I have a hard time getting upset about this to be honest. All our desktop frameworks and libraries include rendering components nowadays, it's not unusual for system components to use these in their UI. Microsoft already has several significant products like VS Code and Teams build around the chromium rendering engine and the next version of Outlook will likely be an Electron app as well apparently.
Beyond that, a desktop OS without a browser installed is largely a dead duck. Most people install browsers using a browser. The first thing I do on a new Mac or PC is launch the default browser to download Chrome or Firefox.
Browser technology is a core OS function at this point and being able to launch a browser has become an essential capability users just expect to be there. Platform components, support processes and some applications might rely on it being there. Imagine a user installing Firefox then deleting Edge, then forgetting about it and deleting Firefox, or Firefox becoming unusable due to an extension or malware. Suddenly the user is functionally locked out of the internet. I think Microsoft has a legitimate interest in making sure users can't easily get themselves into that sort of situation.
You don't need a fully featured browser to download another. All you need is a minimal one without tabs, without extension support, without bookmarks, history or any comfort features – just one web page and the url bar.
Sure, but as soon a we accept we need a browser it becomes a pretty weird argument to say it has to be kept minimal and can't have convenience features.
If the OS 1. has to include a browser for the aforementioned reasons and at the same time 2. must not include a browser because that would harm competition between browsers, what else can we do?
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[ 3.1 ms ] story [ 42.3 ms ] threadWindows users can't uninstall Edge, therefore it's fine if Android users can't uninstall Chrome.
Beyond that, a desktop OS without a browser installed is largely a dead duck. Most people install browsers using a browser. The first thing I do on a new Mac or PC is launch the default browser to download Chrome or Firefox.
Browser technology is a core OS function at this point and being able to launch a browser has become an essential capability users just expect to be there. Platform components, support processes and some applications might rely on it being there. Imagine a user installing Firefox then deleting Edge, then forgetting about it and deleting Firefox, or Firefox becoming unusable due to an extension or malware. Suddenly the user is functionally locked out of the internet. I think Microsoft has a legitimate interest in making sure users can't easily get themselves into that sort of situation.
I'd say that is a big piece of software already.
If I can uninstall then I do not especially care if it is pre-installed.