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Convicted monopolist prevented from re-offending
Microsoft won’t be allowed to buy Activision.
This Sunday (Apr 30) at 2PM, I’ll be at the San Francisco Public Library with my new book, Red Team Blues, hosted by Annalee Newitz.
From Apr 26–28, Barnes and Noble is offering a 25% discount on preorders for my upcoming novels (use discount code PREORDER25): The Lost Cause (Nov 2023) and The Bezzle (Red Team Blues #2) (Feb 2024).
In blocking Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision-Blizzard, the UK Competition and Markets Authority has made history: they have stepped in to prevent a notorious, convicted monopolist from seizing control over a nascent, important market (cloud gaming), ignoring the transparent, self-serving lies Microsoft told about the merger:
If you’d like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here’s a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/27/convicted-monopolist/#microsquish
Cloud gaming isn’t really a thing right now, but it might be. That was Microsoft’s bet, anyway, as it plonked down $69b to acquire…
