Given Microsoft's prior history and the company's worth, I find it reasonable.

It's reasonable for a small group of people to make mistakes.

It's not reasonable for a company of that size who has history trying to build monopolies even when against the law to make that mistake. The know of the decision and did not take it seriously. It could be just to test the waters and see if they can get away with it. EU has to state that it is not reasonable to test the waters like that.

I guess he would never realise what you are talking about.

In the USA people are used to bow down in front of huge corporations and admiring their destructive behaviour towards the economy by creating cartells or missusing monopols.They simply have no sense how dangerous this is.Monsanto is just now doing this with farmers what MS has done to softwarecompanies-destroying them without ever being punished by the goverment.And if they are at least punished like now,they simply pretend"was just a software" mistake and several people of that kind lenin once called"useful idiots"will stand up to defend them.

No matter wether the banks are laundering hundreds of billions of drug money(hsbc),missusing monopoles,manipulating the libor-no punishment at all in the USA as the goverment is completely corrupted by the big corporations.Research what happened when the US goverment tried to split up Microsoft into Windows and office.Some hundred Million dollars were given to the parties-result:no split required.

Being asked why there is no prosecution Genral Attorney Eric Holder attmitted five days ago:"they are too big to jail"

At the end of 2013 Obama would have doubled the debt of the USA within just 5 years.

This means he has made as many debts in half a decade as the USA has made in their entire previous history-and nothing from this money has reached the population.Where has it gone?They gave all the money to wall street to keep the dow up and the banks and to prevent the economy from collapsing by starting one QE after another-and he is talking about europe handling the debts instead of taking a closer look at the usa.

Although the fine seems mightly obscene to us normal peasants, I don't find it anywhere as unreasonable when it comes to just how big Microsoft is. Still, as a fellow peasant I am outraged at such a huge fine for such a small cock up.

Maybe I'm old fashioned, but I still don't see why MS should have to promote another companies browser for them. There's nothing stopping Google from creating their own desktop OS and making Chrome the default browser. There's also nothing that prevents anyone using Windows from installing and enjoying Chrome.

And if we're being totally fair, why isn't it mandatory for Android devices to have to offer the same choice for multiple browsers when you fire one up for the first time? Why is that people only feel that MS should have to do this? I own several Android devices, and an iPad and I don't remember ever being given choices for anything upon loading the device up for the first time.

It's too excessive for what it was, but I don't like Microsoft's business practice when it comes to IE, so I'm fine with it in the end.

"Was Microsoft's EU fine too much? One economics professor says, "Yes""

That sounded like Ancient Aliens man.

Sarcasm?

OT: No ms fan here, but I finf the fine ridiculous.

I agree with you, but MS isn't making it imposible for anyone to install another browser from competitors.

MS is being fined for not promoting competitor's browsers ?   That's why I think this penalty is stupid.

It's really a matter of practicality.  It's more about what's best than about what's right.  Most people will defend the idea of a monopoly from a philosophical standpoint but when the reality hits, when they start feeling all the negatives that come with a monopoly, they will often complain that "they shouldn't be allowed to do that".  I suppose it comes down to the idea of preventing monopolies or breaking them up after they've damaged the market.

Internet Explorer's monopoly of the browser market was bad, very bad.  I don't know that you'll find anyone who would dispute that.  Microsoft forced content developers to ignore accepted convention and to code for IE's way of doing things.  They ignored security problems and new innovations.  Then, bam, we have competition spring up and suddenly Internet Explorer is good.  That's not coincidence at all.

Really, Microsoft brought this on themselves by trying to use their OS monopoly, which no one can do anything about, to leverage a browser monopoly.  They did their absolute best to force people to use IE.  If they'd succeeded, Internet Explorer would probably STILL be garbage.

Should they have to do this?  Probably not.  Do I think it's for the best that Microsoft isn't being allowed to force a monopoly at will?  Absolutely.  People run into anti-monopoly laws everyday without even know it.  It's important for the consumer that they are there.  I can't have a problem with that.

It is ridiculous that MS has to take these steps in the first place.

MS was fined out wazoo and forced to change many years ago by US and EU regulators. They have changed and its clearly not a monopolistic giant any more.

Windows is no different than Android, iOS, Mac, Linux etc at this point. You can easily switch defaults and add any software you want at any level.

However, MS is the only one being punished for having default software that they build. That is BS and should no longer continue. They paid the price and rectified the issue. They should not have to provide endless options to sell their competitors products.

Apple and Google do not have to do this and they are just as powerful in other markets as well. If someone is too ignorant to understand how to switch to a browser, media player, etc that they prefer... then they need to get to fuck off the internet to begin with. Anyone who cares, can easily switch to anything. Hell, most users would be confused by the questions as they simply don't understand any of the differences.