Summary: Online advertisers and analytics companies were furious with Microsoft's decision to enable Do Not Track as a default in IE 10. Microsoft today announced it's sticking to its guns. How will the tracking industry respond?

"When Microsoft shipped its Release Preview of Windows 8 in June, it announced that the default browser, Internet Explorer 10, would have the Do Not Track (DNT) signal enabled by default. That actionunleashed a heated debate in the Tracking Protection Working Group of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).

To the advertising and analytics companies that make up the tracking industry, this issue is an existential one. If the default browser in the world’s most popular operating system is set to disallow tracking, the effect would be profoundly disruptive to companies that live and die by their ability to follow users around the web."

I think this is a fascinating debate between Microsoft and advertising companies. I'm not sure what the eventual outcome will be, but I do wonder about Microsoft's motive. Whatever it is, I have to assume they believe that such a decision is in their best financial interest.

Microsoft sticks to default Do Not Track settings in IE 10 | ZDNet