Opera has filed a complaint with the European Commission to try and stop Internet Explorer from being supplied with Windows. This is to give a better choice for end users, most of whom stick with IE because it's there and works.

The complaint refers to the tendency of Microsoft to use a tactic called "Embrace, Extend and Extinguish". The idea is to adopt a standard and then expand it in such a way that it then is restricted to Windows.

It's happened in a number of areas. Microsoft used to include a programming language in Visual Studio called J++. This was an extended version of Java, missing out the big advantage of Java, which working on lots of different operating systems. It got canned some years ago and Microsoft replaced it with C# when the .NET Framework came out.

In web terms, ActiveX is probably the biggest headache for Opera as it restricts some sites to IE only. Although speaking from a casual web designers point of view there have been other problems where IE handles formatting differently from everybody else.

One problem I have with this kind of argument is that, however dominant Microsoft is, should this not be applied equally across all operating systems. Surely it is just as much an abuse for Apple to include Safari with Mac OS X? Or for Firefox to be supplied with Linux. Although having said that Linux installations tend to come with several browsers not just Firefox.

Maybe the Linux model is the way forward. Manufacturers could supply computers with IE, Firefox and Opera and let people make their own choice. How do you decide what order to list them in?

How about alphabetical and see who creates the Aardvark browser first.