T hey did it with Word, they did it with IE, and they intend to do with Corona, Microsoftis new digital media format.
InfoWorld reports in an article titled "Microsoftis iCoronai set to be rolled out," that Microsoft is readying the announcement of its latest and, to them at least, greatest format for electronic media. Dubbed "Corona," the new proprietary format is meant to compete with the industry standard MPEG-4, a format which Apple and many others have championed. This from the article:
Corona is the companyis (Microsoft) software engine for compressing and decoding video, and is the core of the next version of Media Player.
While competitors such as RealNetworks and Apple Computer have announced support for the open standard MPEG-4 digital media format, Microsoft has chosen to stick with a proprietary technology that it hopes to propagate from its dominance in the desktop operating system (OS) market.
By distributing Corona through Windows, the company aims to make its digital media format a de facto standard, allowing it a leg up in the server software market among others.
The article says that Big Redmond plans to announce Corona Monday (7/15/02). Stop by InfoWorld and read the full article.