The standards were there before Microsoft, and Microsoft even helped in their evolution after entering the browser market. IE is just an old, broken, non-compliant crappy browser, but because it's dominant people write to it instead of the standards. Sad, because for a while IE was IMHO the best browser on the market at one time.
Standards are there for a reason that has nothing to do with competition, but to keep systems communicating. However, Microsoft likes to use its power of monopoly to make what they do standard and lock everyone else out. Some standards are bigger than Microsoft, meaning that Microsoft can't mess with them, like TCP/IP, the basic protocol of the Internet. If Microsoft messed with that, it would be their machines left out in the cold because they do not dominate the router, switch and firewall markets.
Other standards like HTML and CSS are a little easier to influence. Others, like Kerberos are ripe for Microsoft's trademark "embrace, extend, eliminate" philosophy.
It doesn't matter who is breaking them, standards should be met or the computing community at large suffers.
It's this kind of slander that undermines your credibility. Does any other browser even have "full screen mode" yet (press F11 in IE)?