They attempted to sabotage WebGL (refusal to implement) by pointing to shaders as a potential vulnerability (while exposing the very same vulnerabilities in Silverlight, I might add).
In the past MS used their usual sick lock-in tactics in IE. Intense competition forced them to reduce this idiocy. Unfortunately in other areas they still don't care. So I doubt you'll see OpenGL on Xbox or Windows tablets / handsets, until something will force them to enable it.
You can't. That's MS way of lock-in and ensuring that porting of games and other applications is much harder.
Why didn't you expect that? I'd say that WebGL in IE is something unexpected, not the other way around. MS has a long history of being jerks and using lock-in with proprietary standards.
> You can't. That's MS way of lock-in and ensuring that porting of games and other applications is much harder.
It is a way of them not having to write, support, and optimize two entire sets of drivers that accomplish the same thing.
I was actually working in Windows Phone when there were talks about supporting OpenGL (I wasn't involved in any, I just watched from the sidelines). The decision ultimately came down to already having people who could write really fast and stable DirectX drivers. The expertise was there, so it was used.
Sure, they'll find technical excuses. But as soon as it will start biting them back, they'll quickly find needed expertise.
But probably Windows Phone is not the best example, since it's a minor platform comparing to others. MS has no leverage on the industry with it. Xbox is different. It's quite big. And enabling OpenGL there would only make sense for gaming.
If anything, MS made the current javascript ajaxy freak show.