No doubt Microsoft is concerned about the prospect of Antigua getting authorization to sell pirated copies of its products, but we're not quite there yet. However, it is already feeling some pain from the U.S. online gambling ban:
Internet giants Google, Microsoft and Yahoo agreed to pay a total of $31.5 million to settle with the United States Attorney's office in St. Louis for taking ads from internet gambling websites.
"This is a very profitable business that had a lot of money to spend on marketing," stated U.S. Attorney Catherine Hanaway. "I do think it will have a major impact. Obviously these are three of the largest online organizations in the world."As part of the agreement, Google, Microsoft and Yahoo agreed to stop accepting ads for sports wagering and other online gambling. The three internet giants already stopped taking such ads approximately 4 years ago. The settlement reached today was finalized after a year and a half of negotiations between the tech companies and federal prosecutors.
