Mozilla and Google, makers of the Firefox and Chrome Web browsers, don’t have a problem with building new versions of their popular browsers for Windows 8’s Metro interface. Firefox for Metro is on its way and so is Chrome. What they both object to though is that Microsoft’s own Internet Explorer 10 and its successors will be the only browser that will run natively on Windows RT.

To catch up, Windows RT is the Windows 8 version for ARM-based tablets and, eventually, laptops. Windows RT has two user interfaces: Metro and very restricted Windows 7-style desktop that can only run Microsoft customized applications To be exact, Windows President Steven Sinofsky said that the Desktop experience on Windows on ARM, it will be limited to specially tailored “Office 15? versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote; the Windows File Explorer; Internet Explorer 10 and some operating system tools/components.

No problem though right? You’d still be able to run the Metro style Firefox and

Chrome on Windows RT’s Metro interface right? Well, not really, not well.

Is Microsoft blocking Chrome and Firefox from native Windows RT a big deal? More >