Finally, a new cast member gets some "Redmond Justice" airtime-- and veteran Jim Barksdale gets a much needed Gatorade break following his marathon cross-examination by Microsoft attorney John Warden. This time it's America Online senior vice president David Colburn on the stand, testifying that AOL agreed to bundle Internet Explorer as its default browser way back in March of 1996 because they feared that if they didn't, Microsoft would shut them out of the market entirely. Plenty of details are available in an Inter@ctive Week Online article.

According to Colburn, AOL's decision to go with Microsoft's browser over Netscape's "wasn't driven by technological considerations." That is, of course, a diplomatic way of saying that they went with what they consider to be the suckier browser. The reason, says Colburn, is because AOL-- even though they had eight million subscribers-- was scared to death that all of that could go out the window overnight since Microsoft had just launched its rival online service, MSN. Since Microsoft controls Windows, and Windows is on something like over 90% of the desktop computer systems out there, it's easy to see why AOL was nervous; sure, AOL floppies were ubiquitous (we still find them wedged behind the desk and under uneven chair legs), but if Microsoft's competing service suddenly showed up pre-loaded and pre-configured on every Wintel system sold, it wouldn't be too difficult for Microsoft to wipe out AOL in much the same way that they've been wiping out Netscape. Unless AOL played nice.

So allegedly, this is just another case in which Internet Explorer was endorsed by a company based not on the browser's technical merits, but because Microsoft could crush the company if they didn't cooperate. (It all sounds mighty familiar just one day after reading Apple CFO Fred Anderson's apologetic note to Netscape's Barksdale, which reveals similar motives for making IE the default browser for the Mac OS.) In fact, AOL had actually already signed a non-exclusive deal with Netscape to include the Navigator browser with the AOL software-- except the very next day they then inked a deal with Microsoft guaranteeing that Internet Explorer would be used by no less than 85% of AOL's subscribers. Why? So that Microsoft would include AOL in the "Online Services" folder of Windows 95. Without that exposure, their market share would likely have dropped drastically over time-- or so Colburn claims. While it's hard to think of AOL as any kind of victim, at the very least it's an interesting perspective.