Never let it be said that them Redmond-dwellers ain't some crafty buggers. Look, nobody's still harboring any illusions about what Microsoft did to Netscape, right? Billy G. saw that he had a comfortable monopoly in the operating systems market, so when he was late to the Web browser party, he simply bundled Internet Explorer "free" with Windows, sat back, and waited for the market share numbers to change. Netscape, once far ahead, had to stop charging for its browser, and even that wasn't enough; eventually the company saw no way to survive but to sell out to AOL. A simplistic way to put this whole situation: when Netscape refused to "carve up" the browser market with Microsoft, Microsoft used its Windows market power to put Netscape out of commission.

That said, while we find that example of Microsoft's behavior to be abominable, we don't find it particularly surprising. Microsoft saw the Internet and Java as the "platform" that could theoretically make the Windows monopoly redundant, so steps were taken to wrest control of the browser market. While the way the company went about it may have been illegal, we can't say it's surprising. What is surprising to us is that Microsoft would consider AtAT enough of a threat to try to put us out of commission, too.

Now before you dismiss these as the paranoid ramblings of the perpetually sleep-deprived, hear us out. You know, of course, that by threatening to eliminate the Mac version of Office, Microsoft "persuaded" Steve Jobs to replace Netscape with Internet Explorer as the Mac's default browser. Then all Bill had to do was sit back and wait; eventually Mac users got over their initial horror, and several switched to IE. New users, like all those first-time iMac-buyers, didn't even necessarily know they had a choice; they double-clicked "Browse the Internet" and IE popped up. Over time, Microsoft grabbed the majority of the Mac-browsing audience. And all this time, AtAT was broadcasting "Redmond Justice" updates, and apparently getting under Bill's skin.

Well, the hammer's finally fallen. The Mac version of IE 5.0 is out, and early reports (from faithful viewers such as Jens Baumeister) show that it's none too AtAT-friendly. Judging by the feedback we got from "early adopters," those of you who have already upgraded were probably shocked to see AtAT's text rendered much larger than before. The problem is this: with IE5, Microsoft changed the default font size to 16, whereas previous versions of IE (and Netscape, and probably every other graphical browser for the Mac) adopted a standard size of 12. Hence, AtAT looks really weird. Weird enough to get people to switch channels? Maybe. But don't touch that dial! If you edit your Preferences to set the font size back to 12, AtAT will appear normal again, with just a few rendering anomalies (such as the TV set on the Feedback page). What's particularly diabolical about this anti-AtAT tactic is that we can't simply update our code to ensure that IE5 viewers get the best visual experience; while we can tell what browser you're using, there's no way for us to know whether you're surfing with the default font size of 16, or if you went ahead and switched to 12 for a more compatible surfing experience.

Wait, it gets even worse-- faithful viewer Peachawat didn't even get to see the "goofy" version of AtAT. He reports that after upgrading to IE5, trying to tune into AtAT caused his browser to freeze. And when he tried to run his backup copy of IE4.5, he discovered that evidently the newer version replaced some crucial shared libraries, because IE4.5 alsofroze when he tried to load AtAT. (He switched to iCab to contact us.) Note that Peachawat is the first to report that nasty behavior, but if others out there are experiencing the same thing, please contact us and help us find the problem. We figure it'd be far too blatant if Microsoft made its new browser always crash when loading AtAT; it's much more insidious-- and less attention-getting-- if the problems only afflicts a few people out of a hundred.

So here we sit, helpless victims of an evil scheme to decimate our viewership with goofy-looking fonts and occasional crashes-- a scheme over two years in the making. Of course, we hear some of you protest, since Internet Explorer became the Mac's default browser before AtAT even debuted. All we can say is, Bill Gates is more forward-looking than we once gave him credit for. Imagine, foreseeing our rise in the ratings and our fearless exposés of Redmond shenanigans before we ever even hit the airwaves! But it's clear to us now; the entire push to control the Mac browser market was no more than an elaborately-crafted plan to destroy AtAT. Well, fear not-- we're not going anywhere. It'll take more than a browser upgrade to take us out. Wait-- where are you going?...