Comments on: Why Mozilla could beat IE in a European ground war

The European Union may not like Microsoft's "no browser" solution to its antitrust complaint, but this is an opportunity for Mozilla to win through superior community.

[uvasiljevic]

The point is that EU wants to help browsers which are based on public standards, the latest IE version is far from standards. This should prevent Microsoft of enforcing users in direct or indirect way to buy Microsoft's products. The Microsoft is shipping IE with Windows and most of the users don't know enough about computers and browsers they are using default browser which is IE. As a result the companies are making web pages which are working only with IE. Remember days when IE had 90% of the market. Microsoft deliberately makes IE to work outside the standards. All banks in my country (Serbia) which have good E-banking have sites which are working only in IE. On other hand the Microsoft is selling code for programing which is also creating web code which by default is working only in IE. As a result if I want to access my bank account information over web I need to BUY WINDOWS because that is only legal way to use IE, you need to buy Windows if you want to use IE even using IE with Wine on Linux. By putting IE in Windows and making it to work outside of standards and knowing how people are behaving, the Microsoft is selling more Programming software, more Windows and it have more influence it the programming world and users have less choice or none.

[jrcrum01]

IE8 is much more compliant with standards than previous versions, due to an effort to make it so. But this is a false argument. The EU is NOT after standards compliance. I'm not sure what they are trying to accomplish, but they seem to be just anti-Microsoft. I use IE6, IE7, Chrome, and Firefox. I don't run into many major sites that don't work with all 4. In fact, some sites I use have some features that work correctly only with Firefox (galaxyzoo is one example). If you use banks that have sites that work with only IE, I would suggest taking that up with the banks, not Microsoft. In fact, I would think you would want to use IE if so many sites work only with it.

Microsoft is NOT "selling code for programming which is also creating web code which by default is working only in IE". I'm a software developer, and I use .Net, and browser compatibility is not a problem unless a developer intentionally makes it one.

I don't think MS will soon ship Windows with competitors' browsers installed. And if they do, I fail to see how that helps anyone; any of these can be installed easily for free. It would be just more junk software for people to have to uninstall from their systems.

If you want to use Linux and another browser, by all means do so. No need to buy anything from MS. But quit bashing a company that has done more than any other to make computers useful to the masses. There are good reasons why Linux has been a failure in the general market -- and they have nothing to do with browsers. Maybe someday it will be as easy to use as Windows and will achieve general acceptance. It seems the EU thinks bashing MS will help, but they are simply stupid.

[Police_States_of_America]

you can count on microsoft sending IE discs to all the retailers, but even then it can only result in a loss of browser share for MS

[forever4now]

Presumably, retailers could carry disks for all of the major browsers & when someone buys a retail copy of Windows, the store can provide them a disk for the browser they want.

Assuming the sales assistants are informed, it may actually be a good way to educate users about the pro & cons of each browser (e.g. performance, usability, features, security, standards compliance, etc.).

[lennie22]

I saw this posted over at Geek:

"My questions are:
1) can the EC really force MSFT to inlcude competing products in it?s OS?
2)I mean wouldn?t that be unconstitutional?

3) they?re talking about forcing MSFT to put a ??ballot screen? that would prompt users to choose from a specific set of Web browsers?, but isn?t this decision actually limiting competition? 4) what happens when 10 more players join the browser market?
5) wouldn?t this balot screen allow those new players to grab at MSFT?s neck saying they are not being represented by MSFT?s balot screen? wouldn?t this allow the EC to pluck more money out of MSFT?s pockets?

6) the EC argued that MSFT bundled the browser and that it was wrong for them to do so, therefore, shouldn?t removing the bundled product remedy the situation? why should it be ok to force them to bundle the competition?s products in their product? shouldn?t it be a free market, this forcing does not make it a free market?

