12.02.09
Mozilla Firefox Cruises Past Internet Explorer in Germany
Summary: Firefox gains market share particularly quickly in markets that the English-speaking press tends to ignore
OUR reader Goblin, who as an aside took offence in the words of Novell’s de Icaza, has published this post about the demise of Internet Explorer. Not even newer versions of the Web browser have managed to set it afloat and another reader of ours from Germany tells us about these amazing new numbers from Germany (Firefox surpassing Internet Explorer). The same reader once showed us that GNU/Linux is quite dominant in Germany.
A third reader wrote to us an hour ago, arguing that “Microsoft must be running out of money to pay the marketing companies. The marketing companies are skimping on their campaigns by copying old Firefox campaigns.
“Note that MSIE is not gone from Windows, since it cannot be removed. So a good portion of the downswing for MSIE means people are upgrading to Mac OSX, Linux, or even Haiku or Solaris.
“Here’s the poster to go with that “Friends don’t let friends run MSIE” slogan:
http://www.ixibo.com/2008/12/friends-dont-let-friends-use-internet-explorer/
“And comments can be found going back for years:
http://jdjansen.blogspot.com/2008/05/friends-dont-let-friends-use-internet.html
http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2005/01/ie.php
“Microsoft can’t even copy well.” █
“Microsoft allowed us to [remove Internet Explorer from Windows] but we don’t think we should have to ask permission every time we want to make some minor software modification. Windows is an operating system, not a religion.”
–Gateway Computer Chairman Ted Waitt
Needs Sunlight said,
December 2, 2009 at 8:18 am
On Goblin: Miguel and the other in the mono guard always respond with personal attacks. It has been like that since the very first day they announced the project. It’s like he’s made it his life’s work to copy M$ and to try to subvert any and all FOSS projects and his only trick is to attack anyone that says anything less than ‘yay!’
Miguel might be using a little special interpretation of the word developer. It looks like from the context he means *mono* developers and not real developers.
Roy Schestowitz Reply:
December 2nd, 2009 at 8:31 am
Some others took offence in his remarks because they — including me — are software developers who produce Free software.
As for Miguel’s “code”, I refer you to:
“Every line of code that is written to our standards is a small victory; every line of code that is written to any other standard, is a small defeat.”
–James Plamondon, Microsoft Technical Evangelist. From Exhibit 3096; Comes v. Microsoft litigation
[PDF]your_friend said,
December 2, 2009 at 11:06 am
Microsoft has lost the browser wars by not conforming to standards. Even when you look at the heavily skewed and unrepresentative US 63% number you get this:
No version of IE has more than 20%. What this means for Microsoft is that non Microsoft browsers are now more valuable for vendors than any version of Internet Explorer. Firefox’s share trumps any version of IE in all markets, so vendors are better off coding to standards than they are coding to Microsoft. Shame on any web people who are not putting Firefox and reasonable standards first, they ignore the largest segment of the market.
This is what Microsoft deserves for using their browser as a weapon in platform wars. Each version of their browsers is crippled by attempts to promote their Microsoft garbage and harm other standards, java, css, png, ogg vorbis, ogg theora, etc. The result is that Microsoft Windows users depend on a free software browser to be able to browse the web properly and Microsoft periodically sabotages that. There are better reason to abandon Windows but this one is sufficient for most people. Microsoft’s malice has left them with a fragmented platform that works for no one.
Roy Schestowitz Reply:
December 2nd, 2009 at 12:12 pm
Microsoft is also busy poisoning rival browsers without permission.