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Microsoft's new Get the facts has a strange smell to it. It's almost like it smells... old and stale.

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It looks like Microsoft has changed its mind regarding standards in IE8:

We've decided that IE8 will, by default, interpret web content in the most standards compliant way it can. This decision is a change from what we've posted previously.

This clearly shows how important it is to keep up the pressure on Microsoft to finally deliver on its promises.

Some may be wondering if this changes anything about Opera's antitrust complaint, but the bottom line is that the massive focus on open standards lately might be bearing fruit. If Microsoft does deliver a browser which is standards compliant by default, this is great news indeed! And at least now, we will have the EU keeping an eye on Microsoft, and giving it real incentive to follow up its promises for once.

The IEBlog announced today (or is that yesterday by now?) that internal IE8 builds now pass the Acid2 test.

This is certainly a promising development in these times of antitrust complaints and "wars" over standards. Acid2 only tests a smaller portion of certain standards, so it will be interesting to see the first public release of IE8 and how far along it is when it comes to open standards.

In any case, congratulations to the IE team, and I hope this is only a tiny first step in the process of turning IE into a standards compliant browser.

Our Web Opener, David, has written a longer piece with his thoughts on this interesting development. Needless to say, he's a happy camper.