The more things change, the more they stay the same. Why does it take us so long to (re)learn this? Microsoft is, and has been, a monopoly. That it has used that monopoly to damage competitors and consumers isn’t in question. Only the remedy for that damage remains to be decided.
So, smart money would bet heavily on Microsoft not doing anything else to piss off the United States government, the state attorneys general, competitors, or consumers. The smart money would be wrong. Virtually everything the company has done since Judge Jackson’s ruling has managed to piss off everyone everywhere.
Microsoft’s latest gambit is something called Smart Tags. Introduced in Microsoft Office XP, the technology is also included in current beta versions of Internet Explorer 6.0, which will be included in Windows XP, scheduled for release 25 October. Smart Tags add links to web pages—presumably links to Microsoft-controlled pages—without the knowledge or control of the original page’s author.
That’s right, you no longer have editorial control over your own web pages. In this document, for instance, I mindfully didn’t link to the Microsoft website in any of my uses of the company name. Never mind, Smart Tags will “helpfully” fill in those “missing” references, supplying links to the company’s (or its partners’) websites. Even more, Microsoft’s Smart Tags will provide links from any other passages as well. I can only begin to imagine the strange hell to which they’d link “Judge Jackson,” for example. Deciding whether or not to provide links, and how and where these links appear is clearly part of the editorial process. Microsoft has just placed itself in the middle of that process, uninvited and unwelcome.
Commerce trumps freedom of expression every time.
The Smart Tags appear in the browser as purple squiggly lines underneath the automatically linked terms.
How much did you spend on your website? Write it off, because Microsoft just hijacked it.
CNET broke the story, followed a day later by a Walt Mossberg piece in the Wall Street Journal, including the most succinct quote I’ve found: “In effect, Microsoft will be able, through the browser, to re-edit anybody’s site, without the owner’s knowledge or permission, in a way that tempts users to leave and go to a Microsoft-chosen site—whether or not that site offers better information.” Slashdot had amusing running commentary, and Dave Winer had a pretty clear-headed analysis.
0 responses. Comments closed for this article.