7) how will support go???I mean, will MSFT be also forced to host all these browsers on their network and will MSFT be forced to pay the download/bandwidth cost for all the downloads?

wouldn?t this be free advertising for these selected few browsers that will be on the proposed ?balot screen?? of course this is limiting the market to just these few which leaves no room for smaller guys to join the market even if they come up with better products than those on this proposed balot screen. eventually, will MSFT be forced to put them on the balot screen too?

9.) the browser is an essential communications and searching tool, so what about search? opera, chrome, firefox and safari all defaults to 1 search engine, google. google has over 70% of the search market already, wouldn?t forcing MSFT to include all those browsers defaulting to this search engine give google 6x more control over the search market?

10) going by the EC?s logic shouldn?t a user be prompted to choose his/her default search engine on first start up of their default browser choice?

I?m wondering if anyone see how this could get real ugly real fast. with all these questions I?ve asked, I?m sure they beg to question: isn?t the EC?s logic flawed?
"

[jrcrum01]

Yes, their logic is deeply flawed. I think MS should label the EU version of Windows 7 the "EU Idiots' Unintended Results" version.

[odubtaig]

I got as far as "wouldn't that be inconstitutional" and just boggled.

I'm sorry, since when was US law applicable in the EU? Never? Oh right then.

kthxbye.

[Jlmc727]

I think it would be funny if Microsoft did exactly what the EU wants have the install program install and setup every browser known to man. Just keep it on the Europen version as it will cause to many headaches and system crashes.

[Jlmc727]

I forgot the disclaimer
Being as we insisted on this the EC takes full responsibility for any browser related problems with your system

[userNoname]

It's not that clear, Matt. Don't forget the other distribution channel - yes, it's WUS. Just bought a laptop sans a browser? Well, start checking for updates of your Windows and we'll do the rest.

[stevepo67]

Folks -- this is such non-issue -- why are so many people (myself included, I'm afraid) even bothering with it. Can you really imagine ANY PC maker to not include some browser? Can you picture the tech support calls at that PC maker when Joe Ordinary User tries to use his computer to get email or do more-or-less anything with his computer? Sure, YOU may be able to use a command-line FTP to download something but, seriously, do you think most people can?

[jtdev]

Why is the EU going after Microsoft? As many commenters have already pointed out, retailers will definately include a browser with Windows 7 whether or not Microsoft ships it with IE. If the EU wants more competition in the browser market, they should require that retailers pre-install the top five browsers on any computer sold in Europe. They could issue an updated list on a yearly basis so that the list reflects current popular browsers.

My best explanation for the EU going after Microsoft is that they are hoping for a big payday. They know that it is often cheaper for big companies to pay a fine than to litigate and lose potential sales. However, Microsoft's offer to sell Windows without IE makes it tough for the EU to claim that they're violating any anti-trust laws. And if Microsoft isn't violating any anti-trust laws then it's hard to justify slapping them with a huge fine.

I suspect that the EU will soon ask Microsoft to ship Windows with links to install their competitors software. Microsoft will refuse. The EU will then slap them with a fine. Microsoft will pay it and life will go on as usual.

[odubtaig]

Third paragraph, first sentence.

"The EU wants Microsoft to bundle a range of competing browsers with Windows 7."

If you're going to comment on an article you might want to try reading it first, unless you really enjoy looking like a total f***wit.

[odubtaig]

Speaking of looking stupid, that was to jtdev... and about half the people commenting here.

[jtdev]

My comment was that the EU should require the retailers to include the extra software, not Microsoft. Retailers already put a ton of extra software on new PCs so why not simply require them to install the extra browsers? Why ask Microsoft to do it? The only reason I could see was that the EU assumed Microsoft would refuse and they could slap them with a fine. Retailers, on the other hand, would comply providing them no opportunity to make money.

[lazycat202]

Where's Obama administrator? Look how EU is treating American company!!! that's ridiculous!! Let other browsers eat dust by not bundling any browsers in Win7 at all! just throw out a CD with IE only on it to every new PC. that's what EU has been asking for.