Opera Are Behind The Times
As has been widely reported, Opera have filed a complaint against Microsoft with the European Commission. Their argument raises issues similar to those cited in the late 1990s which led to the United States vs Microsoft civil action. Opera have complained that Microsoft unfairly tie their web browser Internet Explorer into the Windows operating system, taking advantage of Windows’ dominant market position. They further argue that Microsoft fail to support W3C web standards with Internet Explorer. But frankly the timing of the suit is wierd, and I think Opera are way off base in their accusations.
- Web browsing is integral to any operating system.
Far more so than in 1998, when the competition between Netscape and Internet Explorer reared its head, the internet is an integral part of everyday life. More importantly it’s an integral part of using a computer - and therefore an integral part of any operating system. Utilising the web is part of the essential uses of a computer, and therefore surely it’s entirely legitimate for it to be part of an operating system. Apple do exactly the same thing as Microsoft, bundling their Safari browser with Mac OS, and they do so for the same reasons - in 2007 a web browser is integral to an operating system. I’d argue that Microsoft would be failing to provide a full service operating system if they didn’t bundle a web browser, and obviously they’re going to bundle their own. - What dominant market position?
Opera may claim that Microsoft’s actions make it impossible for them to compete, but that doesn’t seem to be stopping Mozilla Firefox. As of September 2007 Firefox is the most popular single browser in use. While combined versions of Internet Explorer 6 & 7 still make up just over 50% of the total market, their advantage is limited and under pressure, and the take-up of Internet Explorer 7 despite its inclusion in the automatic updates for Windows XP, and bundling with Vista, has been limited. Opera have less than 2% of the market share, and that’s barely changed for five years. Yet Firefox (and previously simply the Mozilla browser) has jumped from 3% of share to 36% of share in that period. Somehow I don’t think Opera’s inability to compete is simply due to Microsoft’s unfair practices. - What standards?
Opera cite Microsoft for failing to adhere to web accessibility standards. But there are no binding standards, and even the most generally accepted standards published by W3C are almost eight years old - a problem I highlighted on Friday. Even given this lack of a genuine legally binding standard, the Opera accusation would have had far greater weight if they had brought it up towards the end of Internet Explorer 6’s lifespan, at a time when Microsoft had done little to support their browser for a number of years. There were genuine accessibility issues with IE6 at that point, but IE7 resolves many of those and while it’s not perfect it glitches no worse than any other browser.
I’ve no real sympathy with Opera’s claims. And their argument that Microsoft should be forced to bundle competitor browsers with Windows seems to me an obvious ploy. Who’s going to gain most from such a measure? That’d be the browser that has failed to make any significant improvement in share under market conditions in the last five years…Opera. The browser market is increasingly competitive, and while there’s nothing wrong with Opera as a browser, it’s consistently lost the competitive battle. Bringing a lawsuit against Microsoft in the hope that they’ll get European Union backing to aid their market share is an underhand way to resolve that failure.
December 17th, 2007 at 9:51 am
I’m afraid you’re missing the point of the complaint.
1) It could only be launched now, due to MS losing their appeal against the EC case. Now that that issue is resolved, Opera has some leverage to make a difference. They have been arguing this point for many years, as have supporters of other browsers.
2) Yes, the standards are 8 years old. And MS still have failed to support them, despite being involved in their development.
3) No-one is saying that MS can’t bundle a browser - but that if they are bundling a browser, they shouldn’t be doing it in a way that breaks the web and locks websites into only supporting their browser.
4) The W3Schools stats are for that site only, they are heavily web-developer-oriented. That in itself should prove Opera’s point - if 50% of web developers are actively using standards-based technology but only 20% of end-users are, then a lot of people are stuck using a platform that web developers wouldn’t recommend.
5) Finally, Opera is doing just fine, always has. They are still expanding, have cash in the bank, and are building up even more high-profile clients.
December 17th, 2007 at 11:44 am
The standards based argument is something of a fallacious one though, because while W3C guidelines are widely enough accepted they remain nothing more than that - guidelines. They aren’t legally binding in any way, and so I don’t see how Opera can legitimately argue that MS are in some way acting unfairly in failing to support them. Some disability/accessibility legislation references guidlines from W3C standards but I’m not aware of any that actually use them word for word, and legislation such as the UK Disability Discrimination Act merely states that “best efforts” need to be made to ensure accessibility, which can arguably be justified just by providing a text only version of a website.
I also don’t think that there’s such a huge issue in terms of IE7’s accessibility support as is claimed. Certainly I don’t consider it to be materially worse than other available browsers, whereas that would have been a far more powerful argument when Windows was still being bundled with IE6 and Microsoft had failed to support any development for several years. That isn’t the case now, so even if the case can only be launched now due to various legal reasons, it remains outdated.
Reasonable point on the W3Schools stats being skewed in favour of Firefox. Though I’d argue that people aren’t “stuck” using a platform that developers wouldn’t recommend, given the free availability of browsers from Firefox to Konqueror, all under a Windows platform.
I’m sure Opera are doing fine in a business sense, but then I also imagine that their business model at this stage is built to take into account their minimal share in the overall browser market. In terms of market penetration for their browser though, they’ve demonstrated no significant change in take up either by developers (based on W3Schools stats) or wider public usage.