Is the EU’s stance against Microsoft’s browser monopoly unworkable?
The people in charge of the European Union really don’t like Microsoft. They tend to see it as an overly-dominant company which succeeds in maintaining its huge market share in many sectors by unfair means. Microsoft, rather unsurprisingly, disagrees. Cue a battle to the death, with Internet Explorer being the weapon of choice.
The EU has long held the belief that Microsoft is maintaining its huge market share in many sectors by stifling the competition. The main area of attrition surrounds Microsoft’s Web browser, Internet Explorer, the latest version of which, IE8, was released earlier this year to little celebration.
Anyone who knows even the remotest thing about technology and the Internet knows there are many alternatives to Internet Explorer on the market. But all of these other browsers have to be downloaded and installed in the aftermath of buying a new PC, while Internet Explorer comes bundled with whatever version of the Windows operating system that computer ships with.
This fact means a whole host of people either don’t realize there are other options out there or choose to stick with what they know best, even if Internet Explorer is considered by many to be slow and outdated compared to the likes of Mozilla Firefox and Google Chrome.
The EU has been fighting to force Microsoft to stop bundling Internet Explorer with Windows, thereby forcing new PC users to seek out the Web browser they actually want rather than choosing the easy option. But frustrated with a lack of action on Microsoft’s behalf, the EU is now reportedly changing tact.
The Wall Street Journal claims the EU now wants Microsoft to bundle all browsers with Windows, rather than just Internet Explorer. The new PC owner would then make their choice of Web browser using a ballot screen during installation.
The reasons for this move may be clear – to dilute the obvious advantage Microsoft has over its rivals in this market – but the methodology would seem to ultimately be flawed. As Download Squad rightly suggests, carrying this out would be unworkable and unfair on Microsoft. Which would be an about-turn of epic proportions.
Firefox, Chrome, Safari, and Opera may be the big IE competitors, but what about the rest? Don’t smaller, less-well-known browsers also deserve inclusion on Windows? And why is Microsoft the only company being picked on? Surely all operating systems and other devices which come bundled with Web browsers will also be subject to the same change in regulation?
If not, surely this whole thing just adds up to an anti-Microsoft bias.
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June 1st, 2009
Microsoft’s browser problem in the EU is part of a snowball effect from their marketplace strategy in the 1990s. Basically, Microsoft’s conduct during the 1993 EU unfair competition proceedings originally brought by Novel pissed the EU off. What they did was act in the EU the same as they were acting in the US; in the US, their conduct was way more successful, but all it did was piss the Europeans off (who have a much different understanding of “competition” and “fair competition” than do Americans).
If you look at the original 1993 complaint from Novell and the 1998 complaint from Sun, both cases have merit. Since then, Microsoft has repeatedly dawdled in releasing source code–or has understood the EU’s requirements narrowly when the EU meant them to be understood broadly.
Pissing off EU bureaucrats is not a cost-effective or productive strategy, as Microsoft has found. It merely subjects the company to ongoing inquiry by various governments, raises suspicions among Europeans that Microsoft is a “bad” company, and indirectly drives the adoption of open source operating systems and software in Europe–where open source is by leaps and bounds more widely used than in North America.
Microsoft may or may not be the victim of bias in the EU (Microsoft has had a *significant* hand in making the bed they must currently sleep in), but what is clear is that Microsoft’s shareholders have not been well-served by the company’s being difficult with the EU. Microsoft could have complied and demurred to European regulators and avoided much of this mess–and its numerous and very high fines–without compromising the viability and robustness of its products. In other words, a bit of lip service could have gone a long ways.
The tenor in Microsoft’s interactions with the EU are now forever tainted by its reluctance to comply, and the company will be forever scrutinized on every last detail. A huge waste of time and money over the long haul, and a cash cow for the EU now, too.
June 1st, 2009
And the number of OSes in wide use that originated in Europe is….? I guess you could put Linux out there but, seriously.
Real nice to pile on and act like it’s still 1997, but please. the EU is devoid of trail blazers . Microsoft shareholders would have been served worse by caving in coughing up whatever the EU thinks they deserve to ensure equal mediocrity.
As long as Microsoft isn’t taking steps to keep other browsers from running on Windows, that should be sufficient.
How about climbing on Apple for shipping Safari only on OSX?
June 1st, 2009
“[...] carrying this out would be [...] unfair on Microsoft.”
So the bully is going to get hurt by a low blow – that’s nasty; it’s really very shocking and quite beyond the pale.
I do hope that MS recovers quickly from this latest setback, so that they can sail on to all the other setbacks that are awaiting them down the road.
“[...] the EU is now reportedly changing tact.”
So Dave, are they going to tactful or tactless?
June 3rd, 2009
Seriously, the EU has a problem with Microsoft supplying IE and not supplying other browsers, but doesn’t have the same problem with Apple on either their Macs or iPhones, or Windows Mobile devices, or BlackBerry, or Nokia, or …
This is just plain stupid. And Microsoft would be stupid to bow to EU demands by supplying other browsers. As you pointed out, who decides which browsers are going to be included? I liken this to all the hubbub about dialer software, where Microsoft was forced to put that stupid folder on every desktop called “Online Access” or whatever it was. If I were Microsoft, come October my stance would be “OKay, fine, we’re not shipping Windows 7 to EU member countries” and let the stupid EU commissioners (or whatever they’re called) hear the flack from their public.
June 10th, 2009
I was at the microsoft website and it is really disturbing that there were no mention whatsoever about the opera browser. that evil company again to no good. how is this posible? almost all the pages i browsed on said site constantly pushed me to download ie8 and silverlight but on none of them was a mention of flash or firefox or opera; i am sure glad the almighty european union is looking on these evil practices.