Microsoft Will Ship Windows 7 in Europe With IE Unbundled 578
jimmi_hendrix was one of several people to note CNET's report that 'Microsoft plans to remove Internet Explorer from the versions of Windows 7 that it ships in Europe, CNET News has learned. Reacting to antitrust concerns expressed by European regulators, Microsoft plans to offer a version in Europe that has the browser removed. Computer makers would then have the option to add the browser back in, ship another browser or ship multiple browsers, according to a confidential memo that was sent to PC makers and seen by CNET News." There's also a report at Ars Technica.
Re:Why are we deprived of this in North America? (Score:5, Informative)
You're not! Check the pirate bay after the european release is made. Furthermore, look to those Windows - LITE versions that people put together. They are also quite effective.
My question is if they are removing the blue E icon or actually removing the rendering engine? My guess is the former. The way things stand, I imagine many apps would be impossible to run without the rendering engine. A simple test would be to open a file browser and then type in a URL to see if an internet web page can be shown. If it's there, you will see it that way.
Re:Why are we deprived of this in North America? (Score:5, Informative)
A simple test would be to open a file browser and then type in a URL to see if an internet web page can be shown. If it's there, you will see it that way.
MS got rid of the tie between Windows Explorer and IE with Windows Vista; trying to view a local folder in IE opens Windows explorer, and trying to view an internet URL in Windows Explorer opens your default browser.
My question is if they are removing the blue E icon or actually removing the rendering engine?
My reading is that they basically can't remove the rendering engine completely; too much stuff depends on it. HTML is behind the entire Windows Help system for instance, and I can't see them either altering the technology that radically or disabling help. There's also a lot of third party software (e.g. Steam) that uses it.
I don't know how much IE adds to the rendering engine though. It may be the case that MSHTML (what's used for the help system and such) is actually pretty lightweight and IE adds quite a bit, so this split is actually quite meaningful, but I doubt that's the case.
Only Half the Story (Score:5, Informative)
Re:What next EU: (Score:4, Informative)
And I'd also go ahead and point out that there was a time when web browsers were sold seperate from the OS. At that point there was competition to IE - Netscape. Then MS bundled IE with windows so that you *had* to buy IE even if you also bought Netscape, and Netscape died overnight. And then we went 7 years without a new version of IE.
So yea, I'd certainly include "bundling IE" as one of MS's more egregious business practices.
Wordpad/Notepad? Probably staying bundled. But Word and Office? You'll note that they were never bundled, but if they had been I'm sure undoing that would be part of this deal as well.
Re:HugeOrNot (Score:0, Informative)
Years ago, Microsoft released an unbundled version of Windows like this in the past when the European Commission had an issue with Media Player, called Windows N [microsoft.com]. It was a sales flop.
Re:i still dont see the logic (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Getting Firefox? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:MS Updates (Score:5, Informative)
Re:What next EU: (Score:5, Informative)
Big difference that you seem to be willfully ignoring. Neither Apple or any Linux vendor strong armed OEMs into exclusively installing their browser.
Re:This will be hell (Score:1, Informative)
Helpless people won't be buying computers without operating system. When manufacturers install Windows, they will also install browser to those computers.
Re:Getting Firefox? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Next Step: No Safari in Snow Leopard??? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:i still dont see the logic (Score:5, Informative)
Can someone explain to me why bundling IE with windows is considered to be a trust?
No, because it isn't considered a trust. You don't even seem to know what a trust is, so one can only assume your ignorance of this topic is extreme. Have you considered a dictionary?
An antitrust law is a law against undermining the operation of a free market by using overwhelming influence in a market. A trust is a group of companies or organizations that collude to use their market power to this end. A monopoly is a company with enough influence to do it my themselves. MS has been ruled to have such influence in the "PC Operating System" market (differentiating it from the workgroup server OS market.). As such, they are forbidden from using that influence to disrupt other, pre-existing markets. The Web browser market qualifies as such a market.
MS doesn't charge any money for it
Irrelevant.
... and it was better than Netscape when it came out...
Irrelevant.
...why is it all of the sudden a trust and not a trust 15 years ago?
They had a monopoly then too, and it was a crime then, the US charged them with it. Since then other countries have tried them for it over the years. The EU finally charged them in response to complaints from their victims.
