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Netscape Backs Away From Browsers

Posted by timothy on Wed Jun 06, 2001 06:54 AM
from the is-mozilla-a-media-hub-access-tool? dept.
Netscape The Internet
gutier writes: "It seems that Netscape has recognized that it has lost the browser battle, and has decided to restructure itself into an "Internet Media Hub". Information here." The article does not say that Netscape will stop making browsers in favor of various media-integration tools and business offerings, but it does hint that strongly. I don't think this is the first time that an analyst has said "It's not going to be Netscape, but rather Netscape.com," either.
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  • "Lies, damn lies, and statistics".

    Personally I ignore all these types of ratings and stats. As you said, there is *so* much that can be done to weigh the odds in your favor, or to show the odds in favor of whomever you want them to.
  • I hate to break it to you, but the list of platforms you describe is basically irrelevant. So Netscape has cornered the dark back alley of the internet. [...]


    That's all well and good for *you* maybe, but I still use netscape, because I don't happen to run an os in the "95%" range you mention. I am forced to use netscape for mail (unless you can find me a linux mailer that does x509 certs). I've found that recently mozilla and galeon give me the ability to totally dump netscape as a browser, but the hpux/sun/irix's of the world might not be as lucky.

    So while your argument may be true, it doesn't mean that there aren't people still here in the back alley. How about the stats that say that 99% of people in your hometown aren't homeless (or whatever). Does that mean that the 1% that are homeless don't matter? "What? donate to a foodbank? Why, 99% of the people don't need it, so lets just ignore it for the rest".

    The majority is great if you are in the majority. Those not in the majority feel quite different ;)
  • > Hell, Acrobat files even come up in the browser pane.


    which is a common, but evil, bug in the graphical browsers. OK, it's part of a family of bugs. Users should be able to override *all* of the silly things that page designers do--text size, color, and font (FoxNews dark blue on black, anywone), using plugins instead of external applications (No, I don't want to give up a page of real estate while I watch crossfire. OK, realplayer doesn't apply to me until the next election cycle or football season :), blinking (there should be a screen by screen option to defeat all blinking text and recycling gifs)
    hawk


  • I can't tell you anything about the windows version, but under unix, you can choose broswer-applications within preferences, and remove the association to the plugin.


    This still doesn't let you force the launch of an external program when some nutball coded his idiotic page for a plugin . . .


    hawk

  • come home to lynx (Score:3)

    by hawk (1151) <hawk@eyry.org> on Wednesday June 06 2001, @06:54AM (#172960) Journal
    Yes, they're both horrid. When I *must* use one of those, I try to use netscape 3. Currently I have 4.7 installed, since I dodn't use it often enough to figure out how to have 3.0 and 4.7 installed simultaneously under freebsd.


    People, come *home*. That's right, even though you've strayed from the One True Browser, Lynx, it will open you back with open arms. Make sure that your lynx.cfg has
    COOKIE_ACCEPT_DOMAINS: .slashdot.org
    (so you stay logged in) and
    COOKIE_REJECT_DOMAINS: (anywhere else you go regularly),
    EXTERNAL:ftp:wget %s &:TRUE
    (to catch files)
    EXTERNAL:http:xterm -tn xterm-color -T lynx -geometry 80x50 -e lynx %s & : TRUE
    (so that with a . you can open a new browser on a link) and finally


    COLOR:0:black:white
    COLOR:1:blue:white
    COLOR:2:yellow:blue
    COLOR:3:green:black
    COLOR:4:magenta:white
    COLOR:5:blue:white
    COLOR:6:red:white
    COLOR:7:magenta:cyan


    so that you get a light background (the default colors don't work well on a CRT [save a full text console], but are readable on LCD).


    At that point, you are close to Salvation, I tell you. WHen you open lynx, hit "o" to get to the options, tell it to save options to disk, and set the editor to "vi" or "vim," and with a cry of "Hallelujah!" save your options. You can then hit "^Xe" to edit your comments for slashdot with the One True Editor, and free your soul of the abomination called EMACS."


    My brothers, once you've done this, you can see the internet as it was *meant* to be seen. All will be forgiven (except for any web pages you've written that blink, use java, or javascript), and once again, you'll be browsing at high speed and without annoying flashing things and dorky sounds.


    brother hawk, leader of the faithful


    this post void in Utah and for anyone who thinks that Windows works properly

  • The server is / was. The Netscape browser was just that, a browser. Since IIS doesn't run on UNIX, the two choices are Apache and Netscape iPlanet server (yes, I'm aware there are other servers out there, but iPlanet and Apache are the two market dominators). This isn't the invitation to start a flame-thread about Apache vs iPlanet, but realize for Fortune 100 companies still want a commercial entity behind their web server.
    Again, please rediresct all flames to /dev/null

    Secret windows code

  • LOST the browser war? (Score:5)

    by Omega (1602) on Wednesday June 06 2001, @03:42AM (#172963) Homepage
    gutier writes: "It seems that Netscape has recognized that it has lost the browser battle, and has decided to restructure itself into an "Internet Media Hub".

