Bill Gates
Microsoft's CEO and biggest investor, Gates's public persona has grown
with his fortune, to the extent that he is now one of the most famous and
recognizable people in the country. Although Microsoft has teams of lawyers
working on this case, Gates is never too far removed from anything the
company undertakes. Even his supporters admit that his ruthlessness and
arrogance pervade almost every communication that comes from of the
corporation. As such he has become a focal point of industry, government, and
public opinion. This was demonstrated by the fervor generated by his recent
appearance before a Senate Judiciary committee, as part of a hearing entitled
"Market Power and Structural Change in the Software Industry."
Obviously, Gates believes that Microsoft
should be allowed to pursue its business as it sees fit, unfettered by the
government. "We must be allowed to continue to innovate" has been his
constant refrain.
Lawrence Lessig
In December, Judge Thomas Jackson appointed this 36-year-old Harvard
Law Professor to the position of "Special Master" for the ongoing
dispute. Lessig was given the task of interpreting the issues raised and
reporting back to the court in May. Lessig has a reputation as a brilliant
and passionate legal scholar, although not neccessarily an antitrust
specialist. He is, however, knowledgeable about personal computers and the
industry. Microsoft felt that he was too cosy with their rival Netscape,
and accused him of exhibiting "clear bias" based on certain emails
exchanged between Lessig and executives at Netscape. A federal appeals
court agreed, and halted Lessig's on February 2, pending further study by
the court.
Scott McNealy
One of the founders of Sun Micosystems, and
soon after, its CEO, McNealy has been an increasingly vocal opponent of
Microsoft and its tactics in recent years. These years have seen the
encroachment of powerful PCs running Windows into the high-end workstation
market that Sun made its fortunes in. Now with Sun's development of Java,
and its push for Network Computers, McNealy has gathered the support of
much of Silicon Valley in his often evangelical war against Gates and
Microsoft. McNealy and Sun would like nothing more than for Microsoft to
be disciplined by the Department of Justice, and he made this clear in his
recent testimony before the Senate. Any Microsoft weakness, real or
perceived, strengthens the Sun vision of thin computers running
platform-independent Java applications unconstrained by operating systems
and Microsoft's often less-than-open standards.
Gary Reback
Reback is a partner at the Silicon Valley law firm of Wilson, Sonsini,
Goodrich, and Rosati. Lately he has been acting on behalf of Netscape, and
other clients, as a general anti-Microsoft warrior. Reback is credited
with scuttling Microsoft's proposed aquisition of finance software company
Intuit, and for convincing a federal judge to invalidate the 1995 consent
decree. (This ruling was later overturned.)
Although some discredit him as a publicity hungry climber, Reback
portrays himself simply as an evangelist for healthy markets. "I don't
think it's good for one person or company to have that kind of power. It's
almost religious with me. I think that there needs to be free and open
competition, and I think it's important that people stand up for that
concept."