Digital Home Thoughts: EU to Require Microsoft to Remove WMP from Windows XP.

"A European court has denied Microsoft's request to suspend antitrust remedies levied by the EU last March, ordering the company to immediately ship a version of Windows without its bundled media player. The WMP-free versions of Windows XP Home and Professional will tentatively go by the moniker "Reduced Media Edition," BetaNews has learned. The new Windows XP RME will ship to European OEMs in January and make its way to retail outlets by February. Pricing will remain the same as current Windows XP editions, Microsoft says."

What this will mean for everyone, probably not much. Sure OEMs can now make money off of sellling the option to have a media player on their computers, but lets be honest, the time where this could have had an impact is past. Other than Apple and Sony, name one other digital media player that doesn't use WMP or WMA. PlaysForSure has made "sure" that WMP10 is a requirement to download DRM protected songs for almost all media players.