    I don't understand what you mean by Lost the Browser War. It's not something you can win or lose, unless you're talking about giving up from the frustration caused by the monopolistic, anticompetitive tactics of a certain company [microsoft.com].

    As I see it, Netscape is still unopposed when it comes to web browsers. Opera [opera.com] may be gaining, but no other company provides browsers that run on the wide variety of platforms like Netscape does. Netscape runs on AIX, HP-UX, SCO, SunOS, Solaris, Digital-Unix, Irix, Linux, Mac OS, and Linux. Konqueror is making inroads, but nobody has as complete a market as netscape.

  • Umm, you could also buy Internet Explorer in a boxed set at the store for $40. Or don't you remember that?

    Both browsers were available as free downloads from day #1. It might have been only a beta version, but those beta versions were extremely popular at the time because people didn't feel compelled to pay $30 for a browser.

    It's very difficult to argue that Netscape ever intended or made any money off browser sales. The only people who paid for it were corporations.

  • Re:The Death Knell (Score:5)

    by sheldon (2322) on Wednesday June 06 2001, @06:04AM (#172965)
    Microsoft has already promised to release the source to a reference implementation of C# for Unix as part of their standards compliance process.
  • use a different theme. the default "Classic" is ugly. I prefer "Modern" of the two, though I'd like to research some other themes.

    -l
  • Hrm... I guess if Apple wouldn't threaten people duplicating its look and feel, a Very Aqua Theme[tm] would be a reality. But I mean, hell, they should create their own. :-)

    -l
  • > Hell, Acrobat files even come up in the browser pane.

    which is a common, but evil, bug in the graphical browsers. OK, it's part of a family of bugs. Users should be able to override *all* of the silly things that page designers do ... using plugins instead of external applications ...

    Actually, the fact that Acrobat files come up in the browser pane isn't, as far as I know, the result of a page designer's choice, it's the result of Acrobat Reader running as a plugin.

    Perhaps I've missed something, but I didn't see any point in the Acrobat Reader installation process, at least on Windows, where I can tell it not to install the plugin, nor did I see any obvious way to tell Netscape 4.73, at least, not to run the Acrobat plugin, but to just run the Acrobat Reader binary.

    So, unless I have missed something, it's a silly thing that Adobe and the developer of your browser did, not a silly thing that a page designer did, but it still doesn't seem to be overridable.

    I found that sufficiently annoying (with all the extra screen real estate at the top of my browser windows, the actual display window in which the Acrobat reader appears is too short for me to be able to see a full page at a font size that I can read without moving my head right up to the screen) that I

    1. uninstalled Acrobat Reader;
    2. renamed my Netscape directory under Program Files to Fuckscape;
    3. installed Acrobat Reader - it didn't find Netscape, so it installed no plugins;
    4. renamed Fuckscape to Netscape.
    Fortunately, either the Acrobat Reader installation process on various UNIX-flavored OSes lets you say "no plugin, please", or the plugin isn't found because, on FreeBSD, I'm using a BSD version of Netscape and a Linux version of Acrobat Reader, so I didn't have to get out the chainsaw to fix this on my FreeBSD partition at home.
  • 3) Delete dll.

    I think I might have tried that only to have Netscape whine that the DLL was missing, rather than just running the Acrobat Reader program. But it was a while ago, so I may be misremembering....

  • If you've been staying away because of speed, stability, etc...you might want to give one of the latest nightlies a shot - they've gotten considerably more stable (at least for me, YMMV) over the past 2 weeks or so - and runs *nearly* as fast as konq (it may be graphics slowdown from the overly intensive "modern" theme I'm running, until x.themes.org comes back with thinice ;) ).

    ftp://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla/nightly/latest /

  • * Referring to the fact that MS is destined to become Open Source someday, since Gates already made the error of selling his browser for free.


    Not quite so - MS released IE for free to *undercut* Netscape's prices, and gain marketshare. They also used illegal bundling practices to hedge Netscape out of OEMs - preventing Netscape from coming pre-installed on many consumer-level computers. It was all a ploy to get rid of Netscape - and it worked.

    Giving software away for free is the first step toward realizing that Open/Free Source is a superior marketing strategy in the long run...

    Wrong again. There's a big difference between "free" (IE: no cost) software, "Open Source" (IE: you can look at and report bugs in the source) software, and "Free" (IE: you have the same rights as the author) software.

