12 June 2009 | Author: O. Gaywood Media Optimiser

Microsoft: Windows 7 to be released without a web browser

Microsoft has come under further criticism from European Union regulators over the bundling of Internet Explorer with Windows.

However, after being fined around £765m in January 2008 for anti-competitive behaviour regarding the inclusion of their web browser and media player with Windows, Microsoft is now coming under fire for agreeing to release Windows 7 in Europe without any form of web browser. The company claims that anyone who wants to install the latest version of Internet Explorer will be able to do so quickly and easily.

This approach hasn't satisfied the European Commission who says they would prefer that Microsoft include a variety of browsers - that is, that they include their competitors' products - ''not that Windows would be supplied without a browser at all.''

PC makers who want to preload a browser on a computer with Windows 7 will need to get a separate licensing deal with the browser maker while customers who want to a copy of the browser will need to get it by either FTTP or CD.

While this doesn't fit with the EC's best practise it also hasn't much impressed Opera, the company who filed the anti-trust case against Microsoft. Opera - who claims it will reinvent the web when its new browser comes out on June 16 - has said it would prefer a ballot system when users go online for the first time allowing them to choose the browser they'd most like to use.

Opera's chief technology officer, Hakon Wium Lie, said: "We note with interest that Microsoft now seems capable of separating IE from Windows. However, we do not believe that Microsoft's move will restore competition for desktop browsers. Most users get their operating systems from the OEM channel and Microsoft will recommend that OEMs pre-install IE8. As such, users are unlikely to be given a genuine choice of browsers."

Windows 7 is due to be released worldwide on 22 October.

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