Opera hates European Windows 7.
Wikipedia’s video player format complication.
Little carriers: Verizon phones sooner.
Google doesn’t like app stores.
Chrome 3’s XP netbook optimization.
iPod, Zune targeted by lawsuit.
Mozilla’s tabbed-browser design contest.
Microsoft is saying it’ll roll out an update to Internet Explorer 8 in August with a tweak to the setup routine which I just love. If you have another browser set as the default, you’ll see this dialog when you run IE for the first time:
Not only does it not set IE as the default browser without your permission, but it doesn’t even pre-select IE–an option which is always the one that Microsoft would prefer, but frequently not the one the user in question prefers. You’re forced to click your preferred option; there’s essentially no way to end up with IE as your default browser by accident, and nobody will feel that Microsoft is tugging at his or her sleeve or interfering with the system configuration.
[UPDATE: Clarification based on feedback in comments–what Microsoft is doing is showing you this dialog even if you chose Express Settings, which formerly set IE8 as the default browser.]
(Okay, it’s possible that some people will maintain that Microsoft shouldn’t even ask about default browser settings–but it seems like a reasonable matter to bring up during installation of a new browser.)
I’d like to see every software company with a product that involves operating system default settings take this approach; it should also be required behavior when it comes to depositing icons in the Start menu, the desktop, and the System Tray.
The world of software and the Web is rife with examples of companies erring on the side of serving their own interests rather than helping consumers get what they want. The next time I install IE 8 on a system and see this dialog, it’ll make me feel better about Microsoft’s role as a citizen of the dominion that is my PC. Isn’t it just possible that that’s worth more to the company than any number of PCs having their default browser switched to IE for reasons other than express desire of the computer’s owner?
Firefox is the happy result of untold hours of unpaid effort by the Mozilla community. But Mozilla is announcing a pilot program called Firefox Add-On Contributions, with the aim of helping Firefox extension developers make a buck from their hard work. It’s a platform for requesting and receiving payments for extensions, with PayPal handling the exchange of money. It is, of course, optional.
I kind of like the idea–I try to pay for the shareware I use, and the iPhone App Store has shown the power of selling a lot of copies of something small and useful for just a little money. (I’m assuming that the contribution price for a typical Firefox add-on isn’t going to be more than a few dollars.)
So if you’re asked to chip in for extensions you use and like…will you?
TechCrunch’s MG Siegler has a good post up about the latest OS X builds of Chromium, the open-source browser that will become Chrome for the Mac. He’s right that it’s feeling like it might not be too far from being ready for prime time. (I’ll be disappointed if the final version has the nine menus sported by the current build, though–Chrome for Windows has an amazingly minimalist two menus, and that’s one of the things I like most about it.)
I’m in favor of software developers releasing apps when they’re ready, not in a rush, so I’m willing to wait for Chrome for OS X. But with the first anniversary of Chrome for Windows a mere six weeks away, I’m hoping Google might give Mac users a reason to celebrate, too.
Microsoft is rolling out version 3 of Silverlight, its competitor to Adobe’s Flash, and the Expression tools used to create Silverlight content in San Francisco today. The new version of Silverlight can smoothly stream live HD video, supports hardware graphics acceleration, does 2-and-a-half-D effects involving moving flat objects in 3D space, and can be used to build applications that run outside of a Web browser as well as inside it. Basically, it looks pretty cool.
Steve Ballmer doesn’t seem to be here, but another Microsoft exec invoked his Developers, Developers, Developers mantra at the keynote this morning. And every Microsoft employee I’ve chatted with has stressed the notion that Microsoft is about helping developers build applications. (They keep bringing up the fact that Bill Gates and Paul Allen founded Microsoft in 1975 to sell their version of the BASIC programming language–call me paranoid, but I think they may have discussed the talking points they wanted to hammer home.)
Gazelle, Microsoft’s experimental Web browser.
Intel is helping with Chrome OS.
Schmidt hated Chrome OS. Initially.
Flickr cofounder’s follow-up project.
Geographic photos in Google results.
Twitter, Nobel Peace Prize winner.
Microsoft’s Hohm energy site launches.
More physical phone keyboard debate.
Windows Not-So-Ultimate Edition.
Erick Schonfeld of TechCrunch has noticed that StatCounter’s browser market share data shows Internet Explorer usage in surprisingly sharp decline. According to StatCounter, IE has lost 11.4 percentage points to Firefox and other browsers in the U.S. since March, leaving it with 54.4 percent of the market. If IE loses another half a point of share, the combined forces of all other browsers–which I like to think of as a virtual Microsoft rival called Anything But Internet Explorer–will exceed IE’s market share. And it’ll be the first time in eons that Microsoft’s browser isn’t used by the majority of Web users. It’s a remarkable reversal of fortune for a product that was once used by nine out of ten people on the Internet.
