The U.S. government accused Microsoft of illegally monopolizing the web browser market for Windows, primarily through the legal and technical restrictions it put on the abilities of PC manufacturers (OEMs) and users to uninstall Internet Explorer and use other programs such as Netscape and Java.

Claiming more than a million installed MS-DOS machines, founder and chairman Bill Gates has decided to certify Microsoft's jump on the rest of the industry by dominating applications, operating systems, peripherals and, most recently, book publishing.

In the years that followed, Microsoft insisted that Internet Explorer (IE) was not a product but a feature that it was allowed to add to Windows, although the DOJ did not agree with this definition.

[6] The government alleged that Microsoft had abused monopoly power on Intel-based personal computers in its handling of operating system and web browser integration.

Bundling the two products was allegedly a key factor in Microsoft's victory in the browser wars of the late 1990s, as every Windows user had a copy of IE.

The government also questioned Microsoft's conduct in enforcing restrictive licensing agreements with original equipment manufacturers who were required to include that arrangement.

[7] Microsoft argued that the merging of Windows and IE was the result of innovation and competition, that the two were now the same product and inextricably linked, and that consumers were receiving the benefits of IE for free.

The case organized by the Department of Justice was focused less on interoperability, and more on predatory strategies and market barriers to entry; the DOJ built upon the allegation that Microsoft forced computer makers to include its web browser as a part of the installation of Windows software.

[9] He argued over the definitions of words such as "compete", "concerned", "ask", and "we"; certain portions of the proceeding would later provoke laughter from the judge when an excerpted version was shown in court.

[10] Businessweek reported that "early rounds of his deposition show him offering obfuscatory answers and saying 'I don't recall' so many times that even the presiding judge had to chuckle.

[17] Microsoft defended itself in the public arena, arguing that its attempts to "innovate" were under attack by rival companies jealous of its success, and that government litigation was merely their pawn.

A full-page ad appeared in The Washington Post and The New York Times on June 2, 1999, created by a think tank called The Independent Institute.

Many of these cases are based on speculation about some vaguely specified consumer harm in some unspecified future, and many of the proposed interventions will weaken successful U.S. firms and impede their competitiveness abroad.

This was partly because Jackson had improperly discussed the case with the news media while it was still in progress, violating the code of conduct for American judges.

However, the Circuit Court did not overturn Jackson's findings of fact, and held that traditional antitrust analysis was not equipped to consider software-related practices like browser tie-ins.

[30] Nine states and the District of Columbia (which had been pursuing the case together with the DOJ) did not agree with the settlement, arguing that it did not go far enough to curb Microsoft's anti-competitive business practices.

[34] However, Microsoft later "agreed to consent to a two-year extension of part of the Final Judgments" dealing with communications protocol licensing, and stated that if the government later wished to extend those aspects of the settlement as far as 2012, it would not object.

"[36] Andrew Chin, an antitrust law professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill who assisted Judge Jackson in drafting the findings of fact at the initial District Court trial, wrote that the settlement gave Microsoft "a special antitrust immunity to license Windows and other 'platform software' under contractual terms that destroy freedom of competition.

[40] After the resulting settlement, the magazine Business & Economic Research wrote that, contrary to Friedman's forecasts, the case had to that point had little effect on Microsoft's behavior.

[41] Richard Stallman, founder of the Free Software Foundation, advocating for computing freedom, provided suggestions to Ralph Nader's Consumer Project on Technology for dealing with Microsoft's behavior in March 1999.

He has suggested, for instance, that Microsoft should be required to publish complete documentation of all interfaces between software components, all communications protocols, and all files.

[42] Chris Butts, writing in the Northwestern Journal of Technology and Intellectual Property, argued that the U.S. government recognized the benefits of including a web browser with an operating system.