    Giving away "free" software is just a major undercut of your competitor's pricing, and could only be outdone by either giving away a better package, or paying people to take your software. It destroys (in some cases) much of the "value" of commercial competitors, since as long as your "free" alternative is "good enough", many people won't pay extra for your competitor's software.

    This is how MS played the cards with IE. You could get IE for "free", and it worked "good enough" that most people didn't go get Netscape, which at the time cost around $50. MS went a step further by "bundling" - but that's another discussion.

    "Open Source" software means that you're letting people (in some cases the public, in some cases only a select few "chosen" people) look at the source code, and possibly be able to report bugs - but there's no freedom to use the source code - only to look. While this might prevent some security flaws from going unnoticed, it provides no real benefit to the consumer (at least, IMHO)

    "Free" software is just that - once you have it, you have the same rights as the author. Compile, run, modify, redistribute - you can do it all, and you are encouraged to. Many companies (most notably MS recently) are *scared* by this, since it is very tough to compete with on an even level.

    Just bcause a company gives away software at no cost doesn't mean it has embraces the Open Source or Free software movements, or that eventually they will. It just means they're trying to undercut their competition and gain marketshare.

    * Netscape's gift to the world was not a browser, but the concept that astounding software could be free.

    I won't argue with you here, although Mozilla is (finally) turning into a mighty fine browser =)

    I'd like to see MSoft _try_ to sell their browser any time soon.

    They don't sell their browser as a standalone product - but you pay for it every time you buy a computer with Win* preinstalled, or purchase a copy of any MS software. (Win, Office, etc...)

    MS doesn't need to sell it's browser - by bundling it with the OS, it gets to people anyway. It also makes it extremely tough for *anyone* to sell a commercial browser. Look at Opera - they recently started giving away an advertising-supported "free" version of their browser, but they still have very little in the way of market/mindshare (but they *do* have an excellent product). Can you really justify buying Opera when you have IE for free? (as well as Mozilla, Konq, etc...) It's tough.

    Thanks, Netscape. Rest in peace.

    Yes - Netscape has left their mark - even if they die a slow, horrible, painful death by "portalizing", they have left their mark on the world.

  • Yes. Opera is significantly faster, and believe it or not, it saves me time. I think the small fee is acceptable to save 20 minutes per day and allow time for a "coffee break". It adds up over time.


    I'm glad you've found enough value there to justify the purchase. Opera is a damn fine product. They're just trying to sell their product in a market where most, if not all of their competition is given away.

    But the superior quality of the product isn't enough for the vast majority of people to justify buying a browser - just as the vast majority of people don't change their browser's default homepage - sad but true. They've been conditioned to eat what they're given, and that what they're given is "good enough".

    I wasn't saying it's impossible - I was just saying that for many people, it's tough to justify that purchase.

  • Hehe - I love Konq =) It *is* what Mozilla was trying to be.

    But I do try to keep track of the others - and lately Mozilla's been making a lot of headway. I think Konq is still superior at the moment - but they're both miles ahead of Netscape 4.7 =)
  • I agree with you 100%

    Another point is that when you compile a C program you have the source code and can add the missing delimiters. When you read the web page you cannot fix it, no matter how detailed the error message is (and Netscape produces NO error message).

    It is shameful that people here refuse to say that MicroSoft does anything right. In fact, ignoring the exact letters of silly standards is what the original Unix designers did (that's why we have single-character newlines while Windoze and all others have ^M^J and the unnecessary complexity that adds, and why 8-bit characters work), and it really does result in an easier-to-use system, and also makes it a lot easier to program.

    MicroSoft only does evil extensions when they produce data that can only be interpreted by their programs. This must be fought, but simple changes like this, where the result and how to use it are clear, is not evil, it is just an attempt to be user friendly. People here have got to see the difference.

  • But the superior quality of the product isn't enough for the vast majority of people to justify buying a browser - just as the vast majority of people don't change their browser's default homepage - sad but true. They've been conditioned to eat what they're given, and that what they're given is "good enough".

    Exactly, and that's why Opera can't be successful. I know two (and a half) people who use Opera as their daily browser (on Linux). The first time I saw it I guessed it was Opera, from what I had read about it (big honking ad as part of the browser... that's kind of distinctive). I looked at it and I hated it instantly (I don't like the interface and I don't like the look and I don't like installing something that I couldn't compile by myself). When I asked these people why they liked it they said it was more stable than Netscape (I told one one them about Mozilla, but at the time PSM and Java where flaky and they are not the kind of people that put up with bugs, least report them, every know and then). This "more stable" meant "Opera crashes 1/10th of the times". When I asked if they planned on registering Opera, they said "what for?". When I asked if they didn't find the ads annoying, they said "nuh". As far as I understand the WebAd bussiness, you make a profit if your clients actually *click* on the things. If these people I know represent the opinion of the majority of Opera's users, how's this company going to make money?

