When I read things about MS rewritting IE:
When I read new like this I always think that in typical Microsoft fashion Internet Explorer is just not a mere browser, but an integral part of windows (Remember the antitrust trial?)
IE for the windows fan-boys out there is (among other things and at a glance): The pop3 libraries Outlook uses for connecting to pop3 servers, it is the OS HTML, XHTML, & CSS rendering engine for lots of dialogs in the system (probably less so in 8 & 8.1 but still in use), it is also used to render the .chm files (another good idea ditched by MS just because they can, and because it was good), it forms the basis of various system's services HTTP capabilities, and it is also used as part of many 3rd party APIs for lots of other things I forgot.
In light of this "integral" behaviour what MS will do is:
1) Create another bare browser with no options and barely any functionality out of "pinch to zoom" (It seems to be the norm these days anyway)
2) Ship it installed alongside a (not-so) hidden copy of the old IE, (conforms to what they always do add layer after layer of dried old crusts to the OS), if they do not, things will break, and fan-boys will complain.
3) Do lots of marketing and PR, and even claim some open source pedigree to whitewash their image.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
