Microsoft vs. EC

Microsoft is releasing soon its 8th version of the infamous Internet Explorer. Microsoft and the European Commission have maintained a bitter relation, the latter accusing the former of abuse of market position. A fine of €497 million was imposed on the Redmond giant in 2004. An addition €899 million was billed in 2008 for non-compliance...

Yes the European Commission is protecting the right of European customers, after all why IE8 when I can use Firefox, why WMP when VLC is much better.

BUT... what does the Commission use on its computer? MS Office, IE7, WMP and many of the Microsoft goodies. Count over 24,000 employees and calculate the licensing fees!

There is no Linux, no Firefox, no OpenOffice available. I doubt it's a technical issue, as DIGIT (DG in charge of IT) is a very capable DG (I will blog more on that). So why is the Commission not putting its words into actions? Maybe the fine was just to repay the licensing fees...