Microsoft's latest in its saga with the EU's Competition Commission
In response to the EU’s concerns about Microsoft’s bundling of Internet Explorer in Windows, Microsoft has offered to provide a “browser ballot” with the newest version of its operating system software.
Interesting enough, even without a ballot, Firefox has been making progress in the U.S. and Europe without any help from Microsoft (or the EU Commission). According to https://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2009/03/firefox-3-marketshare-exceeds-internet-explorer-7-in-europe.ars, use of Firefox 3.0 surpassed IE 7 in Europe earlier this year.
For what its worth, bundling does not guarantee success of a product. It certainly didn’t help Microsoft Money against Quicken! However, the EU seems to feel differently, so maybe the browser ballot (aren’t browsers free, anyway?) will put this particular matter to rest, at least for a while. It’s definitely a different approach than offering Windows to Europeans without any browser.
