This Friday the Thirteenth turned out to be kind of a bad one for the Macintosh, as today Microsoft confirmed recent rumors that it is discontinuing that platform’s edition of Internet Explorer. This, coupled with the Redmond behemoth’s recent announcements that IE will no longer be a standalone product but will instead be entirely integrated into future versions of the Windows operating system, confirms that the Clinton-era Department of Justice was right to sue for monopoly abuse and that the Bush II-era DOJ was wrong to settle the suit so willingly. This is a decision that surely would never have been made in 1999. (Thanks Ralph Nader!)

With its 95 percent share of the internet browser market, Microsoft’s cancellation of IE amounts to a kind of condemnation of the Mac platform. It remains to be seen whether the strategy that Steve Jobs has pursued with Apple over the past few years — shooting for consumer dollars while half-ignoring the common wisdom that the Mac and Windows machines should be as interoperable as possible — will bear fruit through this unfortunate turn of events. Things don’t look so great, though I’m keeping my fingers crossed that Safari will continue to keep up with the ever-changing demands of the Web browser market.