Nibiru, imo, hits the nail on the head. It is 1. A matter of financial favours and 2. The consyant harrassment Microsoft are getting, which does not bode well for future development of their built in programs, over so called "monopoly rights" etc.
I am watching the next 4 year up to Windos 8 (or whatever) with cynicism. Now Paint is becoming more sophisticated, followed by wordpad and the extremely goo Live writer ( A free download, I know) How long before the big guns such as Corel etc get into the attack. The lis could go on. Why should Microsoft be allowed to have a totally free Backup program, or defragmentation program, when one is free to purchase them. LOL
Sorry to rant. It is a subject closed to my heart. Oddly (I am not a Linux user) but I seem to recall, when I last experimented about two years ago, that Firefox came, not "built in" as such, but ready for use after the install?? No complaints there, apparently, from Opera etc??