Digital Home Thoughts - News & Reviews for the Digital Home

"Microsoft Corp. ended more than a decade of antitrust disputes with the European Union by giving consumers a choice among Web browsers. Microsoft's Windows operating system will include a screen that gives users the option of using rival browsers, the European Commission said in a statement. The so-called choice screen, available by mid-March, lets users turn off Microsoft's Internet Explorer and install an alternative."

Here's why this is mostly an empty victory for the EU: the people who don't know any better, the people who have no idea what Firefox, Opera, or Chrome are, will click on the little blue "e" that they recognize. The people who are experienced enough to use alternate browsers will install whatever they want. So how exactly is this a victory for the EU? I'm just glad it's settled - Microsoft doesn't need distractions like this slowing it down.

"The EU will require Microsoft to package third party browser software with Windows. Furthermore, it will require Microsoft to provide further support efforts to make third party browsers' interface with Windows components like Windows Explorer as efficient as Internet Explorer's. The ruling is set to apply to both desktop Windows OS's and to Windows Mobile for cell phones."

Ah, the EU bureaucrats. With the world economy in tatters, they're still running after Microsoft, salivating for more money. Don't they have better things to do? Or maybe fleecing a big American company is part of their plan for the economic recovery of Europe - I wouldn't put it past them. We all know that Microsoft had some heavy-handed, monopolistic tactics back in the '90s - it's a matter of public record. But in the technology world, that's an eternity ago - politics, and even the law, can't keep up with the ferocious pace of technology and they look like idiots when they try. Read more...