Opera seeks a free lunch from Microsoft
PC World – Opera Seeks Tougher Remedy in Microsoft Case: “Opera argues that because each version of Windows comes with only IE preinstalled, Microsoft has an unfair advantage against rivals like Opera and Firefox.”
Unfair advantage? Has Europe every heard of the free enterprise system? Why should a developer of an operating system and browser have to preinstall someone else’s browser on their own system? Your lucky you even get to run your browser on their operating code. You people just want a free lunch legislated by government. You certainly are free to develop your own operating system and put your own preinstalled browser on it. Quit whining and asking big brother to take money from Microsoft to give to your company. Make clearly superior products and people will use it.
No thanks necessary. Just send me a big check (-:
Date posted: Saturday, December 15th, 2007 10:23 am | Under category: Big Brother/Nanny State, The greedy, dumb
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I’ve been using Opera for years now and I love it. It’s one of my favorite software programs. I think Opera is superior to Internet Explorer in many ways. It is very fast and responsive, highly customizable, free, stable and doesn’t take much space. The latest version of Internet Explorer has improved a lot but in my opinion it can’t beat Opera’s features that I’m so used to. I use IExplorer mainly for writing and reading my emails online or Windows Update.
Nevertheless, I don’t think I agree with Opera on this one. I think Microsoft has the right to bundle Internet Explorer with Windows as well as a media player. After all, MacOS does it and those ‘open source’ operating systems like Linux too. Besides, I think that there will always be something as a software monopoly when it comes to computer Operating Systems.
This article seems to imply that Opera is demanding Microsoft not to bundle Internet Explorer with Windows anymore. I didn’t have the impression from some other article I read that this is what Opera wants. I thought rather they were simply complaining that Microsoft ties certain functions (like Windows Update) to IExplorer so people can’t switch fully to just one browser, as well as that they do not comply with web standards.
Whatever the case, I don’t agree with all those attempts to force MS to change its operating system. I don’t use Windows Media Player for a number of reasons so I don’t need it, but at the same time I’m not bothered by the fact that it’s included in Windows. I mean, that’s why they call software like Microsoft Windows ‘operating systems.’ There are so many other OSs out there – both closed sourced commercial ones like Windows and free open sourced ones like Linux – and they all come with a browser, an email program and a media player. Heck, some operating systems like SuSE Linux that you can download for free come with a DVD full of software that hardly anyone uses and it includes at least two browsers and all sorts of audio and video players as well as numerous image manipulation programs! Of course they’ll say that they give people the freedom to choose whatever they want ‘unlike Microsoft.’
Well, the fact that I can download Opera and listen to music and watch videos without ever having to use Windows Media Player means that I have the freedom to use any alternative I want. I think of you have a commercial and privately owned operating system, you have the right to develop it in whatever way you want it. I did wish that I were able to use only Opera though. So I think there’s some truth in their complaint. Still, things work fine for me this way and Internet Explorer is improving so I don’t care.
By the way, why haven’t they sued Apple for its iPod monopoly? :O
Not that I have anything against Apple, but it shows just how hypocritical the EU is.