I love the "Microsoft jammed IE down everyone's throat" line.  LOL.  I was using Netscape in the 90s... as my default browser.  Saying IE is jammed down your throat is about as idiotic as saying Minesweeper is jammed down your throat.

It's funny to hear complaints that Windows Explorer has some connection to Intenret Explorer.  LOL, it's not a browser.  You're not on the web.  You're just looking at files or settings.  That's not IE. It's like... chance that there is something possibly relating to IE being used or a design concept applies is enough to send you over the edge lol.  If you hate MS that much why are you even using a Windows PC?

Come to think of it... I was using netscape too... and I didn't know shit about computers back then.

I actually didn't stop using it until Aol stopped updating it.

I knew othershit was out there... including IE.  It was right on my desktop... but netscape worked.

Truth is.  People are just going to pick whichever one sounds cool, or possibly even just ask their friends what they use aka IE.  So they'll use IE.

Cause a webbrowser is a freaking web broweser.  They're all 90-95% the same to most people.

This is ridiculous. Ofcourse MS would have their own browser, and media player, why not? I use my IE, and Media Player just fine, and prefer the defaults. If i want change, or another (my iTunes) i just download it...and how do i get on the web from out of the box...IE...*sigh* This is what our money goes to... ugh.

You're just being unreasonable now. I am not sure of your age, but I'm pretty sure that you were a teen that knew shit about computers back then. That's not the same as a 40-something used to a paper-based office work not knowing shit about computers. Younger people have been exposed to much more electronic devices and interfaces and are obviously more prompt in learning their way around.

I'l bring in anedoctes as well. Only not just one case or a few as in you and your parents. More like the few hundreds to thousand clients I've worked with since '97. They have trouble understanding why things open on their desktop with a double click, but links open with a single click. They often have no idea what a browser is, unless they've been exposed to alternatives from savy nephews or sons. Not stupid people, mind you, just illiterate and sometimes with a blind spot when it comes to learning that kind of flexibility and automatisms. And very prone to bring home the very same default choices made for them at work.

Just like there were in history so many bright persons who could not read nor write, we are still at the point where the importance of the web and computers in general for the common people have way overadvanced the literacy on their use. Educating people and aiding them in an important choice of their main tool with an option screen is bad again, why?

Maybe for 90% of them IE will be just as good as Firefox or Opera or Safari or Chrome, but as a web developer I'm telling you that 100% of them will benefit because of the content evolution from the improved diversity and competition in the browser ecosystem.

Edit and PS: For all who named it, I've got IE8 in my test cases, and it's quite improved while still behind in terms of standard compliancy. The fact that tech-savy people can declare themselves anywhere nearly satisifed with an IE browser nowadays - opposed to the times of the frozen-in-awful-state times of IE6 - is one more proof that competition in the browser field brought a better net experience all around. I want more of that, and I don't think we should afford another 5-10 years of rigged browser market.

How are things going to be 100% better for these people... who are just going to randomly pick one based on the name and then never revisit it ever again.

The kind of people your talking about... this isn't going to help them because, they're not going to be smart enough to install a different browser if they didn't like the one they "chose".

In addition, there other friends may end up using something else, making the experience more diversified, making it harder for them to get help.

So no. It just makes things worse for people that bad with computers... if such people even really exist anymore.

^That's not what I wrote: not "100% better" - what would that mean? - but "100% of users will benefit because of the content evolution".

Increasingly user-friendly web-apps and better media serving rely a lot on the efficiency of the JavaScript engine of the browsers and on their compliance to existing and tentative standards. That's a fact.

Even users that chose to stay with IE for the time being will benefit in the long run because when better browsers increase their share then web developers have more freedom to create modern web content, and that in turn forces Microsoft to improve their browser. That's why IE5-6 was frozen in a pitiful state for so many years and then MS had, under the pressure of Firefox, to start working again and churn out versions 7 and 8 in a relatively short time.

Plus, even the simple fact that the user is informed that there is a choice to be made and of the name of the options is a step forward. He/she might pursue by asking more savy friends about those options or stay with the former choice, but how is user education bad?

The idea that by having more diversification the user experience might be worse is frankly silly. Do you really think that if we had any monopoly of the One True Browser things would be better? We had that with IE for a while, and while everyone had the same browser as you had, the poor performance and pitiful standard compliance was the same for each and every user because MS never fixed the wretched thing for years and years.

If in all sincerity you can say that since the rise of Firefox to a significant market share things got worse for the users, then you live in a weird reality bubble. If you say that things got worse for the developers then you'd be an incompetent one.

And you'll be able to make an informed call on how good the average user is with computers when you'll have to deal with hundreds of them on the subject. Until them you, your friends and your family are scarcely a statistic evidence, so you better trust someone who works in the field if you reallly want to resort to anedoctes.

