1.17.2009

EU to Microsoft: Separate Browser from OS

Microsoft Ordered to Delete Browser

Excerpt:

The European Union said Friday that Microsoft’s practice of selling the Internet Explorer browser together with its Windows operating system violated the union’s antitrust rules.

It ordered the software giant to untie the browser from its operating system in the 27-nation union, enabling makers of rival browsers to compete fairly.

“Microsoft’s tying of Internet Explorer to the Windows operating system harms competition between Web browsers, undermines product innovation and ultimately reduces consumer choice,” the E.U. said in a statement.


Comment: Makes SENSE! The browser is an application, not an essential OS component.

4 comments:

  1. What do you like better - Explorer or Firefox?

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  2. It's good to have multiple browsers on one's workstation.

    IE6 is solid. IE7 is nice with the multiple tabs. Unfortunately some websites are not optimized for IE7.

    Firefox is a great browser (that's what I use on my MAC and Ubuntu laptops)

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  3. Firefox is good, but I tried Opera years ago and haven't looked back since. My favorite feature by far is the "mouse gestures," which saves a lot of mouse movement when surfing. Every once in a while I hit a web site that doesn't work well with it - but with my job it's best to have multiple browsers installed anyhow.

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  4. Here is what I don't get. Every OS comes standard with different applications, even Linux and Mac OS. It would be extremely annoying to get an OS and have to download every single application. Does not Mac OS come with Safari? It's been a while since I reinstalled OSX but I think it also comes with iLife. A lot of Linux distros (at least the more home based versions i.e. Ubuntu Knoppix) come with Open/Star Office, and many of them also come with FFX if not all of them.
    Can you imaging shopping for your new OS, you would be forced to purchase your browser at a store, not to mention notepad, paint, Office, minesweeper, etc.
    I think if there is an issue, it should be that it is rather difficult, if not impossible, to completely remove it from the OS. Then again, I think the only OS you can do that with is a Linux distro.(Ubuntu 8.10 server does not have any browser installed, but that may be because it is a CLI OS. Then I found out you can install a CLI browser called w3m.) Even Mac OS, I don't think you can remove Safari.
    I would like to see these people purchase their next computer without a browser, and see how far they get. They would not know what to do. All they could do is browse their hard drive, as there would not be any application on it.

    ReplyDelete

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