Like ZDNet’s Larry Dignan, I’m skeptical about the idea of IE’s usage swooning as strikingly as StatCounter is showing until we get more data from other sources. Still, there’s no question that IE faces fierce competition, and I haven’t seen any market share numbers that show it to be in anything but a period of decline. Every day, fewer people are using IE and more people are choosing something else.
For a very long time, the biggest competition for any new version of Internet Explorer has been…earlier versions of Internet Explorer. Much of Microsoft’s marketing for IE 8 seems to target IE 7 and IE 7 users, such as this list of the top eight reasons to download the browser. But it also addresses people who are at least thinking of using another browser in items such as this comparison of IE 8, Firefox 3.0, and Chrome 2.0. Which, incidentally, maintains that the three browsers are equally customizable–I’d be stunned if there’s anyone outside of Redmond who agrees with that.
If Microsoft merely prevents IE 6 and IE 7 users from jumping to another browser, the browser’s market share will stabilize. (At least among Windows users–if Apple continues to chip away at Windows’ dominance, IE’s overall share will continue to shrink.) But I assume that Microsoft would prefer to not only stop the bleeding but to get IE growing again. The only way that’ll happen is if users of other Windows browsers–Chrome, Firefox, Opera, and Safari–switch to IE in measurable quantities.
What are the chances of that happening? Slim, I think. For Windows users, running anything other than IE represents a conscious decision to use a browser other than the default one their OS came with. Typical users of Chrome, Firefox, Opera, and Safari-for-Windows users all seem to be dedicated fans of their browser of choice. And once you’ve found a browser you’re comfortable with, the incentive to stick with it is high. For all these reasons, any version of IE is going to need to be strikingly different and better to lure expatriates back.
As a wholly unscientific experiment, I asked my Twitter followers if any of them had abandoned another browser to use IE 8. As I write, 26 people have responded. Only two of them had dropped something else to run IE 8.
Is anyone out there a “new” IE user? What do you think it would take for Microsoft to get its browser’s market share creeping upwards again?
The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Microsoft has pulled the online ad for Internet Explorer that showed a woman puking after viewing her husband’s apparently-disgustingly-pornographic browser history. The Journal quotes a Microsoft spokeswoman as saying that “While much of the feedback to this particular piece of creative was positive, some of our customers found it offensive, so we have removed it.” People offended by a browser commercial involving onscreen vomiting? Imagine that!
Me, I nominated the ad as a strong candidate for the honor of being the worst tech commercial in history. Lots of folks agreed with me; many said they liked it. It would be a boring world if everybody agreed on this stuff.
I assume Microsoft had an inkling that some people might feel…well, queasy…at the sight of the ad before it gave the spot the OK, and decided to run it anyhow. It’s certainly possible to do effective advertising that evokes strong reactions and doesn’t appeal to everybody. But maybe one of the lessons here is that it’s not a great idea to do so for a product with a customer base as huge and diffuse as the world’s most widely-used Web browser. Some products have the luxury of offending people they weren’t trying to cater to in the first place, but IE, by definition, is trying to cater to most everybody. (There’s a reason why you don’t see people retching in ads for, say, gasoline. Or paper towels.)
Of course, conspiracy theorists may wonder whether Microsoft’s game plan all along was to release a revolting ad that appealed to some people, get (ahem) bloggers to write about it, catch flack for it, and then withdraw it…
One more thought on why I didn’t like the ad, and then I promise I’ll stop: I’m not instinctively opposed to gross humor. I might have even liked the basic idea if it had been a scene in a well-directed, funny movie. (Hey, I’m a Monty Python fan.) But as a consumer, I regard advertising as a company attempting to initiate a business transaction with me. And so I react better to ads with a certain level of decorum and respect than ones that try to gross me out. (The bar isn’t that high–some people seem more creeped out by the other, vomitless ads in the series than I was.)
That’s just me; multiple reasonable commenters feel otherwise. But it’s fascinating to see how Microsoft had to get real-world feedback before they figured all this out.
[UPDATE: Peter Kafka of All Things D reports that the IE 8 ads were directed by Bobcat “Shakes the Clown” Goldthwait. That explains a lot right there…]
4.7 million Firefox 3.5 downloads.
Twitter tweaks follower, following pages.
New iPhone Sykpe Skype: no notifications.
Energizer’s USB clip charges batteries.
iPhone copy and paste: incredible!
Dell netbook gets GPS navigation.
