Opera brings action against M$ in Europe

Opera has registered a complaint against Microsoft with the European Commission, claiming Redmond illegally ties IE to Windows and is "hindering interoperability by not following accepted Web standards," Reuters reported.

"By tying its Internet Explorer product to its monopoly Windows operating system and refusing to faithfully implement industry accepted open standards, Microsoft deprives consumers of a real choice in Internet browsers," ECIS lawyer Thomas Vinje said in the statement.

Microsoft said the inclusion of IE is a benefit to users, who apparently like non-standards-compliant, insecure browsers.

Does this all seem so very familiar? After 10 years of similar actions in the U.S., have the courts accomplished anything that open source software and the market could not? How to explain the success of Firefox and the absence of Opera in US browser logs?

Brad Linder at Download Squad says:

As for the supporting standards bit, are you serious? Opera's argument is basically that Microsoft is breaking the web because many web developers design pages to render properly in IE without paying much attention to competing browsers like Firefox or Opera. But should the European Commission or any regulatory agency be issuing rulings about what version of CSS, XHTML, JavaScript and other software developers should be supporting?

Tim Faulkner writes on Valley Wag that the move "smells like a publicity stunt meant to remind people Opera still exists. ... Maybe Opera can successfully sue itself into getting some users, and keep Microsoft spending money on lawyers instead of coders."