20 Years Ago Today: 'Firefox Browser Takes on Microsoft' (archive.org)
- Reference: 0175437707
- News link: https://news.slashdot.org/story/24/11/09/0531257/20-years-ago-today-firefox-browser-takes-on-microsoft
- Source link: https://web.archive.org/web/20171220113953/http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3993959.stm
And then, on November 9 of 2004, [2]the BBC reported that "Microsoft's Internet Explorer has a serious rival in the long-awaited Firefox 1.0 web browser, which has just been released." Their headline? "Firefox Browser Takes on Microsoft."
> Fans of the software have banded together to raise cash to pay for an [3]advert in the New York Times announcing that version 1.0 of the browser is available. ["Are you fed up with your browser? You're not alone...."] The release of Firefox 1.0 on 9 November might even cause a few heads to turn at Microsoft because the program is steadily winning people away from the software giant's Internet Explorer browser.
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> Firefox has been created by the Mozilla Foundation which was started by former browser maker Netscape back in 1998... Earlier incarnations, but which had the same core technology, were called Phoenix and Firebird. Since then the software has been gaining praise and converts, not least because of the large number of security problems that have come to light in Microsoft's Internet Explorer. Rivals to IE got a boost in late June when two US computer security organisations warned people to avoid the Microsoft program to avoid falling victim to a serious vulnerability.
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> Internet monitoring firm WebSideStory has charted the growing population of people using the Firefox browser and says it is responsible for slowly eroding the stranglehold of IE. Before July this year, according to WebSideStory, Internet Explorer was used by about 95% of web surfers. That figure had remained static for years. In July the IE using population dropped to 94.7% and by the end of October stood at 92.9%. The Mozilla Foundation claims that Firefox has been downloaded almost eight million times and has publicly said it would be happy to garner 10% of the Windows- using, net-browsing population.
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> Firefox is proving popular because, at the moment, it has far fewer security holes than Internet Explorer and has some innovations lacking in Microsoft's program. For instance, Firefox allows the pages of different websites to be arranged as tabs so users can switch easily between them. It blocks pop-ups, has a neat way of finding text on a page and lets you search through the pages you have browsed...
Firefox celebrated its 20th anniversary with [4]a special video touting new and upcoming features like tab previews, marking up PDFs, and tab grouping.
And upgrading to the latest version of Firefox mpw displays this message on [5]a "What's New" page . "Whether you just downloaded Firefox or have been with us since the beginning, you are a vital part of helping us make the internet a better place.
"We can't wait to show you what's coming next." ("Check out our special edition wallpapers — open a new tab and click the gear icon at the top right corner...")
[1] https://developers.slashdot.org/story/02/11/08/0148216/phoenix-project-considers-a-name-change
[2] https://web.archive.org/web/20171220113953/http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/3993959.stm
[3] https://web.archive.org/web/20180628015444/https://blog.mozilla.org/press/files/2013/11/nytimes-firefox-final.pdf
[4] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Mz8xJW4CNE
[5] https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/132.0/whatsnew/
Actually, they split Netscape in Parts. (Score:2)
[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netscape_Communicator
Firefox download was 5MB (Score:3)
[1]http://www.oldversion.com/wind... [oldversion.com]
[1] http://www.oldversion.com/windows/mozilla-firefox-1-0
Re: (Score:2)
And that was also when there was still a significant percentage of internet users still on modems, that could take half an hour to download. Many modern internet users are spoiled with fiber that can do hundreds of megabytes a second. I also remember many "fits on a floppy disk" software being marketed at the time.
I hope they can find their way again (Score:4, Insightful)
Firefox is immensely important to me, I'm using it right now. But they have become an ads company, their mobile browser leaks memory, and they are neglecting thunderbird. They don't need our money any more, but they've also turned more than half into what they are our alternative to. There are not many actually different browsers out of there, so it's not just me that Firefox is important to. How can we convince them to prioritize quality?
Firefox is Still Best (Score:3)
I have used Firefox for most of its existence. The only time I use anything else is when my android phone uses Chrome without asking or a site forces me to switch because it doesn't work with Firefox. I don't know that will continue to be an option as more sites stop supporting it. Its interesting how the open standards of the internet are morphing into a system of proprietary monopolies dedicated to monetizing content.
Re: (Score:2)
> "Its interesting how the open standards of the internet are morphing into a system of proprietary monopolies dedicated to monetizing content."
You mostly just described the "IE-Only" era, except then it wasn't monetizing content, but trying to force people to use 100% of a single company's products. Either way, Microsoft was very evil- creating "standards" that were not standards, ignoring actual standards, and "misinterpreting" others. And it was absolutely intentional, to try and lock people into the
2044: 20 years ago today Firefox takes on Google (Score:2)
That's the alternate headline of the future I'd like to see. But in reality Firefox is too comfortable with their Google search revenue, they are not willing to take real risks anymore. That's why I support true new entrants to the market like Ladybird and The Browser Company. Mozilla abandoned risky ventures like FirefoxOS and more powerful extensions. I remember when Firefox used to be the cool browser, now it seems like a infomercial browser going on about privacy yet offering sponsored links to ad comp
Open Source won the Browser Wars (Score:2)
First with Gecko/Firefox and then with KHTML/Webkit/Chrome.
What did they think would happen? (Score:2)
Hey, I remember Firefox! That was that browser that wasn't being strangled to death because it's primary sponsor wasn't its direct competition, right?
Re: (Score:3)
They're still going at it like 20 years ago! They're still taking on, every year, more and more... misguided adventures.