Fallout Won’t Land Close to Home . . . Yet

Consumers will see little immediate impact from the ruling Monday that Microsoft Corp. is an illegal monopoly.

“This is steady-as-she-goes from the user perspective,” said Charles Rutstein, senior analyst at Forrester Research. “The wheels of justice turn very slowly.”

Rutstein and other experts say judicial remedies may eventually have a profound effect on the look and feel of the typical computer if the government wins on appeal. Even the most modest of penalties probably would open up to users a broad array of new software for browsing, e-mail and other Web services. But it could be months, or even years, before this outcome would filter onto the desktop.

For example, Windows Millennium Edition, due out this summer, probably will reach consumers intact--even though it continues to link the Internet Explorer browser to the Windows operating system. That in turn will allow it to be preloaded on at least some computers that will be sold over the holiday season this year.

In fact, the company will, according to reports in the trade media, further extend its operating system monopoly into the now-hot realm of digital music. Its new Windows Media Player 7 will take on many of the functions of MusicMatch Jukebox and Real Jukebox, the two top player/recorders for the MP3 compressed music format.

The biggest effect of the court ruling may be more subtle: Until the case is settled, Microsoft may feel constrained from muscling smaller competitors.

MusicMatch’s Bob Ohlweiler, senior vice president of business development, said Monday that even though Microsoft is a potential competitor to his company, Microsoft has gone out of its way to share information needed on its proprietary music formats.