rosoft threatened manufacturers seeking to remove its Explorer browser with a potentially lethal blow - termination of the license for Windows, the operating system that runs almost all personal computers in the world today. In fact Microsoft began proceedings for just such a penalty against Compaq, the world's leading computer maker. Compaq eventually canceled plans to remove Internet Explorer from its Presario computers, but only after intense pressure from Microsoft.(Los Angeles Times 1)In 1995 U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno asked a U.S. District Court in Washington, DC, to place a $1,000,000 dollar a day toll until Microsoft agrees to stop demanding that PC makers license Internet Explorer when they license Windows 95. Reno announced the Department of Justice's antitrust action, and she cited a 1995 consent decree according to which Microsoft agreed not to engage in this type of licensing practices.Microsoft then announced that its web browser would be fully integrated into the next version of its operating systems product line, which was released in 1998. This scheme for constricting consumer choice was to establish Internet Explorer as the "default browser" on all new copies of Windows. A competing web browser can be purchased, installed and selected by the user as a substitute "default browser," but this exercise in personal preference requires additional expense and a lot of extra trouble. In any other industry, selling products at a loss for the purpose of driving another company out of business would be instantly disallowed as "dumping." Microsoft was amazingly candid about the consumer-defeating designs of its Internet Explorer scheme. Steve Ballmer, Microsoft's vice president of sales said, "We're giving away a pretty good browser as part of the operating system. How long can they survive selling it?”(Kaphing 6)Throwing in an additional barrier between the customer and their personal preferences, Microsof...
