Now, this is an IE ad that’s entertaining rather than repulsive–and probably a smart choice of an endorser of interest to the sort of folks who IE8 and its Web Slices feature will appeal to the most.
Kinda reminds me of when Microsoft dragged out Queen Latifah to pal around with Bill Gates at a Windows Media Center event and neither of them seemed to have a clue what she was doing there–except this time, Dolly seems to be in on the fun.
(Via ReadWriteWeb)
Over at Cnet, Steven Shankland has taken notice of some info on a mailing list for Google Chrome developers that suggests that Google’s browser may arrive in an OS X beta in early December. If so, fifteen months will have passed between Chrome’s Windows debut and its appearance on the Mac. (Developer versions of Chrome and its open-source doppelganger Chromium for Mac have been around for quite awhile, but the most recent ones I’ve tried have been almost ready for prime time–but not quite.)
I still don’t understand why Chrome for Windows has an admirably sleek two menus, and Chrome for Mac needs nine of ’em. Other than that little mystery, I’m very much looking forward to Chrome finally becoming a cross-platform browser.
Happy birthday, Firefox! You’re vulnerable!
Hey, where’s TweetDeck for iPhone?
Google invests in mobile advertising.
Android’s app storage problem continues.
AT&T’s faster laptop broadband adapter.
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Here at the Web 2.0 Summit, a surprise guest dropped by this afternoon to be interviewed by cochair John Battelle: Google cofounder Sergey Brin. An audience member asked him a question that was on my mind, too: Exactly what’s going on with Google Chrome for the Mac, which still hasn’t shipped well over a year after the Windows version debuted?
Brin didn’t get defensive: “The timing…has been one of the disappointments of the Chrome project for me,” he said. (Then he said he was sorry the Windows and Mac versions hadn’t shipped simultaneously.) He also noted that he’s using Chrome for Mac himself in pre-release these days–even though it crashes more than he’d like. At another conference last week, I saw Google VP Bradley Horowitz using Chrome on a Mac, too; I suspect that there are legions of Chrome for Mac users at the Googleplex.
As Brin noted, Google doesn’t make it easy to find the pre-release version of Chrome for Mac–actually, it actively discourages non-developers from doing so. But he encouraged those in the audience here who were jonesing for Mac Chrome to download and use it. You can do so here.
Sergey’s right: Chrome for Mac is useful right now, but still needs work. My main problem with it is that it occasionally fails to load sites until I’ve pressed refresh a few times. I also can’t figure out why the Mac version of the browser has nine menus, vs. two in the Windows edition; it rankles me a bit, since Chrome’s outstanding quality is its simplicity. Even so, I’m spending a fair amount of time with this rough draft–when I’m on a Mac, I use it maybe a third of the time. But I’m still champing at the bit to get a version that’s truly ready for prime time. In 2009 if possible…
Norwegian browser stalwart Opera released the first beta today of Unite, its technology which puts a Web server inside the browser, letting Opera run apps that serve content up to the Web as well as download it. (You need to run Opera to use Unite, but the information the apps deliver–such as access to your music and photos–can be gotten to with any desktop browser.)
Unite first showed up last June as an alpha that was accompanied by some of the most excessive hype ever attached to a product that didn’t hail from Cupertino–the company said it “would forever change the fundamental fabric of the Web.” I understand that changing the fundamental fabric of anything takes more than a few months, but Unite got off to a rocky start, suffering issues related to both reliability and privacy.
The new version of Unite has tighter security (including features to prevent Unite apps from getting indexed by search engines unless that’s what you want, and more rigorous password features). The initial group of apps–such as a music server, a photo-sharing tool, and a virtual refrigerator that friends can tack notes onto–have been joined by some additional ones from Opera and other companies, including an instant messenger and a Twitter client:
Opera has also ratcheted down the hoopla, at least a little: The new release is accompanied by a quote from CEO Jon von Tetzchner talking about “moving closer to our goal of reinventing the Web.”
I still think Unite is an interesting idea, but it’s not a fully-realized one, nor one whose advantages are immediately obvious. (Some of its downsides, on other hand, are easy to grasp–such as the fact that Unite apps only work as long as your PC is turned on and connected to the Internet).
There are only a few Unite apps so far, and none of them feels anything like a killer app. Most of them, in fact, might leave you saying “Explain to me again why this is better than using a traditional Web service that doesn’t run on my computer?” (For instance, the Twitter client is extremely rudimentary, as you can see from the image above.)
Anyhow, if nothing else, Unite serves as a good excuse to give Opera a try. It’s a really good browser overall, and at the moment, it’s my primary one–I’ve been having trouble with both Firefox and Opera under Snow Leopard, and so I’m living with Opera and seeing if it suits me better…
When the European Commission (EC) mandated that Microsoft ship Windows XP sans Windows Media Player, the final product proved unpopular with consumers. For Windows 7, the issue is Internet Explorer, and a more diligent EC announced today that it is market-testing its remedy for effectiveness.
