Holidays are over, surprises continue ...

Yesterday, the European Commission presented Microsoft with a preliminary opinion on the outcome of a complaint filed by Opera Software in late 2007 and supported by the European branch of the Free Software Foundation . According to the findings of the EC Antimonopoly Committee experts, Microsoft has violated the rule on the inadmissibility of abuse of a dominant market position (Article 82) since 1996 by including Internet Explorer in the Windows operating system. According to the EC, based on economic calculations and legal documents, this situation prevents healthy competition in the web browser market, slows down the introduction of innovative solutions and ultimately limits the choice of the end user. Under European law, Microsoft now has four weeks to prepare a response for the European Commission, and the company also has the right to request additional hearings on this issue. If Microsoft fails to convince the European Commission of the legality and legitimacy of its actions, it will be fined and a prescription will be prepared, according to which Microsoft will have to take certain actions to restore healthy competition in the browser market.

UPDATE
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Official Press Release of Opera Software

UPDATE

Here is an interesting article that slightly clarifies the situation with MS policy.
minimaltek.ru/?p=52

UPDATE

In connection with a lot of questions like “how to get on the Internet if there is no browser in the system”, please remember that IE was included in Windows 95 in 1995, before that the system was delivered without a browser. But they still went online;)