Microsoft might have saved millions of dollars of legal costs and untold hours of its top executives' time, while avoiding many months of negative publicity and the threat of court sanctions, had the company been willing to allow personal computer manufacturers to erase a tiny icon from desktop computer screens.
In the wake of Friday's court findings that Microsoft is a monopolist that has used its market power to stifle competition, the issue of browser icons may seem trivial.
Yet it was Microsoft's stubborn refusal, in 1995-1996, to allow PC companies to choose whether to display rival Netscape Communications' browser icon, instead of Microsoft's, that fuelled the controversy now threatening the future of the world's largest software company.
The icon battle was just one mis-step in a long trail of strategic, legal and political errors which led to Judge Thomas Jackson's damning findings in the landmark antitrust case. Microsoft repeatedly stumbled in court as it tried to defend its controversial business decisions, and it erred outside the court - among Washington's power brokers - by failing to blunt its opponents' attack.
Often the trail of mistakes leads straight to the top of the company. According to the judge, the decision to force PC companies to display an icon for Microsoft's Internet Explorer program came from Mr Gates, chairman and chief executive. He was determined to prevent any erosion of Microsoft's control over the images that computer users see when they turn on their machines, the judge said. The browser icon controversy stands out as a glaring error by Microsoft. In its determination to gain ground on Netscape, Microsoft placed onerous restrictions upon its biggest customers in the PC industry and attempted to control the images that millions of PC users would see when they switched on.
The episode demonstrates Microsoft's influence over some of the largest computer companies. Compaq Computer, the world's biggest PC maker, fell foul of the Microsoft restrictions. So did Hewlett-Packard, one of the most respected names in the US high-technology industry. These and other large PC companies were apparently cowed by Microsoft's threats.
Microsoft's actions also illustrate an apparent disregard for the power of competition regulators. Microsoft's run-ins with US government trust-busters first came to light 10 years ago, in late 1989. By 1995 it was a veteran of Federal Trade Commission and Justice Department investigations.
In the summer of 1995 it was Judge Jackson, now presiding over the Microsoft antitrust trial, who upheld a contested consent agreement between Microsoft and the Justice Department to settle the company's first serious dispute on competition laws. Other corporate executives might have trod more carefully, but Mr Gates apparently took the settlement of the earlier antitrust investigation to mean that he was free to play hardball.
The company continued to distance itself from the Washington lobbying industry. In 1997, Microsoft contributed just $60,000 to Republican party funds and maintained a small lobbying office in the capital. By last year, its contributions had dramatically risen to $1.3 million, mostly to Republicans.
Even now the company is open to accusations of heavy-handed tactics. Its efforts to limit a proposed rise in the budget of the Justice Department backfired badly earlier this year, as the company was forced to defend itself against further claims of bullying. One Capitol Hill lobbyist said: "This is just the kind of behaviour which got them into court in the first place."
For antitrust experts, Microsoft made similar errors of judgment in court, where the company's aggressive tactics again played into the government's hands.
When faced with evidence from internal e-mails and memos, the company's executives refused to acknowledge their substance and damaged its own credibility. Chief among these was Mr Gates himself, who refused to testify in court. His video-taped deposition included the remarkable claim that he had no idea of Netscape's activities in 1995, in spite of writing a lengthy internal memo citing the company as one of a new breed of Internet competitors.
Prof Steven Salop, law professor at Georgetown University, said: "I believe that Microsoft's trial strategy was an extension of its conduct. It was precisely that type of take-no-prisoners approach - we are in charge, don't cross us or we will punish you. They denied everything and conceded nothing."
