Was Microsoft preventing people from installing firefox on their PCs? Am I misremembering this era?

It was Netscape at the time, and yes. Yes, they were.

They weren't preventing you from installing Netscape. They were bundling IE with their computers by default, and less technical savvy people didn't know they could install and use another browser.

Microsoft required PC manufacturers to have IE installed along with Windows, which is shitty, but not nearly as shitty as preventing users from installing Netscape, which they did not do.

It was a different situation. Microsoft Windows was considered a monopoly, with around 95% of the desktop market (there was no mobile market yet). Microsoft used this to gain a monopoly in desktop browsers. When you are a monopoly, other rules apply, you cannot just abuse your customers and competitors with it.

They absolutely did. The whole antitrust case revolved around Microsoft threatening OEMs to terminate their reseller agreements if they sold the machines with Netscape Navigator pre-installed. It is the literal definition of monopoly abuse!

Pardon me for not being more precise -- they never prevented end users from installing Netscape on their machines.

If we assume for the sake of argument that a particular customer would knowingly buy a computer from an OEM who pre-installed Netscape on it, then the OEM is the user of the computer before the end user buys it. Why should Microsoft be allowed to prohibit such a pre-installation? For security, maybe, but that probably wasn't Microsoft's motivation.

By that logic Apple does not prevent end users from rooting the phone and installing anything they like, it just makes it very inconvenient... and less shady than Microsoft's shell execute bug.

How is shipping OS with preinstalled apps shitty?

Makes it much harder for any similar apps to compete, even if they're better. So you end up with worse overall outcomes.

Microsoft's anti-trust problems were not primarily about Netscape. If that's all it had been it would have been a trivial resolution.

They were about vendor abuse, vendor contracts. Which is one of the key ways Microsoft tried to maintain its power over the tech industry.

And of course as another person noted, Netscape was not in any manner blocked off of Windows. Netscape lost because it was charging for a browser while IE was free and usually installed by default. Then Netscape compounded the disaster by producing a couple of particularly terrible browser versions in a row while IE kept improving.

There was no scenario where a $49 browser was going to win regardless.

The vendor abuse you mention involved threats around supplying Navigator pre-installed.

It's funny that Microsoft had to fight so hard when they could have just developed an operating system from the start, like iOS, that limited installations to whatever they pre-approved. It's always harder to take something away than never give it as an option in the first place.

> Was Microsoft preventing people from installing firefox on their PCs?

It wasn't FireFox, but Netscape definitely was actively worked against.

> Am I misremembering this era?

Apparently.

But here is a link to refresh your memory.

https://bootcamp.uxdesign.cc/the-netscape-microsoft-browser-...

To save you a click:

"The Shell Execute Bug

However, Microsoft’s most significant tactic was the infamous “shell execute bug.” This bug caused some users to fail when trying to install Netscape, but it was not present when installing Internet Explorer, giving Microsoft yet another advantage. While Microsoft claimed the bug was unintentional, many believed it was a deliberate attempt to prevent users from installing Netscape. The bug caused significant damage to Netscape’s market share and cemented Microsoft’s dominance in the browser market."

If Microsoft advertised and open system and then lied, that’s immoral. But they had no obligation to even allow other software to be installed.

> But they had no obligation to even allow other software to be installed.

Of course they did, what kind of nonsense is this? It isn't their computer.

What entitlement. Microsoft makes an OS, they can design it how they want. You can buy it if you want.

Did you just make an account to call others entitled and accuse them of being coercive?

Microsoft was forcing people to pay for Windows when they bought a computer even if they didn't want to use Windows.

PC makers had to pay for licenses based on the number of computers sold, regardless of whether they were bundling Windows with them or not.