Why isn't Apple EVER in court when it too bundles a web browser with its OS?

This is laughable. I tried Chrome for a while and it did perform better than firefox on my home computer, however I returned to firefox because Chrome will not block advertising which absoulutely infuriates me. Chrome is simply Googles vechicle to generate more revenue via adverstising - Google - the 21 century M$ - can get nicked.

The only point I take issue with is where you've written that Microsoft "has been roasted by U.S. regulators every bit as much as the European watchdogs." In reality, the EU has done much more, and much more effectively, than the US' lame attempt to stifle Microsoft. And today they continue pressing, as they should. The US waved the white flag a long time ago...

I have no evidence Google is griping about IE in Europe

Sums it all up really doesn't it. But why not let facts or lack of get in the way of some bullshit. Congratulations on becoming useless.

I don't think Goggle bundles any product it sells. If your not charged for it and decide to install it then it was your choice. So here trying to draw a comparison is a little weak. It seems to be the medias great joy to create confusion. May be you just need to report the facts?

Microsoft "Pushers" have been bundling their software all along! Ever buy a new PC that didn't come PRELOADED with their OS?

I tried to claim my legal right to a refund, but Microsoft refused to honor their own EULA!

Microsoft has been cheating, creating world monopoly!

Microsoft restricts innovation, and is why they buy other innovation, especially for locking in their customers, by locking them out to anything else.

Microsoft is the DEVIL! Free yourself, with FREE open source intellectual property, that allows you to review the source code, to edit and change it as needed, unlike $M...

It's no wonder why Microsoft must PUSH it's products, WOW, a new day, Windows 7... just same old Vista DRM!

Microsoft doesn't listen to it's customers, they sold out to RIAA and MPAA content distributors....

It's okay for them to mass produce billions of intellectual property, but if your child lends a copy of a song, your bother shared a film, it's $22,500 dollar fine, lawsuit in court and made an example...

I wonder what the artist feel and think about having their real work stolen, blocked in the marketplace by these gangster!

Of course, it's okay to broadcast to the public over the radio, over the television and satellite works of art, intellectual property...

Heck, every time you go to the public library, aren't you sharing, copying and accesing works of intellectual property?

In fact, when you get right down to it, all innovation is always built upon prior works of art and innovation.

By limiting society, you create a monopoly, which Microsoft reaps huge profits...

I guess I should be polluting the air, and then charge everyone for clean air, sold in bottles, which are patented by IPR laws, to only be legal when customers pay with direct deposit!

Isn't it great to be a capitalist? Seeking nothing more than rich rewards and profits over decency, transparency and honor....

So, would you argue that poor little M$ does not use IE and Windows to promote it's second rate web server and other non standards? One reason everyone takes turns complaining about M$ is that M$ is .... get this from ten years ago .... an abusive monopoly.

If I was Microsoft I would suspend all sales in Europe and let them go back to Linux and DOS (many German firms are still trying to use). Microsoft developed a product if you like it or not and is under no obligation to sell to Europe.

Sick of the complaining.

FYI: Love Chrome.

Lee

Microsoft needs to break up. The regulators in the US failed to level the playing field, and MS continues to embrace and extend their monopoly.

IE fails to maintain industry standards, and as such MS shouldn't be permitted to monopolize product offerings with their non-standard compliant browser.

I would hope that in their turn Google, Apple, and Mozilla will also encourage the European commission to enforce the oversight which US regulators and MS itself have failed to do.

-- JMO.

just a silly thought... if IE isn't bundled with Windows how do you easily find and install Opera or Firefox or Chrome?

Safari is bundled with OSX yet no-one seems to complain (though there are a number of alternatives, Firefox included)

Any browser you choose to install has the option of making itself the default and has since the early days of the DoJ and EU seeing MS as a bucket of money.

Are we going to have to return to a world of carpet bombing CD mailers from AOL and Compuserve .... or will some common sense prevail?!

"Some advice to Google: The cop you help to get Microsoft will one day come after you."

The EU will only go after extremely evil companies like Microsoft and it's satanic leaders, Ballmer and Gates.

Honestly, what difference the EU can make now.. a fine of 300M will not make big difference, neither to Microsoft, not to google. we will still see IE incorporated in the OS for the next 5 years at least. probably never, there are always legal tricks to keep it within the OS.
what would really make a nice difference is a new OS. I am not sure when the IT companies will step up against Microsoft in the big area.

All I can say it's about time. And it is sad that we have to depend on europe to do what our antitrust divison should have done a long time ago. They should break up microsoft for all the anticompetitive bs that they have been doing.

So...you have no proof...at all.

To be honest, I think YOU are talking trash.

