SleepyEgg

With Microsoft's EU-appeasing browser ballot rolling out across Europe over the next three months, dissatisfaction is growing with its implementation. Last week, flaws in its randomization emerged—a result of ineptitude rather than malice. Today, six Web browsers have petitioned the EU to complain about the overall design of the browser ballot. They argue that the ballot fails to do what it is supposed to: provide European consumers with "information on the 12 most widely-used web browsers."

The complaint stems from the way the ballot is designed. The ballot lists the 12 browsers with the highest market share. The top five browsers—Microsoft's Internet Explorer, Google's Chrome, Apple's Safari, Mozilla's Firefox, and Opera—are immediately visible in the ballot. The next seven—AvantBrowser, Flock, K-Meleon, GreenBrowser, Maxthon, Sleipnir, and SlimBrowser—are only visible on scrolling to the right with a horizontal scroll bar. It is this design that is deemed inadequate. The complaint, signed by six of the seven secondary browsers (the exception, K-Meleon, was excluded due to an inability by the other six to find anyone to contact to represent that browser) argues that this horizontal scrollbar is inadequate—an overwhelming majority of people won't notice it or use it.