Re:MS Updates (Score:3, Informative)
afaik Windows 7 Updates works with a seperate program, not via the browser.
Re:Getting Firefox? (Score:3, Informative)
I don't have a Vista box handy right now, but I know the Win7 help text is quite extensive compared to older versions of Windows. Typing FTP in Windows Help provides instructions on how to use Windows Explorer to access ftp sites. Though it's not much more complicated than accessing any other files, you just type the address in the address bar (and to get you started they give ftp.microsoft.com as an example).
Re:i still dont see the logic (Score:5, Informative)
If someone wants a new browser they should get it themselves. Can someone explain to me why bundling IE with windows is considered to be a trust? MS doesn't charge any money for it, and it was better than Netscape when it came out, why is it all of the sudden a trust and not a trust 15 years ago?
It was antitrust 15 years ago. The DOJ found for Netscape. Then we elected Bush, and the enforcement of the ruling went out the window.
(BTW, it's antitrust because MS leveraged their OS monopoly to gain market share for their browser, after Netscape turned down their purchase offer.)
Re:Why are we deprived of this in North America? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Why are we deprived of this in North America? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:I don't understand you guys... (Score:3, Informative)
allright,
although this has been mentioned on slash about a million times before, here it goes:
-there are other ways to install a browser, you can have a downloader supplied, you can do it via FTP, or you can simply pick up a CD.
-IE is insecure, and simply having it on your system is a risk. someone may accidentally use it, other programs with vulns can invoke it etc.
-apple does not have a monopoly on the consumer OS. And even if they did, they're not abusing it.
Microsoft was not found guilty of being a monopoly. They were found guilty of abusing it.
Welcome to slashdot.
Re:MS Updates (Score:3, Informative)
What year is it in your little world, 2000? Critical updates have been delivered via control panel applet/service since, what, Windows 2000 at least. Non-critical ones can be easily downloaded using Firefox, or any browser you'd like to name.
Vista (and possibly XP; I haven't had XP in awhile) even let you select the non-critical ones from the same control panel as the critical ones, so there's absolutely zero reason to use IE to get updates. Not that there has been one in ages, anyway.
Re:Why are we deprived of this in North America? (Score:5, Informative)
Geez, how about just making the help consist of GODDAMN HTML FILES?
Um, they basically are. They're zipped together somehow because help usually has multiple pages and they want it in one file, but that's what they are behind the scenes.
They point is how do you display that HTML? It's that which we are talking about. Right now Windows uses MSHTML to display them. The APIs under discussion would allow Mozilla to hook up Gecko so that it could render your help files (which would maybe allow you to totally remove IE stuff from the system), or someone to hook up Webkit to display help files, etc.
(Another interpretation of what you say is to just have the web browser itself display help files; this has a number of drawbacks, not the least of which is that without a browser in there by default, you wouldn't be able to read help. And it's exactly that situation which is why I'm postulating that MS isn't going to remove MSHTML.)
Re:i still dont see the logic (Score:4, Informative)
Is there really a "web browser market" when only one of the four major players are actually trying to charge for their product?
Yes. AT&T was forced to stop bundling telephones with their telephone service, despite the fact that no one was selling telephones at the time. Immediately thereafter there was en explosion of innovation including push buttons, autodial, answering machines, wireless sets, etc. Why do you think that is? Why do you think we have antitrust laws?
IE, FF and Chrome are free.
IE is Windows only and every time you buy Windows you're paying for it. The cost is bundled into the price of Windows. "Free" is just marketing. The others make money in ways other than directly charging for the browser.
The only company out there trying to make money by selling a web browser is Opera.
Opera's regular browser is free too.
When I was using a WinCE phone, Opera Mobile was absolutely the best browser for that platform.
Guess what, you paid more for that phone than you should have. The phone maker paid Opera. Opera spent millions working around broken Web pages. Broken Web pages exist because IE is broken and was artificially granted huge market share despite being inferior. MS's actions, thus, cost Opera money and they pass that on to you, which hurts their business by making their product more expensive and less useful because of MS's illegal act.
Despite whatever technical merits their browser might have, I think Opera is looking to the government to create a market for them that in a truly free market, wouldn't exist.
