Of course, more than likely this is just a grab to have MS throw enough money at them to make them go away, considering that the need for Symantecs product lines is getting more and more irrelevant thanks to the additional software MS keeps adding to windows.
You say that as if it's a good thing? Maybe when you lose your job because the company you work for, just had Microsoft add an inferior similar product to the one you're making to it's OS, you'll see things in a slightly different light? I don't think it's unfair for Symantic to get some compensation for the people who are going to lose their jobs as a consequence of this. but they may succeed in a motion injoing MS from distributing Vista with any of the disputed code for quite a while...
No they won't. Microsoft have no respect for the judicial system. They'll ship it anyway, and just pay the fine. Unless ofcourse the more likely scenario that they couldn't get it ready on time occurs, in which case this becomes a significant oppertunity for Microsoft to blame Symantec for their own shortcommings.