[Last Visible Dog]

There is a lot to lose. Microsoft dominates the browser market, so it can have a huge influence on forcing standards that are favorable to it....and if it can't force a standard, it can just violate it and make it the default standard. If they lose the majority, that power goes away. Thats worth quite a lot.

Microsoft dominates the browser "market"

Amount Microsoft makes off of IE (monthly - multiply by 12 for annual amount): $0.00

If FireFox takes over the world and nobody used IE ever again - amount Microsoft will lose: $0.00

The browser is nearly valueless - what is in the browser and what serves up the content for the browser is where the value lies.

[antiRepublicrat]

Amount Microsoft makes off of IE (monthly - multiply by 12 for annual amount): $0.00

Since IE is part of Windows by Microsoft's claim, then the amount of money made off IE is some percentage of the billions of dollars of Windows income.