A
year ago last summer, we received some devastating news: AOL had signed with
the evil empire (Microsoft) to develop a new browser, while basically stabbing
it’s most recent acquisition, Netscape, in the back by putting it out to pasture.
Netscape (and Opera, Mozilla, and Safari for that matter) was the better browser
as far as web developers were concerned. It had better support for new technologies
and was less buggy and more secure than Internet Explorer.
At the time, it seemed that the evil empire had triumphed – I.E. already enjoyed
the lions share of the browser market thanks to its packaging with Windows on
all new PC’s. What was worse, the evil empire would no longer offer free upgrades
to I.E. after version 6. To get the latest and greatest, you had to upgrade
your operating system. Talk about holding the world hostage. Web developers
all over the world could be heard crying in anguish.
AOL in an effort to assuage its guilt over killing
its own progeny gave $2 million in seed money to the Mozilla organization,
which was the highly lauded open source continuation of Netscape/ Gekko based browsers. Several other big name organizations
also contributed https://www.moenyfall.co.uk, but it really seemed like a lame gesture. Mozilla was a great
browser, but it didn’t seem to be able to compete with Internet Explorer on
any quantifiable level. As developers, my office embraced Mozilla, but we weren’t
really sure where it would lead. Then this summer, Mozilla released its newest
effort called Firefox, and WOW–
is all we can say. Talk about interactive, talk about customization, talk about
the wave of the future, talk about great security systems, talk about listening to its
users and creating add-ons that were really useful. According to Business 2.0,
Firefox is being touted as Microsoft’s Greatest Nightmare.
Hope amongst web developers has been resurrected with FireFox and in an effort
to steal some market share from the evil empire, by placing a support ad in
the New York Times in a campaign called Firefox, Take Back the Web. You can
help spread the word and find out more about what seems like the second coming
at www.spreadfirefox.com. This is truly a grass roots
effort, where your voice can make a difference. Go and get the new Firefox browser
– its FREE, yes FREE, help support
the cause by making a small donation to Mozilla (a not for profit org) and use
the best browser on earth. It will change your life, or at least your online
user experience.
