Mozilla's VIP of engineering has again likened Internet Explorer to malaria, insisting that although a lot of people have it, most of them wouldn't actively choose it.
In a lengthy discussion about the forthcoming Firefox 3.5, Mike Shaver explains that he finds a resurgent browser division at Microsoft a compliment, and insists that all he wants is a fair fight – where browser choice is about suitability and choice and not defaults.
"One big compliment is IE7 and having Microsoft get defensive about browsers," Shaver told TechRadar.
"If you read the documentation about IE8 they are very defensive about it. They don't like the idea that people think that there is a better browser than theirs.
Malaria
"They didn't used to care at all – IE6 wasn't a competitive thing. Walt Mossberg, at one point, described IE as still the most popular browser and I said that was like describing malaria as popular in Africa," he jokes - not for the first time.
"A lot of people have had malaria and a lot have got it but it doesn't mean that they have to choose it. Of course, in that case, Bill Gates is on the other side; he's trying to get rid of it, much to his credit."
Shaver believes that educating people in choice is one of the key problems facing Mozilla in pushing beyond their current 23 per cent share of the market (and significantly more in Europe).
"…ultimately people start to think 'what are the effects of my choice on my cellphone or on the web?' and they may well choose to use something other than Firefox, but we're not trying to lock that in; we want them to have a meaningful choice. We just want to be in a fair fight.
"The market is a very important part of deciding what to build into your products. There's a big distortion right now because we can't distinguish between the people who have IE because its structurally there and those who chose it. This means we can't say 'wow, some of these things were a great idea and we can tell because people adopted IE8 when they added it'.
"We just know they got IE8 when they got the pop up saying they should update their browser."
A legacy of support
Back at the launch of IE8, Microsoft told TechRadar that it would be necessary for anyone hoping for the lion's share of the browser market to support legacy users of older versions, but Shaver does not feel that this is a problem.
"You do need to take care of your users, but a developer other than Microsoft would like to have a chance to have those legacy users so we could support them, right?
"We don't know how people are really being supported – are they getting security updates to IE6, are they getting updates that will help them take advantage of the web properly?
"They get some if they have the right corporate account and so forth, but we take care of users in terms of making it easy, and encouraging them to get on to the new browsers and having them get used to updating their browser.
"The web is moving around beneath us."
Your comments (6) Click to add a new comment
mikedevenney
June 29th
6. I use IE because many sites don't work well with other browsers, not because it's GREAT and not because it came packaged with the computer. Although, one does wonder how we would get online to download our favorite browser if no browser came packaged with the operating system on our new computer in the first place? Either way, I'll keep using Google Chrome for speed and IE for work based websites. FireFox just isn't used at my home or office.
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lovlid
June 24th
5. It seems to me that if firefox et al haven't been in the news for a few days, they just put out another complaint about IE, and hey presto! back in the news. Look out for opera later today, nodding their heads. Its getting boring.
And stop assuming everyone who uses IE are just too thick and lazy to try your browser mr shaver. Maybe you need to make it more appealing, but being a whiney lady dog is not attractive.
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gandharva81
June 23rd
4. This is very very bad to abuse any other.
Anyway each and everything is good on their own place but here I Like internet Explorer.
Try the best Best of luck....
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lemurleaps
June 23rd
3. @mcdragon Many of the apps that start IE do not actually need IE, their lazy programmers hard code "C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe" software. Its not that hard to get the path to the default browser, its in the blooming registry!
And if their lousy website really is IE specific then its up to me to render it using Trident via IETab or similar.
It's particularly galling see that I can run MS Update in FX with the Trident engine.
Many of IE users do not use the web much, their bank account, the local newspaper and transport timetables are just about the only sites they ever visit. The functionality of IE 4 or Mosiac would be good enough for many.
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mcdragon
June 22nd
2. My bad, it works on Mac OS X - so still useless for me.
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mcdragon
June 22nd
1. Malaria is considered a tropical disease, right. Well with a tropical disease, once you get it you usually can't get rid off. With other users its probably ore like you cant get them off it.
The biggest thing that now bothers me with IE that I am sometimes forced to use it because certain vendors programmed only for use in IE, Vetstream for example uses only Oracle's IRM than only works on Windows and only on IE. Bah
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