French politicians want to tax tablets for not running Windows

[Avi Greenbury]

Nathan Bahn wrote:

> Attention all--
> 
> I can't help but get the impression that French legislators and M$
> lobbyists are joined at the hip.  I could be wrong, of course.....
> 

I'm reminded of the advice to not ascribe to malice that which may
explained by incompetence.

It's worth noting, too, that the distinction is between mobile
operating system and 'PC' operating system. That is, Windows 7 is as
taxable as OSX or, say, Ubuntu. It's Windows Mobile 7 that's not deemed
taxable (being a mobile system) and I'd imagine iOS is similarly
excluded.

The distinction is, obviously, harder to draw with Linux which is so
portable by design, and has no need for a distinction between 'mobile'
and 'PC' editions. 

I've not yet seen anything that refrains from sensationalism by enough
to really understand what's going on here, though. Just a lot of
exclamation that the French government is out to destroy Linux or
something.


-- 
Avi