EU Accepts Microsoft's Browser Choice Promise

itwbennett writes "Hurrah! The European Commission's antitrust investigation of Microsoft's position in the browser market is over. The EC has accepted Microsoft's commitment to offer users of 'Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7 a choice screen through which they can pick the browsers they want to install on their PC,' writes Peter Sayer in an article on ITworld. 'The screen will be offered to users in the European Union and some neighboring countries for the next five years via the Windows Update mechanism. In addition, PC manufacturers will be allowed to ship computers with competing Web browsers, as well as or instead of Internet Explorer.'"

Comments

oh dear

[kennethmci]

sounds great - although, i can hear the customes complaining 'i cant find internet explorer'! i love the alternative browsers , but cant help feel the 'average consumer' doesn't really care that much? i have actually installed firefox on family members computers, and couldnt really answer ( with info that they found useful ) what the difference was... my family dont really care to much about usability compliance and security ( well - until theyre shot down themselves with it! )

Re:oh dear

[AlexiaDeath]

My dad certainly started to use the red ring thing for internet after I had to clean off porn spam off his PC. He is in his sixties and was somewhat embarrassed about it. The rest of the family does it because I named it The Internet and put it on the desktop. Since then time needed to spend cleaning both family computers during my home visits has gone down to about an hour per year. So the user might not care, but the tech savvy family member that gets the free cleanup work does.

Re:oh dear

[AlexiaDeath]

My parents use web based e-mail clients happily. I'm yet to see a free e-mail provider with MAPI. Gmail does POP and IMAP. Outlook does not do IMAP. POP3 just confuses them because it deletes all their mail from server and they can read it at other computers. That leaves Thunderbird, but honestly the Gmail web interface is better, if you have broadband and connection is always available.

Re:Hurrah?

[minsk]

When governments are not a huge customer of Microsoft, there might be some ground to complain about them being subject to anti-trust laws.

For the moment, "Microsoft tax" is far too literal. And your comment far too close to the usual silliness of reducing regulations on government-supported monopolies...

Re:Hurray!

[dotwhynot]

Which IE8 can't do, I think. Can you even install IE6 on Windows 7?

Only in VirtualXP mode. I believe Win7 is the best bet to get rid of most of the remaining IE6 users, because many corporation and governments that skipped the Vista upgrade cycle, and didn't want to update/certify intranet applications between cycles, will upgrade to Win7 (for many reasons). Let's hope they do it quickly. At least IE8 is a huge step in right direction.

Re:past behaviour

[Insanity Defense]

Yes, that's right. Supplying your own browser with your own operating system is analogous to murdering someone. Good work.

Microsoft did more than just supply a browser for their own OS. They forbade OEMS from installing any other browser. They programmed it into the system so that end users couldn't easily remove it. They did everything they could to KILL competing browsers. In short they used their OS monopoly to force a browser monopoly and that was and is illegal. Now attempts are being made to rebuild competition in the browser field.

Re:I demand choice in my car as well

[AntiDragon]

General Motors have a 90% share in car sales worldwide? I'm shocked and awed!