After a non-productive talk between Steve Ballmer (MS) and Mario Monti (European Competition Commissioner), the European Union is ready to sue Microsoft.
The case: abuse of its dominant position on the PC-market.
On Wednesday, the European Commission will - at Monti's request - probably fine MS for a couple of hundred million Euro.
According to Monti, MS is using its quasi-monopoly position in PC-operating systems to take out software products of competitors.
The European Union has been negotiating with MicroSoft for the last five years, but according to Monti, there's nothing left to pressurize MS but to fine them.
The EU will force MS to take Media Player out of its OS.
Theoretically, Media Player is free, but everybody knows that the price of Media Player is included in the price of Windows.