After repeatedly wrangling with Microsoft over whether the company would be permitted to ship Internet Explorer 8 with Windows 7, the EC and Microsoft reached a compromise: letting customers pick which browser they want. Windows 7 users in European countries will select their default browser from a ballot screen that will be pushed for customers to configure via Windows Update.
The ballot features a choice of 12 browsers; browsers are listed alphabetically by vendor, and are sorted into groups according to their popularity. Microsoft provides introductory information for each option. You can see a screen shot of the ballot screen here.
Further action could be taken against Microsoft pending the EC’s findings in the Opera antitrust case. Opera indicated today that more work was needed for the ballot remedy to become acceptable.
I’d be interested in knowing what the users ultimately do, and would like to see data about installations to see if it jives with what is being reported on the Web. Firefox 3 has surpassed IE 7’s market share in Europe, but who’s to say that the remedy isn’t effective if Internet Explorer 8 is the most popular choice. As long as people are happy with the process and it is fair, the results really don’t matter.
Can you convince someone who doesn’t even know what a Web browser is to switch to a new one? Google appears to be trying, with a new Web site and video, which I learned about in this post by MG Siegler.
The site is, of course, a thinly-veiled promotional vehicle for Google Chrome. Although it’s an extremely soft sell–and since there’s no shipping version of Chrome for the Mac yet, the version of the site I just perused on my MacBook Pro has links to Opera, Safari, and Firefox (but not Flock or Camino, alas).
The video’s narrator says that most people don’t know what browser they’re running, or what a browser is. Can that possibly be true? Did Google do research on the matter? I dunno. But I do know that there are such people as folks who use computers every day but simply aren’t interested enough in technology to keep track of such things. One of the smartest people I know thinks her browser is Google. (Hint: She gave birth to me.)
Another question: How many people who are only dimly aware at best just what a Web browser is know how to download and install a new one, as Google suggests?
Alternative theory: Even if Google is serious about the idea that many folks don’t dump IE because they don’t know they’re using it, maybe the site and video–which are either soothing and straightforward or patronizing, depending on how you look at them–are meant more as goofy fun and a conversation-starter than as sincere outreach to the Web’s most blissfully ignorant users.
Lots of Web sites use SMS short codes to let users retrieve quick hits of information–movie listings, weather, and the like–via text messages on their mobile phones. Which is cool, except for the fact that the codes (short though they may be) are tough to remember.
Here at DEMOFall, a company called Dotgo is launching a service that aims to make SMS text services more powerful and usable. Instead of texting an individual service (such as Google’s GOOGLE, or 466453) you text the name of a site to DOTCOM (or 368266). It responds with instructions on accessing the service in question–for instance, you can get Fandango movie listings by texting Fandango + your Zip code.
And it looks like Dotgo isn’t fazed by sites that have made no provisions for text-message access. Such as, oh, Technologizer–it lets you read our posts via SMS (albeit in pretty unwieldy form–it has to chop them up into 160-character chunks, sans graphics):
Why would you use Dotgo on a phone with a capable Web browser, such as the iPhone? Well, you probably wouldn’t. Dotgo says it wants to bring the service to the millions of phones out there–especially in developing nations such as Africa–that have SMS capability but no real Web access. Makes sense to me.
There’s a market for kid-friendly online browsing. Children watch their parents on computers and want to get in on the fun from an early age, even if they don’t quite know how. Although there are a number of kid computers (VTech, Fisher-Price, etc.), these low-end devices don’t offer the same breadth of options available on the Internet. Kids don’t want one brand of entertainment; they want many. Enter software-based solutions. Earlier in the year I talked about Kidthing, which showed up at CES. Now I’ve had a chance to play with Zoodles as well. Here’s my take on the kid-friendly browser launched last April.
One year ago today, Google released Chrome, a day after the news–at once startling and inevitable-feeling–leaked that it had decided to get into the browser business. (Lest we forget, Chrome remains the only major software product ever to be announced via comic book.)
Back on September 1st, 2008, I hadn’t yet had the opportunity to try Chrome and knew very little about it, but was so excited about the news that I cranked out a post called Ten Questions About Google Chrome. A year later, it’s easier to answer most of them. Shall we? (I skipped recapping question #3, which involved me wondering whether Google had given Mozilla a heads-up it was working on a browser.)
1. Will Google stop promoting Firefox? It’s been known to use the Google homepage to tell IE users they should be running Firefox, and it distributes a version of Firefox with the Google Toolbar built in. You gotta think that it’ll redeploy some or all of its Firefox-boosting energies to drumming up interest in Chrome.
One year later: Yeah, it stopped promoting Firefox. The companies still have a mutually beneficial relationship, since Google remains Firefox’s default search engine, and revenues from the ads displayed with search results helps fund Firefox development. And you can still get Firefox–optionally–as part of Google Pack. But Chrome is now Pack’s default browser, and there’s no question which product Google is rooting for in Browser War 2.0. (Hint: It’s the one with “Google” in its name.)
