This week, the European Commission announced its preliminary satisfaction with a settlement offer proposed by Microsoft that would end an antitrust battle that has been simmering for over 10 years. Microsoft General Counsel Brad Smith posted a response that said: "We welcome today’s announcement by the European Commission to move forward with formal market testing of Microsoft’s proposal relating to web browser choice in Europe. We also welcome the opportunity to take the next step in the process regarding our proposal to promote interoperability with a broad range of our products.”

As Smith alludes to, a big part of the proposed settlement has to do with Microsoft including a browser ballot window in Internet Explorer that lists a broad array of browsers and allows users to choose which one to use. Opponents of that proposal, including Mozilla and Opera, have criticized the fact that the ballot screen is found within Internet Explorer, which is still bundled with Windows, and the fact that any alternative browser must be downloaded, which many users will be too lazy to do. So why are Mozilla and Opera being so reticent in the wake of the European announcement?

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Though the Opera browser isn't open source, it's free and its new server-in-a-browser feature, Unite, is really making significant inroads toward online collaboration. If Chrome and Firefox are to keep their edge over Opera, their development teams had better sit up and take notice.

Opera's Unite technology lets users run chat rooms, host Web sites, and share files that even people not using Opera can access. "The interaction is all done via a central Opera Unite server — Opera Unite uses a proxy between the server and its clients (found at operaunite.com) to avoid the need for any special firewall configuration," writes the development team. Unite launched today with six features but is calling on the Opera community to design and create any new services they'd like to see available.

Read on to have a look at what Opera unite can already do and why Google and Mozilla haven't cornered the market on browsers just yet.