In 1995, Microsoft signed a Consent Decree with the Department of Justice. This decree prohibited, among other things, Microsoft from making license agreements that were contingent upon the licensee entering other license agreements with Microsoft. This was meant to address Microsoft's practices of using its operating systems dominance to crack open other markets, and to forestall such practices in the future.

In October of 1997, responding in part to the complaints of Netscape and its lawyer Gary Reback, the Department of Justice announced that it was filing a petition to find Microsoft in contempt, alleging that it had violated that consent decree.

The Department of Justice claimed that Microsoft was forcing computer manufacturers to license their Internet Explorer web browser as a condition of licensing the Windows operating sytem. Another part of the DOJ's petition was that the Non-Disclosure Agreements Microsoft forced its partners to sign were overly broad and improperly discouraged these partners from bringing potential abuses to light.

Microsoft claimed that Internet Explorer was a crucial part of Windows, and thus not subject to the separate licensing stipulation of the decree.

Full time-line of the case.

Brief biographies of key players.