I'm gonna say... you either dealt with idiots, or are making it up quite honestly... if "most people" who came to you had those problems.

Regardless, it's a fairly simple thing. When everyone uses the same browser it's easier for people to talk to each other, and solve problems... you know. So they don't have to go to tech people.

With multiple browsers... you can't go to as many people for help, and you can't even get help online as easily because you have to sort through all kinds of different solutions for different browsers.

Real simple concept.


Firefox, which you mention... is actually the perfect counterexample to your entire argument.

Which is... if people make a better browser... people will use the better browser. Firefox rose rapidly because it offered a lot IE didn't.

I'm supposed to be sorry because a bunch of browsers that didn't offer more the IE didn't make it?


I should be hoping for people to use 50 versions of similar browsers that all work differently?


It's better if people have to deliver more broad content that has to factor in dozens of different browsers that all do the same thing then it is to let people worry about a handful of websites doing things a handful of ways?

If there were better browsers then IE. PEOPLE WOULD USE THEM. That's the thing though, you've got to offer people features THEY WANT.


Your comparisons remind me of the PS3 vs Wii stuff where people complain the Wii isn't powerful enough... ignoring the fact that power isn't what the regular consumer wants.

In all honesty, i'd be surprised if this even changed web browsing all that much. I mean a large number of people kept using Netscape over IE even after AOL shut down Netscape and told people to stop using it.

Why? Even though every other browser was better then it at that point? People just wanted to use it, because it fit what they wanted to.

Hell, i kept using it for a while afterwords.

As already stated there is plenty to push Microsoft... Firefox.

^Every single statement you make has been addressed in previous posts yet, thus we either get on from those points or the discussion will loop in repetition without any meaningful content.

The only point I feel ther need to underline is that you're extremely naive if you think that all it takes is creating a better product than IE to have people use it instead. Case in point: the Opera browser introduced user-centered features like tabs and quick history before Firefox and was -obviously- a better browser than IE even back then, when it came in either a commercial version or a free, adware one. Same can be said for Phoenix/Firebird before it was renamed Firefox: even in beta state it was light-years ahead of IE.

And yet, it took volunteer viral marketing, a commercial partnership with Google and an ad campaign on american newspapers to get the Firefox snowball effect rolling. And that never happened with Opera, Safari or Chrome - each of which is a better browser than the IE family ones.

The point is: there's plenty of people that didn't even know they could swap out the browser and experience the net in a different way, or that thought it was a difficult or dangerous change from the default. A better product means nothing by itself. Every single browser for Windows - read, for most home and office computers in the world - except IE has the additional difficulty slope of having to be known, downloaded, installed. That's nothing for me or you, numbers show that it was a great deal for most people back at the times of Firebird and Opera 6.

Now do you really think that magically since then every single windows user has become savy in the way of software? That's all there is in forcing MS to put an option screen: make the existence of a choice known to the majority of users, make it easy to pursue their choice.

A) You actually didn't adress any of those points... they still stand.

B) Being a better product people want is all that is needed.  Having to do a litle advertising is called BUISNESS.  Mc Donalds is one of the worst fastfood restruants in the world when it comes to taste tests, yet is the most popular.  There are tons of similar restraunts that provide a higher quality of food yet they often fail.

Brand name is part of the appeal.   Brand name is part of consumer quality, as is the fact that it's already installed and you don't have to do antyhing to use it.

Once again, i'd say that most people do know the option exists.  You don't have to be tech savy about it.  You just need to have 1 person in your family who uses something else.

Who is the first people most people go to when they have computer problems?  Not computer experts.  No, they go to friends, family and usually a younger family member who knows a lot about computers.  No, people know those browsers exist.  They just aren't convinced in any way that those browsers will be better. 

So they aren't the better product.

^ Once again, I think I made my point already for everything you just said. I won't repeat myself and leave it to the willing reader.

I will just comment on this nonsense of yours:

"No, people know those browsers exist.  They just aren't convinced in any way that those browsers will be better. 

So they aren't the better product."

First I dispute that people are in general that informed about browsers, but I explained that yet and brought the experience of someone who has been developing for diverse clients for over ten years, web developing for five. The real nonsense is your last statement "so they aren't the better product".

What makes a product better is how it caters to the user's needs, both known and present or eventual and future when it comes to actually using it. If the user is afraid to swap the browser because he thinks his computer will break, or if he doesn't know of a feature other browsers might have -that he would gladly use once he's shown- that has squat to do with the quality of the product. That's just misinformation. You seem to think that brand name and marketing add intrinsic value to an object. They don't, they just add market value ie they make an object more wanted by user X, certainly not a better product for X. Apparently misinformation about competitors does also make a product better in your view.

I certainly don't care for a "free" market with your definition of product value and I very much welcome a nudge in the direction of facilitating users in finding out the value of software by trying to use it.