Slashdot Mirror
Windows Could Lose Media Player in Europe?
Chris Gondek writes "If Microsoft cannot settle an antitrust case brought by European Union regulators, the company may be ordered to remove Windows Media Player as an integrated feature of the dominant Windows operating system, at least for personal computers sold in Europe.
The European Commission also could order Microsoft to include rival media players with Windows to make those products as easy for users to access as Microsoft's own music and video player."
I wonder what the E.U. would say if MS was a European country? They already are trying to destroy Boeing with the heavily subsidized Airbus. Their hypocrisy shines through on many levels.
For example, recently the E.U. decided to impose sanctions on the U.S. for giving tax preferences to exporters after the World Trade Organization repeatedly ruled this out of bounds.
The tax breaks, now known as the extraterritorial income exclusion, were designed to offset the perverse effects of U.S. high tax rates and system of world-wide taxation--the first wrong. This system handicaps U.S. firms competing against foreign counterparts whose governments tax only their home income.
Then came the second wrong. Even though the Europeans themselves rebate value-added taxes on their exports, they decried the U.S. tax breaks as unfair and won their case at the WTO.That decision was disturbing on several levels, not least because it is part and parcel of a wider European effort to stifle tax competition.
I don't get it. Are Europeans to dumb to install the player of their choice? I don't think so. Nobody is forcing them to use media Player, MS is just providing a means for them to play media files and more, they don't HAVE to use it.
And the same people to bitch about it being there and clogging up their system would be the same people bitching if it wasn't there saying why can't MS even put a media player in there overpriced OS. Hypocrites.
I don't want Real or any other spyware software on my PC. WinAMP is nice but ultimately WMP does the job I need it to and it creates files that are portable for my Pocket PC
Sooooooo, we should expect Ford to include Porche engines, Chevy axles, Chrysler brakes....
WTF is wrong with people?!?!?!?!
Since when does a company have to HELP the competition do anything?!?!?!?!?!
If you "I hate M$" bandwagon riders could pull your heads from your asses, and LOOK at WTF you are saying, you would see what a joke most of your mantra is...
(I guess MSN should include AOL and Netzero+Juno....SETI software should include Kazaa...)
miserable failure miserable failure miserable failure miserable failure war criminal