Mozilla Firefox: It is Microsoft vs. Online community
November 4th, 2004 Leave a comment Visited 34 times, 1 so far today
Mozilla Firefox: It is Microsoft vs. Online community
It is not everyday that Microsoft feels threatened by something so trivial. But I am pretty sure that they would be terrified of November 9. Well, not exactly… they are going to rock the gaming world with the launch of Halo 2. But that day Mozilla Firefox also releases its first final version.
Firefox is not just another application from the Open Source Community. It is something that is aimed to practically take back the web from Microsoft’s monopoly in the Internet Browser market. Internet Explorer holds around 90% of the market share (take or remove few percentage points). And that seems to have made Microsoft complacent. We have not seen a major enhancement (apart from some itsy bitsy security updates in Windows XP SP2) in the browser engine that brings it at par with the technologies and web standards relevant today. And the reason IE is the most used browser; it becomes necessary for corporations to support it with their web applications and websites. And in the process, they end up making sites that uses proprietary and sometimes insecure IE only technologies like ActiveX.
Internet Explorer crushed the original king of the browser market when it was integrated with the Operating System in Windows 98. The reason that it was free and came preinstalled with the OS, made it sure that people preferred to use it instead of download and buying another browser. Netscape practically died with that move and had to go free. But it was too late and Internet Explorer took over as the number 1 browser in the market.
With Netscape getting messier with each updating version (Netscape 6 was absolutely horrible), there were few alternatives left for users to switch to. Opera and few other browsers survived but were not lucrative enough to challenge the monster from Microsoft. That led to the vision of Mozilla Foundation. And Firefox is the major piece of weaponry in their arsenal, which is aimed at directly hurting Microsoft where they have heart the online community. It is aimed at getting some of the chunk of the market share of Internet Explorer and provides a safe and compact alternative to people. And it is a statement from the open source community to tell Microsoft that they can no longer ignore the casual surfer’s need for a better browser. And the popularity of it proves that people wants to fight back to prove that they will not take an inferior product.
November 9 is the D-Day when Firefox announces its presence to whole world, through a full-page advertisement in a major newspaper in USA and other online campaigns that they are ready to rock Microsoft. If they can succeed in upstaging Internet Explorer by dropping its usage numbers even more, maybe the next giant step would be to launch Linux in a similar ways! It is popular no doubt, but it needs the promotion that is being done with Mozilla Firefox.
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November 4th, 2004 at 07:11 am
Firefox’s fluidity and speed has brought the fun back ! And no annoying IE pop-ups. Hurray ! Nice work guy
November 4th, 2004 at 07:13 am
I have been using firefox for a month now..its one of the best tings that happened to the web browser in a long long time.Speed is fast.it uses ess resources, tabbed browsing is awesome…some ppl have complained that there are some display issues..i have never seen any..everyone download this browser…
November 4th, 2004 at 07:17 am
I hope people will see that Firefox is more than just tabbed browsing. Being a web designer, Firefox’s ability to render web standards compliant elements is just great.
November 4th, 2004 at 07:19 am
in my opinion, firefox it’s a much better browser than microsoft internet explorer.
November 4th, 2004 at 07:35 am
Used it for 40 days, uninstalled IE. Firefox works, it’s fast, it’s free, no pop-ups, no security problems and no patches required. That’s how it should be.
November 4th, 2004 at 07:37 am
Have used Mozilla firefox virtually since its inception. I love it. It rocks and there is no way I’m going back to IE, or PU as I call it.
November 4th, 2004 at 07:55 am
Been using Firefox since it was Firebird…around v. o.3 I think. It just keeps getting better. The other day I had to use Internet Exploiter on someone else’s machine, and I was appalled at the amount of popups and how slo-o-o-ow it was. “Take Back The Web”.
November 4th, 2004 at 07:56 am
The best thing is, Firefox GREATLY reduces your risk of getting infected by spyware. Unlike Explorer, it doesn’t have as many security holes that let spyware come in. I work at a PC repair shop and we get more work because of spyware than anything else — trust me, Anti-virus programs DO NOT PROTECT YOU FROM SPYWARE. Firefox looks nicer, blocks popups, and runs faster. It takes about 15 minutes to download on dial-up, you can download it at http://www.mozilla.org
November 4th, 2004 at 08:01 am
Bye Bye IE. Bill Gates has enough money. This browser is the best. Customizable with different themes. Just too cool.
November 4th, 2004 at 08:04 am
Been using Firefox for about 6 weeks now and I’m very impressed. Far more intuitive and customizable than IE (extensions are fantastic). Looking forward to when Firefox is given more industry support on web sites, increasing its compatibility.
November 4th, 2004 at 08:14 am
Firefox is amazing! It has an elegant interface, lightening fast load times, renders page as well as, if not better than, MSIE. I’ve also switched to Thunderbird, an email client developed by the same project. Using Firefox, Thunderbird, and Clamwin (OpenSource Virus Protection) I’m managed to keep my PC free spyware and viruses for months.
