Keith Teare writes how Microsoft is the de facto gatekeeper for internet innovation: if your product, technology or idea cannot get integration with IE, then your innovations are necessarily prevented from reaching internet users. His proof? That Microsoft "cut off the air supply" to his company, RealNames.
This argument is really getting tired. RealNames failed to thrive because it was a dumb idea (registration fees for words and trademarks to bring AOL's Keyword interface to a URL bar near you). It was a dumb idea that required Microsoft to play nice (er, favor RealNames' proposed monopoly over trademarks in the URL bar), and was overdependant on Microsoft's favor to survive.
None of these examples prove that Microsoft is a gatekeeper for innovation, nor that any innovation that Microsoft disapproves of will necessarily be squashed by the giant of the North West. There are better examples that demonstrate Microsoft doesn't play nice. But not every failed startup dies because of some action or inaction of some evil dastardly billionaire villain.
