[Am-info] Windows in trouble for any html use!

[Felmon Davis]

On Tue, 13 Jul 2004, John J. Urbaniak wrote:
>
> The reason that IE is entwined (metastasized?) in the Windows OS was a
> ploy by MS in its attack on Netscape.  The original (1993, I think)
> Antitrust settlement had a small clause in it that allowed Microsoft to
> offer solutions that were "integrated" into the OS.
>
> So, in order to crush Netscape and still continue to obfuscate the
> original Antitrust agreement, MS made the ridiculous claim that IE was
> "an integral Part" of Windows.  They took some dlls from the browser and
> some dlls from other parts of the OS and intertmixed them.  They claimed
> that IE was absolutely necessary for Windows to run.  Thus, they were
> able to destroy Netscape and escape the full wrath of the Antitrust
> Dept..  As later versions of Windows evolved, more and more dll
> shifting/sharing occurred.  It probably now is totally integrated into
> the OS and can't be removed.
>
> As I recall, some pressies at that time sort of chuckled, but I remember
> NO UNIFIED OUTRAGE from them.  They should have known better, and they
> should have warned the public.  But they didn't.  They kept parroting
> the "Consumers aren't really being harmed" mantra emanating from the
> Redmond charlatans.
>
> The Press failed us all.
>
> John

good summary and I wholly agree. one more point: the whole issue of 'harm
to the consumer' is difficult because consumers understandably tend to see
the surface, precisely that such-and-such improves 'ease of use', for
instance, but they are not schooled to see how changes to infrastructure
can impose at first unnoticed costs or harms. (maybe the most obvious and
by now clicheed example is dropping file extensions so things don't look
too geek.)

I suppose this is where a competent press can instruct and where there is
reasonable disagreement, stimulate healthy discussion.

Felmon