"Why would Google complain about IE? Because its own Chrome Web browser is struggling to gain share versus Microsoft IE"

Shouldn't your question be "Why Microsoft has 69% browser market share? Because its abusing their monopoly on their OS"

You are talking as if its an evil for other competitors to trigger the EC to apply more pressure, which, really, I can't see where the problem is for competitors to keep pushing until Microsoft behaves according to laws.

Just think the role of computers before Windows 95 was released, simple computers are NOTHING.

Its only Bill Gates who created the market for home users and everyone picked up from there. If you are able to send an email or post a comment or do anything with computers at home, then pls thank Mr. Gates for it.

If you want to try out (or develop from scratch) a new OS then pls go ahead and don't complain the innovator.

FYI: I don't like Chrome or Firefox. They crash several times and there are so many restrictions, no standards.

Thanks

The bundling of IE has been a glaring violation for years (well before Google became significant). It's about time somebody took action on this.

Microsoft needs to allow IE to be easily uninstalled from Windows (e.g. using Add/Remove Programs).

This would allow:

1. OEMs to "replace" IE with their browser of choice, when they build new PCs. Their choice could be based on regional preferences or negotiated deals with browser vendors (like they do with anti-virus software, etc.).

2. website developers to focus on open web standards (versus Microsoft's proprietary extensions), since they can no longer be sure that IE is available on 90% of PCs.

3. websites to be equally accessible to ALL browsers on ALL OSs, eliminating the need to "switch to IE" for some websites.

4. users to free up disk space, if they decide to use another browser.

This action would also "motivate" Microsoft to build a quality, standard compliant browser, if they want people to install and use it.

I hope the EU can make this happen. It will benefit everyone!

I guess everybody forgotten about why we are here. I mean the whole PC idea, internet and all that!
MS came up with technology (or bought it or whatever) and now everybody is a computer scientist. I remember the days that knowing how to write program or use computer was a big deal. Anyhow, nobody seemed to mind IE till internet hit it big.
They did R&D about IE over the time and they got it where it is.
I think internet exist because of IE (at least for masses) Now that it’s time for profitability that are complaining about unfair competition?
Where were these people when during the time that everybody was asking why the heck Microsoft is wasting all their money into IE? What is the purpose of this explorer and …
It’s like you push Pfizer to allow Merck to sell Viagra!!! It’s their research, their OS and they have any right to built it into window. You don’t like it then download Firefox, chrome, opera or….
By the way, I like to see how you do that with IE.
I hate to defend MS but….

These comments are so 1999. Get over it. Use what you want to and stop telling other people what to think. You lot are more 'evil' (ha) than Microsoft. That's M$ in Newspeak to all you young and dumb doublethinkers.

Shock horror... my car can with a factory fitted stereo.
Will the EU please sue Ford so they can fit a different one.

Probably not, but it's really easy for me to go down the road to Carphone Warehouse or Car Toys (depending on what side of the pond you're on) and get an upgrade.

Same story with IE. If you don't like it tap in a URL of your browser of choice and within minutes you never have to see it again. If you don't like Windows then get a Mac with the bundled Safari or a Linux distro with the bundled Firefox

It's just another example of the EU trying to show it's hip and with it, and actually just wasting taxpayers money attacking an American company (who also create a lot of jobs in Europe) when they should actually be worry about how badly they have messed up Europe - it could have challenged the US as an economic power if only they were smart

Just another way for failing, over extended governments to get more money.

this is totally absurd article-- and who in the US has any right to complain about what the EU does? you don't live here. and MS is big enough to take care of itself. As for Chrome-- it's laughable. And Boll the Pill did not create the market.. he poached everything in sight. He's not the Messiah.

My god, people are stupid, you posters and the EU included. MS, as every software company that can, has changed and is still changing their user interface to a web interface as much as they can. For example, Windows Explorer is really just an html page using the mshtml rendering engine to display it, and it has been so since Win 95. More and more of your "windows" are really just html pages.

The reason MS did this is that html provides a standard interface design language, making it less expensive to develop. This is true for MS as it is for everybody else. There is no more ominous reason for MS to be doing this than there is for any other software company.

Since the html rendering engine is embedded in Windows to display the user interface for many programs, they can easy leverage the same engine to supply a browser. And that's what IE is, just a wrapper around the mshtml rendering engine.

So MS can't remove the mshtml engine from Windows unless they rewrite all their user interface programs, at great expense to them. And if they did that, what would the advantage be to the Windows user? There would be NONE.

If you don't like IE, or you want to try something different, just install another browser. MS DOESN'T STOP YOU FROM DOING THIS. They could, and this would be just cause for a lawsuit, but they don't.