Yeah, expecting the government to enforce the laws and MS to obey them the same as everyone else sure is unfair. Let's cut to the chase then. Do you feel antitrust law is wrong in principal or do you feel it should not apply to MS in this case. Why?
Re:Total protectionism by the EU (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Getting Firefox? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:HugeOrNot (Score:3, Informative)
From your own link:
StatCounter's total scores for Europe put IE marketshare at 48 percent and Firefox at 38 percent.
That said, it does appear that some IE users are switching to firefox at a slow pace (2% every 1/4 year, or 8% a year). At that rate, in a year and some, firefox may overtake IE share.
Re:Why are we deprived of this in North America? (Score:3, Informative)
Doxygen is able to write .chm files, so I think it is sufficiently documented so that another browser could display them.
I think the complaint is more that Microsoft is not providing any means to call another browser. Assuming the file is adequately documented and actually serves some purpose then the browsers should interpret them.
Re:This will be hell (Score:1, Informative)
Did you even read the summary? As has been mentioned in countless other posts.
"Computer makers would then have the option to add the browser back in, ship another browser or ship multiple browsers"
Re:HugeOrNot (Score:5, Informative)
I've been saying this same thing for a long time now, but the odd part is, I've been using firefox and chrome between work and home and I almost never happen on an obviously broken site anymore.
To a certain degree I probably have a higher tolerance for things that don't line up, etc., but I'm pretty sure the web is a LOT cleaner than it used to be... in that regard.
Re:Why are we deprived of this in North America? (Score:5, Informative)
Here's a question: why aren't people angry that Apple bundles Safari with OSX?
Allow me to anticipate the answer: because Apple doesn't hold a monopoly on consumer operating systems. This is true, Apple does not hold a monopoly on consumer operating systems, and arguably Microsoft does.
No, it's because Apple has not abused a monopoly to try to enter other markets. When they start to do that (for example in the iTunes space), you can expect the EU start to go after them. Now I'm sure the EU process can be corrupted, and they're far from perfect, but in this case I don't think they have an illegitimate target.
So why are people fighting to have Microsoft's software unbundled with Microsoft's other software? Why aren't people fighting against the OS monopoly itself, instead of the fringes of the monopoly?
Having a monopoly is not illegal. Abusing that monopoly to apply leverage to your partners and customers is. Sometimes the radical solution to a monopoly has been to break up the monopolist, however I think fines and sanctions for abusive behaviour are a better remedy, as they set limits on the kind of thing companies think they'll get away with.
In this case, it seems Microsoft thinks they can do whatever they like, and have decided to thumb their nose at the EU by claiming they'll just unbundle IE from retail versions too (I imagine the focus of the investigation is OEM versions). If instead they decided to stop trying to abuse their monopoly position and just produce better software, this problem (and many others) would go away, but I don't think that's in their corporate DNA.
I mean, what problem is being addressed? Is the problem with Microsoft that they bundle the browser they develop with the operating system they develop? People are free to choose their OS, right?
Wrong. Because of past pressure by Microsoft on OEMs and other dirty tricks, all commercial competitors to them in the open OS market have disappeared (OS2,BeOS). The only competitor left is Linux, which for obvious reasons is more difficult to attack, though that hasn't stopped them trying.
Apple wisely (for now) sticks to producing their own hardware to get round this problem, otherwise I'm sure you'd see Ballmer saying I'm going to fucking kill Apple [wikipedia.org] and putting extreme pressure on the likes of DELL to never bundle Apple products. That would be illegal, but they've done it before, and they'll do it again.
OEM versions of Windows are the real battle-ground here - people do not choose their OS, they choose a computer, and MS has cleverly shut off almost all alternatives to them in that space. Having done that, they bundle IE so that they can control competitors like Google by controlling access to the web - classic abuse of monopoly status to attack competitors.
So the problem is not having a monopoly, the problem is abusing it to try to attack competitors - because of Microsoft's track record in that area, and huge existing power, they are not given the benefit of the doubt when bundled software could extend their monopoly in other fields. Forcing them to level the playing field on browsers is a good first step to stop them trying to control the web and tie it to Windows.
Re:Getting Firefox? (Score:3, Informative)
That's what Microsoft have proposed, but I don't expect that the EU will let them get away with it. They are not stupid.