Report: Suing states want unbundled Windows

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By Cara Garretson

(IDG) -- The nine states that did not join the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) in settling the antitrust case with Microsoft Corp. plan to propose a set of remedies to the federal judge overseeing the case on Friday, according to press reports published Thursday.

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Lawyers representing attorneys general from the nine holdout states -- California, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Iowa, Florida, Kansas, Minnesota, West Virginia, and Utah, plus the District of Columbia -- met on Wednesday to hammer out a remedy proposal that includes tougher enforcement sanctions and that closes a number of what these states consider loopholes in the DOJ's settlement agreement with Microsoft, which nine other states did agree to last month.

This remedy proposal would force Microsoft to offer to both computer makers and consumers the option of buying Windows without bundled applications, such as a browser or media player, according to an article in the New York Times.

According to a Reuters report, demanding a cheaper, stripped-down version of Windows is one of the possibilities the nine states are considering. Also under consideration is a requirement that Microsoft must include support for Sun Microsystems Inc.'s Java programming language in Windows XP, the report said.

The states that rejected the DOJ settlement are scheduled to file a proposed remedy Friday with U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly. Microsoft will respond to that filing by December 12.

Meanwhile, a collection of consumer advocate groups on Wednesday cheered the holdout states while denouncing the proposed settlement that Microsoft, the DOJ, and nine other states agreed to.

Cara Garretson is a correspondent for the IDG News Service.