Microsoft Agrees to Windows 7 Browser Ballot, Exclusive Details Revealed

From DailyTech: Microsoft has long offered one -- and only one -- browser with its market-leading Windows operating system -- Internet Explorer. That inside connection helped it gain over 80 percent of the market at one time, though its lead has now slipped to just below 60 percent of the total browser marketshare. Now, thanks to a 2007 complaint from third-party browser maker Opera and a subsequent investigation by the European Commission (the branch of the European Union that handles business law), that artificial advantage may finally be at an end.

The European Union ruled it was anticompetitive for Microsoft to release Windows 7 without rival browsers to Internet Explorer, which came installed by default. Initially Microsoft opted to release Windows 7 in the EU without IE 8. However, it now has come around and has made a proposal along the lines of what Opera had originally suggested -- a browser balloting scheme.

DailyTech spoke with Opera's Chief Technical Officer Håkon Wium Lie, the man who first proposed the CSS web standard and a pivotal figure at the browser company, about the development. Mr. Lie expressed happiness that his company's browser might finally get a chance to come directly to users with Windows. He states, "This is good news, we think, that Microsoft put this proposal forward. This will give users access to more browsers. It's good news for users. It's good news for browser makers. And it's good news for web standards."

According to Mr. Lie the currently proposal from Microsoft is to present users a ballot screen during Windows 7 installation. Any browser maker with over 0.5 percent Windows browsing marketshare would be eligible to be on the screen, with a maximum of 10 allowed options. This would mean that Opera, Mozilla's Firefox, Google's Chrome, and Apple's Safari would likely be the browsers presented.

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