Google, who less than a year a go didn’t have an office in D.C., seems to have picked up the ways of Washington pretty quickly. The New York Times reports today that Google has gone to Justice Department and EU antitrust authorities to complain that the search box in Microsoft’s new Internet Explorer 7 browser uses MSN as the default search engine.
Google has informed the European antitrust authorities of its worry that “Microsoft’s approach to setting search defaults in Internet Explorer 7 benefits Microsoft while taking away choice from users,” said Steve Langdon, a spokesman for Google. … “We have spoken to the Justice Department generally about our business and the importance of preserving competition in the search market,” Mr. Langdon said.
Wow. This is deja vu all over again. According to Microsoft, it is simple to change the default search engine if you want to. Also, last time I checked, Firefox, Safari, Opera, and the AOL browser all have Google as the default–and Google paid cash to the latter two for the privilege.
The Technology Liberation Front is the tech policy blog dedicated to keeping politicians' hands off the 'net and everything else related to technology.
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