Some of the top browser makers around have issued a letter to the European Commission (EC) alleging that Microsoft gives the Edge browser an unfair advantage and should be subject to EU tech rules.
A letter seen by Reuters, sent by Vivaldi, Waterfox, and Wavebox, and supported by a group of web developers, also supports Opera’s move to take the EC to court over its decision to exclude Microsoft Edge from being subject to the Digital Markets Act (DMA).
As Edge comes pre-installed by default on Windows machines, users must navigate the Microsoft offering in order to download their browser of choice. The letter states that, “No platform independent browser can aspire to match Edge’s unparalleled distribution advantage on Windows. Edge is, moreover, the most important gateway for consumers to download an independent browser on Windows PCs.”
Theres like 2 or 3 commonly supported browser engines and the people who run them are complaining about unfair monopoly by a browser whose main purpose is to find another browser?
…and we all know what that advantage can do! (Covertly looks in IE’s direction)
I agree with going after the Edge Lords and making things more fair…but I’m guessing Chrome is the most used we browser by a long shot even on windows so the “No platform independent browser can aspire to match Edge’s unparalleled distribution advantage on Windows." part feels like users are comfortable stepping over Edge’s corpse to download chrome anyway.
It’s true, although chrome has gotten a significant boost from Google promoting it in search and every Google app (which I don’t know if they still do).
So chrome beats edge on users, but it’s also likely largely because of the unfair advantage it receives/received from that promotion. Those options are not really available to other browser developers (unless Amazon or meta also decided they want a browser for some reason).
Chrome got popular at introduction because it was much faster at loading and displaying websites. Sure, there was a marketing push by Google, but it succeeded on the products merits and not some unfair business advantage. It still is a great browser.
We do need antitrust protections but not always because consumers are getting a bad product. It’s more about the balance of power. Maybe their products are good now, or their business practices are fair now to other market actors, but you never know when that will change and then it’s too late. It’s like you need safeguards against autocracy also when they’re genuinely doing good job of running the country, because it’s never worth it in the long run when they inevitably start doing nasty shit
If users had a pop-up which allowed them to select more than just Edge or Chrome, other browsers may see an increase in users. Chrome is as much a default as Edge is in that way.
Again I’m in favor of choosing browsers on install, but lots of Chrome installs on Windows is not the same as being the default.
So much so that you even get this annoying popup from Edge when you try to download Chrome with Edge - which should be against the rules imo.
And try to reset edge as the default every single time Windows updates
Sorry, I phrased that poorly. It is the default alternative, most users don’t bother to look for anything else.
And Chrome also does pop-ups not unlike it when you visit Google websites on a non-Google browser.
neiiigh, its dead.
As Edge comes pre-installed by default on Windows machines, users must navigate the Microsoft offering in order to download their browser of choice.
What’s the actual alternative they want here? That users look up download URLs on other devices and download their browser of choice via command line using
cURLInvoke-WebRequest? That ISPs provide browser installers on USB sticks?Also, it’s not like MS is cornering the market on browser share here. Even with this “unfair advantage” they’ve only scraped together a 5% slice of browser usage.
I’d settle for them being force to offer links to alternatives when you first install Windows.
AND being forced to stop the bullshit every few updates where they force you through choosing options. One of which is “update to recommended browser settings for security?”… Which just defaults the system to use edge.
Basically either offer users a dialog box asking which browser they’d like to use or offer the browsers in the Microsoft Store.
And stop telling me that “The Internet is better using Edge”, Microsoft.
For a while when you installed Windows, the first time user setup gave you a choice of popular browsers and it handled the download and install.
Now Microsoft is actively trying to sabotage other browsers with popups and office apps bypassing the default browser setting.
When was that?
They were forced to as the result of an antitrust settlement in 2009, and then the “remedy” expired 5 years later and they ripped it out
https://www.pcworld.com/article/430914/microsoft-kills-eu-browser-choice-screen.html
Oh man, I had no idea this was a thing!
Require Microsoft to distribute competing browsers in the Microsoft store.
I can install Firefox, Chromium etc. from my distro’s package manager. I don’t open a web browser to install software. You still do that on Windows because Microsoft has a financial incentive to keep competitors out of their store, so their store sucks.
You can install Firefox from Windows’s package manager Winget with the command:
winget install -e --id Mozilla.FirefoxYou don’t have to use the Store or Edge.
And how many people in the world will use that? eight?
IMO edge coming pre-installed isn’t a big deal. But I’d like to be able to uninstall edge and not have Windows periodically try to trick me into setting edge as my default browser again.
ftfy
Yeah I personally use Brave but that’s what I found.
why go after microsoft.
Go after fucking google.
Chromium is the plague, not Edge.
It’s possible to go after both. M$ has some fucked up practices that trick the user into using edge that shouldn’t be okay
I went to the widgets pane on my w11 laptop once, clicked an article and to my horror, all of my data had been synced from chrome to edge, including passwords, history, open tabs, extensions, pretty much everything.
I even went as far as to report it to the ACCC (the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission) since I’ve never seen it from other browsers, and that I found it pervy the fact they did it without consent, although I doubt the ACCC would be enough to change this shitty practice, and others like it.
They’re not even trying to trick the user anymore, they’re forcing them.
Isn’t Edge also chromium?
Yes, and its a nasty story thats all unofficial cause no one is ever gonna go on the record, at least not for another 10-20 years when it comes out in someones book…
but the short of it is, Edge had its own browser engine, but google kept making changes to youtube and other google sites that broke Edges performance and made it run like dogshit, while leaving chromium based browsers alone.
after many instances of sabotage > microsoft workaround > google sabotage> microsoft workaround. Microsoft finally gave up and remade Edge as a chromium based browser.
