RealNetworks Inc. (NASDAQ:RNWK) traded for $12 in December. On a good day, the stock now changes hands at $8.

Real is one of the internet stock survivors of the 2000 crash. For one day in 2000, it hit $96. At that time, though, it was in a different business. The company was the only true competition for Microsoft Corp.'s (NASDAQ:MSFT) Windows Media Player. Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) has a competing product called QuickTime, but the battle for the multimedia PC player was between Real and MSFT.

As Real started to lose ground, it did two things. First, it used its player platform to build a music and game download business. Then, it sued Microsoft for antitrust violations for trying to push its player out of the market.

Real won the suit and collected $761 million. That left the company with almost $700 million in cash against a market cap of less than $1.3 billion.

I'll bet you never thought you would hear Microsoft invoke shoe laces in its argument to defend its bundling of Media Player with its operating system, as it appeals the EU's anti-trust ruling.  Yesterday was the first day of a five-day hearing before the Court of First Instance in Luxembourg.

In defending its decision to bundle Media Player with its operating system, UK's The Independent reported that Microsoft's attorney told the court, "One has to consider whether there is a demand for shoes without laces.  Since customers want to buy shoes with laces it has become commercial practice, therefore it is not tying."

The European Commission's representative didn't buy that analogy.  According to The Independent, he told the court that Microsoft's bundling was "more like one in which shoemakers obliged consumers to buy laces from them."

Shoe laces, of course, are not the real issue here.  The real question is whether Microsoft's bundling of Media Player stifled competition from other software offerings, such as Real Player.  The European Commission's representative described Windows as a "virtual monopoly" and claimed Microsoft is driving rivals out of the market and having a "chilling effect" on innovation, according to The Independent.

Wish I could be in the court room in Luxembourg listening to the arguments this week, but I'll have to depend on the European press for that front seat coverage.