I don't know that an asteroid isn't going to kill me in the next 3 minutes, but I can make some educated guesses about the world. My read of the situation is consistent with the way that the advertising industry has reacted in every single similar situation. It's consistent with the way that they're acting right now with tracking restrictions that require affirmative consent. There's a pattern here.

> Also changes the perception that Microsoft were doing it to attack Google.

Who cares?

> Once it's a standard you'd get it enacted in law that companies have to respect the setting.

If we're going to talk about suspicions, I have seen zero evidence that a DNT standard would have actually helped get legislation passed. Generally speaking, that theory does not line up with my experience of how lawmaking works.

Nor does getting it passed into law mean that advertisers wouldn't immediately lobby for it to be revoked as soon as any company turned it on by default. Heck, they'd try to force it to be opt-in instead of opt-out in the law itself if given half a chance. They would argue that Microsoft was being anti-competitive (exactly as you're arguing right now). Facebook is currently arguing that Apple's privacy controls are anti-competitive, there's no reason to believe they wouldn't make the same argument about Microsoft if DNT was turned on by default, regardless of what the law said.

A privacy standard that can not be turned on by default is not worth fighting for.