eWeek is reporting that Microsoft won’t build desktop search into Windows. Why not?
“Speaking on a panel on search technology at the Harvard Business School’s Cyberposium, Mark Kroese, general manager of information services and merchant platform product marketing for MSN, said the federal antitrust battle Microsoft waged with the government has made the company think twice about what technologies it can add to the operating system.
“Working at Microsoft today vs. five years ago is different,” Kroese said. “If anyone thinks the antitrust case hasn’t slowed us down, you’re wrong. If I want to meet with a products manager for Windows there needs to be three lawyers in the room. We have to be so careful, we err on the side of caution. We are on such a fine line of conduct.”
Indeed, while including desktop search in Windows might seem like a logical step to many, “there’s no immediate plan to do that as far as I know,” Kroese said. “That would have to be a Bill G. [Microsoft chairman and chief software architect Bill Gates] and the lawyers’ decision.”