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Re: Firefox to Overtake Internet Explorer by the End of 2007

__/ [ B Gruff ] on Tuesday 25 April 2006 15:36 \__

> On Tuesday 25 April 2006 14:41 Ray Ingles wrote:
> 
> > <snip original post />
> >
> >  The headline, BTW, is meant as a joke, as the article makes clear. But
> > it is a real trend at that website, and it's hardly an isolated result.
> > IE will probably be around for quite a while yet, particularly with IE 7
> > coming out. But it might fall to minority status in a year or two;
> > that'd be interesting.


Don't forget another factor which is the operating system. Apple zealots
would argue that Safari and Firefox are bound to reign. Given what we see in
Vista and given that IE for Mac has been discontinued, abolish the
skepticism. It is hard to make prediction as to trends 2 years ahead, let
alone just one. Growth is not linear either. It is rarely so because the
mouth-to-ear phenomenon exponentiates (it's a pyramid) and you have the
cattle effect.


> >  Of course, alternatives don't have to be the majority to force web
> > designers to code to standards. They're already doing it; very few
> > websites anymore insist on IE or anything stupid like that.


And that, of course, is one important milestone. Back when I was using
Mozilla and Konqueror, some of the Web was inaccessible to me. Ever since
Firefox, there has been a status quo of 'Web neutrality'. Nobody can truly
discriminate against Firefox and get away with it.


> Yep.  From what I read, IE7 is also more "standards compliant" than its
> predecessors, and is actually likely to break a good few of those existing
> "IE only" sites":-)


As for the former point, I can't say that I have been reading the same
'stuff'. Compliance is better, but grossly incomplete. There are still many
bugs, not to mention lack of important functionality in a closed-source
browser with no hooks or API for developers (nothing on par with Firefox and
Greasemonkey, for example). In turn, this will deter users and drive them
away to Opera, Firefox, or whatever.

The following was published 20 hours ago:

http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,1952999,00.asp

,----[ Quote ]
| The Great Microsoft Blunder
| 
| Internet Explorer is a dead albatross.
| 
| I think it can now be safely said, in hindsight, that Microsoft's entry
| into the browser business and its subsequent linking of the browser into
| the Windows operating system looks to be the worst decision?and perhaps
| the biggest, most costly gaffe?the company ever made. I call it the
| Great Microsoft Blunder. 
`----

In summary, Dvorak says that IE is bound to die.

As regards sites breaking in IE7, I have heard a lot about it.


> Talking of Firefox and jokes, I saw a beauty the other day, and wish I'd
> bookmarked it.  On a discussion board, a bloke was playing merry hell about
> a site that wouldn't let him access it because he WAS using IE!  I think
> the term he used was "fascists"!
> Whether he was just joining in the joke or being serious, I don't know
> (probably the latter!), but it was one of those Firefox jokes, something
> like:-
> "We are sorry, but you are using an insecure browser!  To download Firefox,
> click below....."
> 
> In fact, one actually only needed to click "continue" anyway, for any
> browser, but *I* thought it was funny:-)


This would be one among many such sites. I could find some links if you want.
One such story was published in Digg yesterday. I think it hit the front
page, which would help it create a buzz in the blogsphere.

Some are using the top banner to display an ad promoting Firefox and
suggesting IE users (based on user-agent sniffing, maybe Opera too) to
upgrade to Firefox. I was actually visiting several such sites. Some others
are discriminating /against/ Firefox and denying access to Firefox users who
are not using an agent switcher. Rojo in its early days (if not still)
denies access to non-Firefox browser, if not just IE.

Best wishes,

Roy

-- 
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