25 watts is the good old days now - Bob Colwell, former Intel chief architect
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Microsoft confirms browser ballot page
RELUCTANTLY REPENTANT BROWSER MONOPOLIST Microsoft has offered users a chance to try out its browser ballot page, as it seeks to put an end to discussions with European regulators.
Dave Heiner, vice president and deputy general counsel at the firm detailed the firm's last option for the browser ballot page, explaining that it intends to roll out the feature over the next month and ahead of expected European schedules.
"Over the next few weeks, Microsoft will begin offering a 'Web browser choice screen' to Internet Explorer users in Europe, as required by the European Commission," he said. "Internal testing of the choice screen is underway now. We'll begin a limited roll-out externally next week, and expect that a full scale roll-out will begin around March 1, a couple of weeks ahead of schedule."
In December the European Commission ruled that Microsoft should put an end to competition issues and provide computer users with a choice of browsers, since it thought that the inclusion of Internet Exploder on Microsoft desktops made this impossible. Microsoft agreed to offer users a choice, and this is the solution.
Heiner said, "Microsoft agreed to use Windows Update to provide a browser choice screen to Windows users in Europe who are running Internet Explorer as their default browser. This browser choice screen will present a list of browsers, with links to learn more about them and install them. The design and operation of this choice screen was worked out in the course of extensive discussions with the Commission and is reflected in the commitment that Microsoft made. Users who get the choice screen will be free to choose any browser or stick with the browser they have, as they prefer."
We still think that this, combined with the fact that when the update is applied the IE shortcut will disappear from start lists, is going to confuse the hell out of a lot of people, but it is still a solution.
External testing will be conducted in three countries, the UK, France and Belgium. After this trial Microsoft will roll out the option screen across the continent. It expects to start the rollout in the first week of March.
The browser choice screen software update will be offered as an automatic download through Windows Update for Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7. There are five options, Internet Explorer, Opera, Chrome, Firefox and Safari. We know which one we won't be choosing. µ
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I'm not an MS fan at all, but why should only MS be forced to give users the choice of browsers? What about Apple? And Linux distros?
You have to click AGREE to proceed past it when you first start using the software.
Don't agree. Click NO.
"All you crying Europeans need to do is stop complaining about internet browsers
posted by : Professor"
HEY DO YOU MIND, US "EUROPEANS DIDN'T ALL HAVE A SAY ON BEING IN THE RUDDY EU. I KNOW US BRITISH, THE TRUE BRITISH THAT IS WERE GIVEN ZERO SAY AND STILL AREN'T!
When will Apple be forced to include competitor products into their OS? I'd like to see Safari removed and Opera/Firefox etc. bundled. Actually no, I think they should be allowed to put their own stuff in their own software without some politicians with godcomplex messing with what they can and can not put in their own products. It's moronic!!!
When will the people in Europe stop complaining? If Microsoft was a European company there would be no problems with IE being preinstalled.
While I use Win 7, I seldom use IE and prefer Firefox.
All you crying Europeans need to do is stop complaining about internet browsers and worry more about serious world issues that we all need to work together on, to solve.
GO U.S.A.!!!!!! Without us, Europe wouldn't have the right to complain...lol
And I don't want Linux, but I want it to provide me with an option to install Windows7 or OSX instead.. Any version of Linux should do that of course and Apple too. Equal terms for everybody. How about we enforce Google to give visitors the choice to use Bing for their searches instead. Silly is the limit.
You can bet Opera will still be moaning. They wont be happy until people are forced to use their browser
I don't want I.E. installed to begin with I wish we had a choice in America. I have had to many bad apples with I.E. i hate it.Give me the choice when installing windows and i guaranty i would not install I.E.
DimitrisK: Microsoft already created
Office Open XML formats for Office 2007 (docx, pptx etc), which are open formats.
K.L.: That's only a problem if you are using an old version of Office (Office 2000 or older). Newer versions of Office use Microsoft update, to update automatically.
Anyhow, it will be interesting to see how this affects IE's market share. My guess is that it won't put much of a dent in it. The average user prefers IE simply because it's familiar, and it works. Most users won't switch because IE already fills their needs, and they don't want to be bothered with learning even a slightly different interface. They honestly couldn't care less about the browser nerd wars.=)
The website for Microsoft Office requires an IE browser for checking of updates to work. Does the compromise with the EU commission addressed this?
Real "consumer choice" would involve having more than one major operating system (crammed full of Microsoft-only software and services) for sale in stores. Microsoft has reached critical mass, and has managed to force its way onto nearly all new non-Apple computers.
True, people COULD just install Ubuntu or OpenSuse Linux and be rid of the buggy MS Windows -- but most just use the machines as configured as appliances -- the huge botnet networks are evidence of that.
So I think that this "browser ballot" is a great first step. It lets people know that they HAVE a choice of browser, and perhaps can start them thinking that they can actually be more than passive consumers. Perhaps more people will select more secure non-proprietary OS's on new machines, or install them in place of Microsoft's preinstalled virus magnets.
Consumer choice aside, this is crazy. It sets a precedent that should make all corporations fear. Where does this end?
Back in the mid-90s, remember a court order that forced Microsoft to open the specifications of it's products?
You know, things like the Windows API, and the .doc .xls .ppt specs.
WHERE exactly did this court order went?
I am starting to think all this browser story is a distraction to divert the public from the real issue, which is the closed specs of the various standards Microsoft products use.
The problem is NOT with the products themselves. As a previous commenter said, not all software bundled with Windows has to have a free alternative.
The problem is with the closed specs, which close the doors to competition. For example, I personally don't have any problem with Office 2007, but I DO have a problem with doc's/xls's/ppt's closed specs, which make free implementations like OpenOffice have huge compatibility issues and be hard to make.
So, enough with the browser nonsense already, Internet explorer owns less than 60% of real market share, and it's about to go lower when HTML5 gets out of youtube's beta.
On the other hand, Office 2007 vs OpenOffice and Windows 7 vs Wine... Not so good.
PS: Good thing HTML and HTML5 are open standards. Die silverlight, die.
The almighty VOLE for years has crushed and stifled competition by realizing that most users will use what ever is the default. It is about time someone stood up to the mighty Vole and all the Vole apologist I applaud the EU to bad the US did not have the backbone.
Microsoft has every right to include their browser with the operating system. Consumer idiocy (choosing to use IE) is not Microsoft's fault or responsibility to mitigate. Anyone who believes otherwise is just as much of an idiot as those who use IE as their only browser.
I don't get it. Is this for f**king retards? Yeah I hate IE but there has never been anything stopping anyone from typing www.firefox.com and freely downloading. If I was MS I would tell the commission where to put it.
Not that I'm an M$ fan, or IE for that matter (I use a combination of Chrome and Firefox), but where does this end?
Will we reach a point where any of the software bundled with Windows has to include free alternatives? Stuff like Write or MS Paint have plenty of free, better featured alternatives..... will we end up having to choose these as well.... If so, it could start to get somewhat inconvenient.......!