Microsoft’s Browser Ballot: A Look Back (Premium)

If Google’s Android web browser concession seems familiar, that’s because Microsoft did the same thing a decade ago. Here’s a look back at Microsoft’s browser ballot screen, which was later renamed to Browser Choice.

It all began with a public statement from Microsoft general counsel Brad Smith, on July 24, 2009.

“As the European Commission has just announced in a statement, Microsoft has made a new proposal in an effort to address competition law issues related to Internet Explorer and interoperability,” the statement reads. “Under our new proposal, among other things, European consumers who buy a new Windows PC with Internet Explorer set as their default browser would be shown a ‘ballot screen’ from which they could, if they wished, easily install competing browsers from the Web.  If this proposal is ultimately accepted, Microsoft will ship Windows in Europe with the full functionality available in the rest of the world.  As requested by the Commission, we will be publishing our proposal in full here on our web site as soon as possible.”

The letter goes on to describe Microsoft’s other efforts to adhere to the demands of the European Commission. This included creating so-called “E versions of Windows 7” which the software giant believed made it conform to EU law. And “a public undertaking designed to promote interoperability between third party products and a number of Microsoft products, including Windows, Windows Server, Office, Exchange, and SharePoint,” which seems rather quaint today; a big part of the EU complaint concerned Microsoft’s lack of interoperability documentation. Microsoft was also under fire for its proprietary Office document formats, another quaint vestige of the past now.

The EU eventually did agree to the Browser Choice interface and to a revised version of Microsoft’s proposal to create special versions of Windows 7, which it would sell alongside the normal versions in the EU. (Few consumers ever choose the special versions, which were called the N editions and cut out some key media player functionality.) And that triggered the following editorial by me, presented here with the usual annotations.

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The Fat Lady Sings: Microsoft Caves ... to Opera?!
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It’s important to remember how much the world has changed since the decade between 1998 and 2009, when Microsoft belligerently responded to regulators and courts in both the United States and the EU. At the start of this time period, Microsoft was still the singular dominan...