If seeing the icon bothers you, you can remove the icon for IE from your desktop on XP. And in Vista and Windows 7, it's not even there by default. You can also remove the shortcut from the Quick Launch Toolbar and Start Menu, too. And how do you download your alternate browser? You use the IE that came with your Windows, of course.

Why do so many people stick with IE when they could easily use a different browser? BECAUSE THEY HAVE NO COMPELLING REASON TO CHANGE! If they did, they would reach out to their knowledgeable friends, like the ones who help them fix their computers, and the friends would install an alternative browser. But they don't, because IE is adequate for 2/3 of computer users.

Yes, it's a pain for developers to get their web page working on so many disparate browsers, but that's competition. It certainly would be nice if IE followed Mozilla standards better, but it comes close at least.

Personally, I use Firefox for most sites because of all the Plugins (I can't browse without Adblock, Flashblock, and Firebug). But I still use IE for some pages, since they just render better in IE (due to the way they're coded, not due to any "advantage" in IE). Opera and Chrome add little value to the browsing experience, and that's why they're also rans.

So complaining that IE has a monopoly is ludicrous. That won't stop the idiotic EU, or the unthinking MS bashers, though...

"a complaint filed by browser also-ran Opera"

Except Opera has three many users as Chrome on the desktop, and is currently the dominant mobile browser.

Also-ran my ass.

"it's nice to think that U.S. companies might stick together in the face of European regulators"

Yeah, evil Europe. Because there are no antitrust trials in the US..oh, wait!

Go ahead, let the anti-EU and anti-Opera comments flow! Opera isn't a US company after all, so it must suck despite the fact that it dominates the mobile browser market.

bob_p:

I guess everybody forgotten about why we are here. I mean the whole PC idea, internet and all that! MS came up with technology

Fail more with your dishonest revisionism.

They did R&D about IE over the time and they got it where it is.

@Offbeatmammal

if IE isn't bundled with Windows how do you easily find and install Opera or Firefox or Chrome?

Safari is bundled with OSX yet no-one seems to complain

Any browser you choose to install has the option of making itself the default and has since the early days of the DoJ and EU seeing MS as a bucket of money.

Will the EU please sue Ford so they can fit a different one.

@TanMan: Your ignorance is quite amazing.

There is no more ominous reason for MS to be doing this than there is for any other software company.

Since the html rendering engine is embedded in Windows to display the user interface for many programs, they can easy leverage the same engine to supply a browser.

So MS can't remove the mshtml engine from Windows unless they rewrite all their user interface programs, at great expense to them. And if they did that, what would the advantage be to the Windows user? There would be NONE.

If you don't like IE, or you want to try something different, just install another browser. MS DOESN'T STOP YOU FROM DOING THIS.

Why do so many people stick with IE when they could easily use a different browser? BECAUSE THEY HAVE NO COMPELLING REASON TO CHANGE!

Yes, it's a pain for developers to get their web page working on so many disparate browsers, but that's competition.

I still use IE for some pages, since they just render better in IE (due to the way they're coded, not due to any "advantage" in IE).

So complaining that IE has a monopoly is ludicrous. That won't stop the idiotic EU, or the unthinking MS bashers, though...

Why should Microsoft be able to break the law without consequences?

As for "unthinking MS bashers", you are just a Microsoft shill, seeing as you cannot answer any actual arguments or facts, so you resort to personal attacks instead. Pathetic.

Please get it up it's called cause and effect do any of you idoits remember that. Microsoft is a business Google is a business Apple is a business. Businesses compete against each other sure microsoft stole Apple's ideal but dude that was over 20 years ago Apple turned out just fine. Google will one day learn when they have been in the business long enough. Like the other said if the EU doesn't like how Microsoft operates then stop buying the products. The U.S. doesn't seem to mind.

BTW Chrome is an ok browser but it still doesn't compete with IE 8 that's my opinion and just a point every browser can be hacked.....trust me!

I don't understand why everyone is complaining about IE, I'm not a big ms fan because it is an inferior product to many linux distros, however if I'm going to be mad at MS it's because of things like .net, direct x, and .doc formats that are intentionally non standard and force developers to make products that only run on ms. That is a problem but putting IE on MS just makes sense to me.

@ryan

IE *IS* intentionally non-standard, and forces developers to make pages that only run on IE.

THAT'S THE WHOLE POINT.

Are you paying attention or what?

MICROSOFT ABUSED ITS DOMINANT POSITION IN THE DESKTOP MARKET TO DESTROY COMPETITION AND CAUSE LOCK-IN IN THE BROWSER MARKET.

@Lee
They are still an abusive monopoly.
It would be great if they stopped selling in europe, you'll be surpised when only a small fraction of the people care about the difference between windows and linux