...And why it indicates a significant degradation in Windows market share

HERE IN BoycottNovell, the market share of Firefox is around 62% (Internet Explorer is at 12.5%), which proves that populations play a considerably big role in the nature of such figures that are accumulated. One type of 'population' may also be a geographical one and adoption of Firefox is known to be high in Europe.

“Now it is over 30% and the Microsoft spin is brought out...”A reader from Europe has just sent us this pointers to XiTi Monitor, comparing this new page to an old presentation style.

"Look at how Firefox has had steady growth for years and the headlines are about it approaching 30%," he writes. "Now it is over 30% and the Microsoft spin is brought out: "whereas little more than three [of ten] use Mozilla Firefox.""

Further he argues: "How can surveys retain their integrity in spite of minions of Bill?

"Part of it is a mistake on my part, not comparing the right pages. However, the problem is there it's just that the two URLs I sent (see above) can't be compared.

"In this one, the presentation is better, but one can't help but suspect influence given the damning with faint praise found in the other link."

Either way, the reader wishes to "just make noise about Firefox passing 30% in Europe."

Two related articles are:

1. Opera files antitrust complaint with the EU



2. Browser market is broken - thanks to Microsoft

To conclude, writes the reader: "The last XiTi link showed European average weekend use of Firefox at over 30%. That is several months before the highly successful launch of Firefox 3.0. So any reports from the fall are going to show higher numbers, probably even during the work week. Since MSIE has metastasized, by intentional actions, throughout Microsoft Windows, a large rise in Firefox use will be tied to a large drop in Microsoft Windows." ⬆

“There's a lot of Linux out there -- much more than Microsoft generally signals publicly -- and their customers are using it...”

--Paul DeGroot, a Directions On Microsoft analyst