Mastodawn

Microsoft Edge gets "unfair advantage", browser makers claim

https://lemm.ee/post/44032674

Microsoft Edge gets "unfair advantage", browser makers claim - lemm.ee

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.”

Stovetop Oct 4, 2024

I guess it could be said that Edge has an unfair…edge?

one_knight_scripting Oct 4, 2024

Take your upvote and gtfo. Lol

FenrirIII Oct 4, 2024

It was an edgy comment.

essteeyou Oct 4, 2024

Yikes, all these browser-based puns are a bit much for this little internet explorer. I’m out.

SynopsisTantilize Oct 4, 2024

I think youre just going to have to Brave through it.

rmuk Oct 6, 2024

Netscape.

AbidanYre Oct 4, 2024

It’s like the mid 90s all over again. Let’s see if anything happens this time.

rottingleaf Oct 5, 2024

I want that Web to die, die, die.

Gemini is a step in the right direction, but the new Web should be both non-extensible by design and transparently allow distributed storage, distributed untrusted computation, and separation of the concepts of a site and a machine that serves it. In other words, serverless, where websites and services and even web applications are identified cryptographically, and anybody can contribute their computing power (or storage) to a site\service\application, out of desire to help or for money. With smart contracts, ghost keys and other buzzwords I have no real idea about.

And fuck Microsoft.

Thomas Oct 4, 2024

Please submit a second copy of that letter, but replace Windows with Android, PC with Mobile, Microsoft with Google, and Edge with Chrome.

funkajunk Oct 4, 2024

Please submit a third copy of that letter, but replace Windows with iOS, PC with iPhone, Microsoft with Apple, and Edge with Safari.

morrowind Oct 4, 2024

I mean that already happened

funkajunk Oct 4, 2024

Don’t you tell me what I am isn’t

rmuk Oct 6, 2024

Can you raise both your arms above your head? Do you smell burnt toast?

funkajunk Oct 6, 2024

🔥🍞

PunchingWood Oct 4, 2024

I thought we’ve already been through this before?

I vaguely remember get the option which browser to use during an install before.

Feels like they need to stop nitpicking about this stuff. I barely know anyone that even uses Edge, it’s almost like it just functions as a downloader for Chrome or anything else.

At what point are they gonna stop? Until Windows comes without any bvrowsers at all and we’ll have to store copies of installers on USBs and postmail Google if we want a copy of Chrome.exe?

ElectricMachman Oct 4, 2024

That was a Windows 7 thing - it used to be hosted at browserchoice.eu but that’s long gone now.

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/BrowserChoice.eu

PunchingWood Oct 4, 2024

I could’ve sworn I’ve seen something like this in a W10 or W11 installation not even that long ago though.

It’s not something I imagine EU would just forget about whenever a new OS dropped.

StrongHorseWeakNeigh Oct 4, 2024

I mean I really don’t think it’s that big of deal. Edge only makes up 5% of market share, so it’s obviously not helping them that much.

PhobosAnomaly Oct 4, 2024

That’s not the problematic metric though. It’s the 70-80% (link) install base of the Windows OS on desktop computers that Edge is installed with that’s the basis of the anti-competitive allegation.

The fact that it still only takes 5% of the browser usage is more of a happy accident.

Desktop Operating System Market Share Worldwide | Statcounter Global Stats

This graph shows the market share of desktop operating systems worldwide based on over 5 billion monthly page views.

StatCounter Global Stats

StrongHorseWeakNeigh Oct 4, 2024

That makes sense but also they clearly need any edge they can get. Maybe they should even make it more difficult to install other browsers. Like artificially lowering the search results of other browsers. Maybe they could get 6% market share that way.

brucethemoose Oct 4, 2024

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.

NaibofTabr Oct 4, 2024

Yeah they can’t fight Chrome, they are Chrome.

scutiger Oct 4, 2024

They’re suing because Microsoft got an exclusion from the Digital Markets Act. Google did not.

morrowind Oct 4, 2024

Suing? It’s just a letter

celsiustimeline Oct 4, 2024

Hasn’t it been shown that most people use Chrome despite Edge’s “unfair advantage”?

chingadera Oct 4, 2024

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.

Llamatron Oct 4, 2024

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

JordanZ Oct 4, 2024

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.

Llamatron Oct 4, 2024

Good to know. Thanks. Still a shady thing to do. Why have it ignore the global setting?

JordanZ Oct 4, 2024

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.

JWBananas Oct 5, 2024

Teams is built on Edge webview. It’s Microsoft’s lighter-weight version of Electron.

UnpledgedCatnapTipper Oct 4, 2024

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).

Pasta Dental Oct 4, 2024

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

bizarroland Oct 4, 2024

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 being so that they can track and quantize more of every single thing you do on the internet to monetize you

one_knight_scripting Oct 4, 2024

No it doesn’t. I just reinstalled Windows 11 pro and I’m running without a Microsoft account.

scutiger Oct 4, 2024

Home versions, which most home users have, force the use of MS accounts. They’ve patched the bypass tricks that people used before.

horrorslice Oct 4, 2024

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.

bizarroland Oct 4, 2024

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 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.

horrorslice Oct 4, 2024

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!

one_knight_scripting Oct 4, 2024

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.

scutiger Oct 6, 2024

Apparently they disabled that bypass recently.

I don’t know if installing Windows 10 and then upgrading can get around this though.

one_knight_scripting Oct 4, 2024

Ah. I was unfamiliar with the home version.

kurcatovium Oct 4, 2024

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.

bizarroland Oct 4, 2024

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.

one_knight_scripting Oct 4, 2024

You win.

Aedis Oct 4, 2024

This doesn’t make that behavior any less scummy, but have you tried using any Google website on a browser that isn’t chrome?

pycorax Oct 5, 2024

Is this blocked by ublock origin coz I’ve never gotten that at all on Firefox.

Pasta Dental Oct 5, 2024

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

Fubarberry Oct 4, 2024

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.

A_Random_Idiot Oct 4, 2024

why go after microsoft.

Go after fucking google.

Chromium is the plague, not Edge.

Halosheep Oct 4, 2024

Isn’t Edge also chromium?

A_Random_Idiot Oct 4, 2024

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.

Wrench Oct 4, 2024

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.

h4lf8yte Oct 4, 2024

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.

Wrench Oct 5, 2024

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.

h4lf8yte Oct 5, 2024

This is not about Internetexplorer this is about EdgeHTML.

Wrench Oct 5, 2024

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.

A_Random_Idiot Oct 4, 2024

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.

Wrench Oct 5, 2024

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.

A_Random_Idiot Oct 5, 2024

Dude. Seriously. Genuinely.

Are you on drugs?

Or are you the victim of a mental derangement?

Because we need an explanation for this complete divorce from reality you seem to be suffering from.