So Google establishing a now industry standard of evergreen versioning so that they could iterate relatively quickly on features, rather than have to maintain compatibility with years old versions, and iterating quickly on their own major websites - is a bad thing?
Right.
Yeah, let’s go back to having to maintain terrible legacy browsers that behaved completely differently for the rest of time.
ah yes, the google white knights. here to completely misconstrue the argument to make everyone but google the bad guy.
because thats what a trillion dollar company that threatens to seize control of the internet needs.
Rofl. So let’s white wash the browser history before chrome, then. Back when IE reigned supreme. You must either be too young or not in the industry to champion that.
On “features” they would like to see. Most of the time features that make it difficult to block tracking and keep their advertising business going. The web is all about communication standards between different programs and this includes the joint adoption of new standards and respect for the existing standards.
And Google established a lot of the standards that were both open and long living.
Yeah, Google has strayed far from the “Do no evil” philosophy in the last decade. But this rewriting of history to praise IE and demonfy Chrome from that era is ridiculous.
This is about EdgeHTML not IE
Because we should wipe away 2 decades of history and pretend the next thing is flawless on release?
Edge came in with a freight train of baggage, and didn’t make it. It’s absurd to frame this otherwise.
It’s like the mid 90s all over again. Let’s see if anything happens this time.
Please submit a second copy of that letter, but replace Windows with Android, PC with Mobile, Microsoft with Google, and Edge with Chrome.
Please submit a third copy of that letter, but replace Windows with iOS, PC with iPhone, Microsoft with Apple, and Edge with Safari.
I mean that already happened
Don’t you tell me what I am isn’t
I guess it could be said that Edge has an unfair…edge?
Take your upvote and gtfo. Lol
It was an edgy comment.
Yikes, all these browser-based puns are a bit much for this little internet explorer. I’m out.
I think youre just going to have to Brave through it.
Not to forget than when using bing, if you look for words like Firefox or Chrome, you get a large banner saying to use Edge instead. Super shady stuff
Is this blocked by ublock origin coz I’ve never gotten that at all on Firefox.
It’s possible, I use Firefox and uBO as well on my main PC, but I remember seeing it when installing Firefox on my windows partition
This doesn’t make that behavior any less scummy, but have you tried using any Google website on a browser that isn’t chrome?
Not to mention that Microsoft forces you to use a Microsoft account when you create your account on your home computer which is then automatically logged in to edge and *bing so that they can track and quantize more of every single thing you do on the internet to monetize you
No it doesn’t. I just reinstalled Windows 11 pro and I’m running without a Microsoft account.
Edit: I was unfamiliar with how different that is from the home experience. I’m still using Windows 7 keys to install Windows 11 so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ consider me out of the loop.
Home versions, which most home users have, force the use of MS accounts. They’ve patched the bypass tricks that people used before.
Ah. Did not realize this was an issue with home. I can not say I experienced that. Hell, I still use Windows 7 pro keys to activate Windows 11.
Do you know if you could use audit mode to bypass OOBE and get around it? Simply curious.
Ah. I was unfamiliar with the home version.
I do a workaround when installing/setting up Windows on others PCs. Use my dummy MS account -> create local user -> change to admin -> delete out the MS account. Boom, then only the local account is on the PC.
I’m willing to bet you’re still ending up in their database. Unless you are using some sort of VPN to first obfuscate your location and then a brand new account that has not been used before, then there’s going to be some record of similarity.
When I’m installing Windows 10 or 11, I use the Rufus installer to create a pre-built admin account that I can sign in with.
That’s a good point, and a good idea about modifying the installer. I will give this a shot next time I have to do a reinstall. Thanks!
Well, it is impossible to install W11 Pro without MS account for normal person. Sure tech people can do it after couple seconds of web search, but your average PC user? Nope. No way.
Oh yeah?
Open edge and search for something. Check in the top right corner and tell me you’re not signed into some sort of pseudo-created Microsoft account.
You win.
A letter seen by Reuters, sent by Vivaldi, Waterfox, and Wavebox, and supported by a group of web developers, also supports Opera’s move to take the EC to court over its decision to exclude Microsoft Edge from being subject to the Digital Markets Act (DMA).
OK…
Shouldn’t they be fighting Chrome, more than anything? Surely there’s a legal avenue for that, though I guess there’s a risk of getting deprioritized by Google and basically disappearing.
Yeah they can’t fight Chrome, they are Chrome.
They’re suing because Microsoft got an exclusion from the Digital Markets Act. Google did not.
Suing? It’s just a letter
Windows is absolutely abusing their position as the dominant OS to push their other products. The number of “no don’t do that” messages and pop ups when trying to install chrome on a windows computer is clearly anti-competitive, and the only reason microsoft has been getting away with it is because Edge/etc hasn’t achieved enough market share.
Yup. Teams ignores default browser and opens URLs in Edge. I have to right click copy and open in Firefox. I refuse to be forced to use Edge
There’s a setting Teams, under “Files and Links” where you can change it from Edge to Default Browser. Scummy that it works that way, but you can work around it at least (for now anyway).
This isn’t exactly true. It just has its own override. If you go into Settings and go to the ‘Files and Links’ section, then ‘Links open preference’ you can toggle it from Edge to Default Browser.
Good to know. Thanks. Still a shady thing to do. Why have it ignore the global setting?
That’s why I called it an override. There are only two options in the drop down. Edge and Default Browser. They built an option to override the system default. MS will do everything they can think of to get you onto Edge.
Hasn’t it been shown that most people use Chrome despite Edge’s “unfair advantage”?
Long last effect from us nerds telling everyone to stop using IE, because Google wasn’t a hotplate covered in wet shit at the time.
