Despite Microsoft's announcement Wednesday that it's now allowing computer manufacturers to "turn off" the Internet Explorer icons in new computers that ship with Windows, it seems unlikely that the Windows desktop will be morphing into a substantially more level playing field any time soon.
Computer manufacturers used words like "exciting" and "pleased" to describe their newfound freedoms, but they declined to comment specifically on what this would mean for their customers.
The computer manufacturers' non-specific responses lent credence to the theory -- being proffered by folks all over the Internet at this very moment -- that Microsoft's announcement was mostly an empty bit of PR puffery.
Kathy McKiernan, a spokeswoman for AOL-Time Warner, said Microsoft wasn't going nearly as far as it needed to in making its operating system truly flexible.
For starters, this announcement only affects Microsoft's "bundling" of its Internet Explorer Web browser. That's the bundle that caused the Feds to cry antitrust, but it's a pretty old issue now. For AOL, what's important is Microsoft's "bolting of Passport, Media Player and Messenger to Windows XP," McKiernan said.
Passport is Microsoft's "universal sign-in" service that's central to its .Net initiative and its MSN Internet provider, which competes directly with AOL.
Microsoft's MSN Messenger is an instant-messaging application whose largest competitor is AOL's Instant Messenger. And the Windows Media Player is a video and audio player that rivals audio players from RealNetworks, which is closely allied with AOL, as well as media players made by software companies owned by AOL.
So does this make any difference at all for Joe Q. Harddrive's brand-new Windows XP computer?
"From my perspective, it does not," said Dell spokesman Tom Kehoe. "We've always sought to deliver the best options to our customers, and this allows us to do that."
He added that there's a lot of misinformation about OEM licenses in general, suggesting that the company didn't really feel that Microsoft had been tying its hands.
David Albritton, a spokesman for Compaq said, "We are excited that this offers us greater flexibility."
But he didn't answer the more pressing question: Is Compaq considering offering an Explorer-free version of its computers?
"No decisions have been made," Albritton said, echoing the reaction of other manufacturers.
Clearly, it's important to listen as much to who is saying what as to what they are saying. Some computer manufacturers may be hesitant to bite the hand that feeds them software.
AOL isn't a computer manufacturer, but it is a direct competitor in a number of areas. For instance, AOL owns Netscape, which makes Navigator, the browser that used to be No. 1 until bundling came along -- so it's easy to see why McKiernan thinks Microsoft's continued bundling of all these apps in XP is a tad bad.
Or, as Tom Miller, Iowa's attorney general who's leading the multi-state effort to break up Microsoft, said in a statement, "Over the years we have seen a pattern where a defendant does something wrong or illegal, achieves its objective, and then says it won't do the same thing again when it's really too late to make a difference. That seems to be the situation here. Much of the Microsoft announcement deals with the browser -- but the browser war is over. Microsoft has won."
He added, too, that it was telling that Microsoft is choosing to make this announce on the eve of XP's release: "The Microsoft statement does make clear one thing we have argued for some time now -- that XP issues are a significant element to be considered in our case."
Microsoft, of course, was not without its own cheerleaders on Wednesday. In addition to the very pleased computer manufacturers, there were statements from several "pro-innovation" groups saying, essentially, that Microsoft's generous gesture should be returned by an equally generous offer from the government.
Jonathan Zuck, a spokesman for the Association for Competitive Technology, said in a statement, "Microsoft's voluntary announcement shows they are serious about resolving their legal issues."
But he added that the company should "stand firm" on its other "innovations" -- presumably referring to such applications as Media Player and Messenger, which on Tuesday finally recovered from a weeklong mess of trouble.