November 4th, 2004 at 08:29 am
found Firefox at a friends place in Germany last year,I liked it and now all my friends in the USA are using it too.
Never used IE only Netscape.
November 4th, 2004 at 08:42 am
I use Firefox even though sometimes i have to switch to IE to view some pages. That is the downside, but on the upside, i get less spyware, the find feature is better, it has a built in pop-up blocker, i have installed many search engines, foe example IMDB,Amazon, and Dictonary.com. Its very convenient.
November 5th, 2004 at 12:42 am
Firefox rox. The theming, extensions, speed, security, pop up blockers and autoupdates are the best I’ve seen.
November 5th, 2004 at 02:15 am
The extensions are great. I can access my .mac calander from anywhere using the mozilla calendar 0.8+ extension or other Ical’s . And the McSearchpreview enhances google, A9, MSN, Yahoo to memtion a few.
November 5th, 2004 at 03:50 am
Today a co-worker asked me to check a website, because his Antivirus triggered there. I opened it with Firefox. Nothing. Then I openend it with IE. No virus, but at least 9 windows opened. I have been using Firefox since it was named Phoenix, and almost forgot how they are called: pop ups.
November 5th, 2004 at 06:58 am
firefox will be taking 5 % of the browser market share from six months after the launch of firefox 1.0 on november 9 and the firefox browser is going make microsoft to run for its browser share afer six months with thier bloody security updates and new features
November 5th, 2004 at 08:36 am
Never used IE, only Netscape, mozilla & Firefox from its day as Phoenix to Firebird to Firefox. It has been a rapid progress. Another good software Thunderbird a mail client to compliment Firefox and good bye to that stupid outlook and outlook express, free of all virus in the e-mail
November 5th, 2004 at 10:06 am
I didn’t realize all the different browsers available until I switched to Linux. I used Konqueror for a long time, but then I tried FireFox and I love it. Now it’s my browser of choice under Windows, Linux, and Mac. I’d like to thank Sun for Java and Mozilla for FireFox, and all the developers that spent endless hours to make it all possible.
November 5th, 2004 at 11:55 am
Firefox and Thunderbird will lead the Windows users over to Linux and away from the shoddy workmanship that makes up most Microsoft products. Today, I just converted another hardline Windows user over to Mandrake Linux after enduring an infected computer that tools could not fix. Bill Gates, please move onto stealing and cheating in some other field and country.
November 5th, 2004 at 02:58 pm
I have been using FireFox since last one month and I have been telling my friends and collegues to use FireFox and DROP ie. :)
-Ansar
November 5th, 2004 at 03:06 pm
The extendability makes this browser the number 1. And yes: I recognize using IE and discovering a pile of popups.
November 5th, 2004 at 05:50 pm
Also on November 9th we get the next Microsoft security bulletin.
November 5th, 2004 at 08:13 pm
Can I just say – Firefox plus Adblock!! Go to adblock.mozdev.org, and reach for a much quieter saner browsing life.
November 5th, 2004 at 10:29 pm
I love Firefox and I use at work and home. There is no way I going back to use the buggy IE.
November 6th, 2004 at 03:43 am
I use IE6 at work, and the more I use it, the more primitive it seems. No native pop-up blocker, no tabbed browsing, I can’t even find out how to zoom in or out on a page – all 3 features have been in Opera for years, and in every version of Mozilla I’ve used. I really hope Firefox will bring modern browsing to the masses.
November 6th, 2004 at 04:11 am
I’ve been using Mozilla/Firefox on my home PCs over two years now. I helped a friend of mine cleanup his PC of Adware and viruses and in the process installed Firefox. A couple days later he called me up _specifically_ to thank me for installing Firefox for him.
November 6th, 2004 at 04:32 am
I’ve been using firefox since it was phoenix and it gets better all the time! Imagine, a browser that gets improvements instead of years of stagnation! For those nasty Internet Exploder-only websites, download User Agent Switcher from Mozilla.org…it makes your browser ‘look’ like it’s IE (or Netscape or Opera) and stubborn pages will often display.
November 8th, 2004 at 01:36 pm
Excellent piece of software
November 9th, 2004 at 01:15 am
Firefox is bustin out all over
Firefox is going public tomorrow in a huge ad campaign to educate the world that IE is NOT a necessary evil. There are other choices and they are better. Firefox woo! I would use it full time if I could get the automatic mac os x spell checker to work …
November 9th, 2004 at 06:57 am
Have been using FireFox for over a year, both on the Mac, Linux and Windows. Excellent. Small, compact and far higher quality than Microsoft’s Internet Apology 6.
Nowadays, when I stumble across a site which doesn’t render correctly in Firefox (or Apple’s equally excellent KHTML-based Safari browser) then I immediately do two things:
1) mail the site’s administrator to bring the lack of standards-compliance to his/her attention.
2) make a mental note never to visit the site again.
You can do more than just use FireFox: Get your friends to use it too, and don’t let IE-only sites get away with it – let them know how you feel!!!