spokesperson who delivered it. Even though we've yet to hear exactly how the government plans to prevent Microsoft from acting this way again (if the phrase "consent decree" is any part of the remedies, we'll scream), right now we can only suspect that Steve feels he's already gotten his money's worth. If nothing else, he got to see Microsoft's worth drop $79 billion in a day. What's more entertaining than that?

And hey now, this is interesting. You know that last-ditch settlement offer that Microsoft faxed to the government late last week? Apparently the New York Times claims that the government showed "elements" of that proposal to both Steve Jobs and Sun's Scott McNealy to get their opinions. What Steve said is, unsurprisingly, kept under wraps, but at least McNealy's overt anti-Microsoft streak gave us his reaction: "What I heard was worse than weak." We're assuming that Steve concurred, but of course he's not exactly in a position to damn Microsoft in public. It's a fun exercise for the viewer, though.