@loves2splooge

The problem comes from the combination of the following points:

1) browsers and the internet in general are such an important part of everyday life in work and out of it, and more variety in browsers is demonstrably good for the average consumer when it comes to accessibility, security, standard-compliance, content availability.
2) MS Windows has a huge marketshare, resulting in almost a de-facto monopoly when it comes to the "desktop" users. The choice of the OS is not even a known issue for most users, let alone an option.
3) most users are not literate enough to even know that there are alternative browsers, let alone download and install them.

Put those three together, and you have that a "special" treatment for MS is deemed as a necessary practical solution for the better good of the net ecosystem. Imposing on them that during installation a variety of browsers can be installed and set as default is ad-hoc, but the marketshare split is such that trying to stick to general rules as if we were in a really free market when it comes to OSs is irrealistic.

That may have been true once, but it isn't not. If we go back 5 or 6 years, MS had the market, 95% or so marketshare. They have since lost around 40% of that share. Why? Because products that people liked came out, and they decided to use them. The fact is, the EU isn't trying to keep MS from being a monopoly. MS's marketshare in IE is only about 60% and falling... they are trying to prevent it from even being a market leader. That's an abuse of power.

As much as I dislike Microsoft, this is a really unfair case. My Windows 7 comes with IE but I am using Firefox. It's not at all like they are forcing anyone to use IE. And it would be a huge pain in the ash to install a windows product and get updates initially and even a new browser if there was no browser installed with Windows. I mean, every time I want to install windows I have to have Mozilla mail me a disk, because that's basically what the EU is saying here. This is basically a mob protection fee, want to sell Windows in the EU well you gotta pay 1.68 b euro's or my boys will rough you up. (in court)

Excellent:)

Microsoft really has nobody else to blame but themselves.

They could've dodged this bullet years ago by simply adding IE as a separate, optional component of their later OS versions (like XP) to begin with, instead of forcing people to use it by binding critical functions like system updates to it.

Though I do agree that this should be enforced on Mac OS's as well, if only in the interest of fairness - most Linux distros apparently do this already, so no problems there.

Maybe I wasn't clear. The monopoly is in the OS market, not in the browser market, but MS always exploited their position of advantage in the OS market to push their other product lines.

Now it's great that Firefox and to a lesser extent Safari, Opera and Chrome have been chipping in the browser space, and in the case of Firefox even became first-tier players. It's a testament to the dismal quality of IE6 that Firefox could make the inroads it did.

But even the most entrenched fans of laissez-faire in economic matters know the dangers of exploitation of a monopolistic position to hamper competition in related fields.

In that sense, I think it could be a pragmatical necessity to push for ways to level the field when it comes to browser choice, as it's arguably the most important piece of software when it comes to most users, and at the same time one that is transparent to most of them.

Not at all. What do you use to browse files on your Windows computer? Windows Explorer? What if they decided that it was unfair for Microsoft to bundle a visual file browser interface with their computer? You had to use command prompt unless you obtained an alternative yourself?

Long ago, MS decided that web browsing was an INTEGRAL part of a PC user's experience. Are they right? Absolutely. Even reading this forum, most of us aren't using IE (I'm using firefox right now). But I just bought a new laptop, I would be INFURIATED to fire up the laptop and find I have no way to go online. You buy a machine with windows 7, plug it into your cable modem/router, and it pretty much just works. How much good does that do you if you have no browser? MS, when they initially made Explorer part of the OS, was building towards the future... They pictured browsers to be like any other number of applications that users got built into their OS, at no cost, and with no setup required. And if you wanted something better, you could get it.

And binding critical functions to it - I say, "So what?" IE may be part of the updating process, but does that prevent me from using Firefox? Nope. Doesn't force me to run IE. "They could have dodged this bullet years ago" ? There shouldn't have been a bullet to dodge. What if the same thing happened with other products? The USPS occasionally sends out little ads for holiday stamps or to announce new services/price changes. They can mail to every residence in the US at a cost of nearly nothing since they already deliver. This is basically like requiring USPS to mail ads for FedEx and UPS for free, because otherwise it's advantageous of them to use their own infrastructure for their own gain.

That's not illegal though. MS is big, rich, and yes, has the vast majority of OS marketshare. But the EU is taking shots at them wherever it can - even if it's not valid. <60% and falling marketshare doesn't show them as an abusive monopoly. They don't own, the market, and they are on pace to continue losing the market. How do you call that abusive? By that logic companies with bigger advertising budgets, or popular brand names could abuse their position of advantage.

In short, if they used one near monopoly to create another, there's a case to be made. When using your influence does nothing other than slow down your rapidly falling marketshare, you're in the clear.

Let's say things as they really stand: MS was last to recognize the importance of internet. And although I agree that a web browser is important for a PC, making it closely tied to the OS is totally unnecessary and dumb, and it gave only troubles.

Sweet. M$ can pay out some more money.