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Microsoft's IE7 Search Box Bugs Google
tessaiga writes "The New York Times reports that Google is crying foul over a new IE7 search box feature that defaults to MSN Search. Although the feature can be modified to use Google or other search engines, Google asserts that "The best way to handle the search box [...] would be to give users a choice when they first start up Internet Explorer 7." Google goes on to assert that the move "limits consumer choice and is reminiscent of the tactics that got Microsoft into antitrust trouble in the late 1990s". I notice that in my version of Firefox the search box defaults to Google, and that the pulldown menu of pre-entered options doesn't even include MSN Search, but Google seems to have been oddly quiet on that front for the many years prior to IE7 that Firefox has made this feature available."
Google seems to have been oddly quiet on that front for the many years prior to IE7 that Firefox has made this feature available."
Except Firefox isn't owned by Google, making this an entirely different situation. Hence, the whole "antitrust" arguement.
This submission should be modded (-1 Flamebait)
Microsoft just doesn't get it. They should make Google the default search engine and stop working on their own search technologies altogether, which cost billions of R&D dollars and is a big drag on their stock price. This way soon after IE7 is officially released, Google will suddenly have such a large market share that they can easily be convicted as a monopolist in the online search market. After Google is convicted, their legs will be dragged no matter what they want to add to their search capability. This is such an economic way of bringing down your competitor, but Microsoft just doesn't get it. They still try to introduce their own search engine to bring true competition to the market.
/.ers, they bought your competitors' propaganda and have shown how stupid they are anyway.
Wake up, Microsoft! Your competitors are taking advantage of the anti-trust law to reduce competition in the market, do the same thing! Forget about the stupid users such as
> Not only are there completely viable options to Google - Google has never been convicting of abusing a monopoly. Note that later point, many people don't mind a monopoly as long as it doesn't abuse it (see Microsoft).
;)
Oh, come on, there are completely viable options to MS. But MS has the market, like Google seems to have the market. And MS wasn't considered to be abusive at first. You think Google will be a "saint"? I sure hope so, but, my friend, you should know that power corrupts even the best of us.
> Great, neither has my nine-year-old son, so what? He isn't aware either of how
Then show us, Obi-Wan
> - Microsoft killed DR Dos (a *far* better dos) by creating fake incompatibility messages
OMG - Pink Ponies!. I can't believe you actually state the (indeed "fake") message in a BETA version of Windows as the reason for DR-Dos being killed. Unfortunatelly for you I am not 9 years old. I REMEMBER! I also remember how DR-Dos died... At a time when everyone (at least everyone I knew) was using DR Dos 6, Digital Research was bought by Novell. And they planned DR Dos 7, and planned... and planned... and didn't really ever release something better...
> - Microsoft killed OS2 (a *far* better OS) by ensuring incompatibility between its applications and OS2 ones
It is well known that MS actually believed in OS/2 for at least the first 5 years of its life. OS/2's initial versions were not that great (no 32bit 80386 mode - remember?), so it didn't pick up. Windows did pick up and it was obvious that MS focused there. However there was no "ensuring incompatibility" - OS/2 would run Windows programs (at least in the Win 3x era, by including Win code). Yes, OS/2 Warp was probably better than the first version of Win 95, but it was too little, too late.
> - Microsoft killed Netscape by giving their browser away for free. Once they had the market share they allowed it to stagnate.
> - etc, etc, etc
Oh, come on... And video killed the radio star... I want my OS to include a browser. The point is, that MS "allowed it to stagnate" at a time when downloading a replacement was a matter of 2-3 minutes. Let me give you an example of things not being MS's fault. At the times of Opera 5 (somewhere around 2k?) I was an undergrad and had a website that had over 200 visits/day at its peak. I was really impressed by the browser, but it had an ad, and I had no income. So, I optimized my site for Opera, I put up a banner and I signed up for the free licence for webmasters program. If they even replied my request (saying e.g. we want more popular sites), I would not have removed the banner. It was not MS's fault.
>No, my nine-year-old isn't aware of how he's been harmed by Microsoft's abuse of its monopoly. But there are plenty of people who are. These are people who've had to pay for expensive license fees for MS Office in order to have a compatible tool, who've spent a ton of money fighting viruses in the MS world, etc.
There is OpenOffice. What? It is not viable? Of course it is not! It's a bigger memory hog than Windows Me itself! Whenever I try to use it I run into problems. Being a professional in the software engineering business I cannot but admire how such a huge project like MS Office worked out so well. I get pissed every time Word changes what I type thinking it knows better, but that is a minor complain. Yes, I do feel obliged to pay the people behind office - it got the monopoly because there was never better competition.
And I won't even START to discuss your blatantly ignorant statement that viruses are MS's fault.
> I think there's room to honestly evaluate and consider both actually.
Yet, once more, you spend so much of our time accusing MS for almost everything but the Bubonic plague.
Listen to your 9 year old next time. And start a topic about Time Warner, because I still get interruptions in my service after months of delibarations
IE is, by definition a Default & Preset. IE is forced upon you, Firefox and Opera is chosen.
I have to choose to run it, and I chose to install Firefox and run that instead. There nothing forced here, it's just a battle for the non-technical user who doesn't know any better than the default.
But this double-standard and hypocrity from Google is pissing me off.
It's not just Firefox. It's also Opera, Netscape and even AOL Explorer. You can argue AOL Explorer is forced on AOL users in one way or another. Google didn't make a peep, in fact they paid quite the money to obtain 5% stake in AOL and force this decision upon AOL.
Now Microsoft *DOES* come with other engines preloaded, maybe your beta was old or something went wrong, but when I installed it, it features other engines, and even more, adding more engines to Firefox and Opera is a pain in the ass.
IE7's support of OpenSearch is a lot easier to use and they keep a current page with search engine providers, including Google.
I'm afraid we're looking for a phantom problem here. The issue quite apparently is just that Google doesn't get the default this time and it's bitchin' like any sane corporation will.
However what is Microsoft expected to do? They added a feature that was demanded (every other browser has it) and they had to apparently pick some sort of default, even if they ask the user "what do you want", user friendliness alone says you gotta have a default in case the user doesn't know what to select.
What does Google think? That they should dump the feature, or maybe they should chose Google over their own search engine? Don't be ridiculous.