  • WTF? Name a hole that Apache has that will allow you to open up a command prompt like you can with IIS & IISHack...

    Fuck, name a non-fixed security problem in Apache at all...

  • No, layout won't change. What'll change is IE specific plugins and x86 Win32-only binaries downloaded to your browser will be expected to run......

    Layout is irrelevent. Why bother controlling that standard when you can "extend" the Web experience to make it Microsoft-only.

    That's what scares me.

    Jeremy Allison,
    Samba Team.
  • 1) Netscape 6.0 was terrible -- Virtually everyone in my office tried it (once). These are people in the tech industry and therefore somewhat infulential. Ironically, it seems to be hated more by the Netscape 4 people than the IE people. Of course, that's just not news anyone here.

    2) Mozilla is just not advertised enough. Sure, there's lots of good word of mouth here on /., but NOWHERE else. When I try to tell co-workers and other tech people about it they seem rather dubious and don't go out of their way to try it as they did with NS6. My theory is that "Moe Zilla" is just too cheezy and bad shareware sounding.

    3) Microsoft advertises the IE beta on "WindowsUpdate". I bet lots of people get the "Critical Update Notification" and go up to download a new IE patch and end up with the 6.0 Beta. (Generally, MS Beta browsers are not a good bet for average users, so it's strange placement right below the "critical" stuff.)
    --
  • Microsoft would not ignore the standards.

    No, of course not. Why would anyone ever think that of Microsoft? I can't imagine ever having any issues with Microsoft's standards support - the very idea is unthinkable. After all, you have to embrace the standard before you can extend it in non-standard ways, you know.

    Heaven is when one browser has 100% of the market share, works cross-platform, and could bring newer, more modern, and more useful features to the public.

    Don't confuse what makes your job easier with what's better for the public - look how nice it's been when almost everyone uses one broken email client, after all. Anyone having 100% market share is always bad in theory, and almost always bad in practice. If there's anyone I would trust to have 100% share of a market, it's not Microsoft.

    Caution: contents may be quarrelsome and meticulous!

  • probably because their main product (Netscape Browser), does not make any money, but is very expensive to keep developing for. Not only is it not making any money, it would be _impossible_ for it to make money. It is free(beer).
    They are a company, they need to make money.

    Is an Internet Portal the way to do it? probably not :(
  • Have they said when, and what the license would be?

    Well, even if they have, I won't hold my breath. They are widely know for "optomistic" release dates.
    And for last minute changes to the license.

    Caution: Now approaching the (technological) singularity.
  • I believe Mozilla stands a pretty good chance:

    1) The muckups that NS 6 and NS 6.01 made of the Mozilla image won't be there anymore.
    2) IIRC, the NS development staff have already all but pulled out of Mozilla development.
    3) The latest Mozilla builds are starting to *SHINE* and that alone will give it momentum.
    4) Neither Konq or Opera have the same level of DOM and JavaScript support as NS or IE (Sure, nearly, but not quite)

    I actually use Opera 5.0 for Linux for most things, but still use Mozilla a lot of the time because some sites require either IE or Netscape, and Mozilla is close enough to Netscape to be acceptable to these people.

    I'd like to see a more level playing field in future, with Konqueror, Opera, Mozilla and IE all keeping eachother in check. Without a reasonable number of players, IE will just walk all over the idea of standards based browsers.
    --
  • I use hp-ux and have been looking forward to a port of nutscrape 6 for a long time

    FYI, since Mozilla 0.8, there are prebuilt binaries for both HP-UX 10.20 and HP-UX 11. I know there have been some also for older milestones (M18, IIRC). They are made available some time after the Windows/Linux/Solaris releases.

    Unfortunately, it seems you have to build and install GTK and the other libraries (i.e. libjpeg, libungif, libpng and friends) by yourself, which isn't exactly a painless process on HP-UX 10.20 (I don't know about 11, but it should be definitively simplier).

    OTOH, if you really want it, IE 5 is available for HP-UX 10.20 (just search the microsoft site). At least it seems to work enough...

  • "Netscape Navigator" will likely never be a product again. This is no shock. It will almost certainly be given away (free debugging!), but AOL's primary interest is clearly in developing the next-generation of platform on which to build the AOL client.

    They are trying to gain control over the browser platform for basically the same reasons that Microsoft did. Mozilla/Netscape helps them do this.

    The interesting thing is that AOL needs Netscape more than ever. As MS begins to flex it muscles to see how far the Bush administration will let them go, AOL needs to be very aware of how easily a few key media deals could cripple their market, and having their own browser platform will help make them a little bit more independant.

    --
    Aaron Sherman (ajs@ajs.com)
  • Netscape still has a very strong brand name and while it's no longer the case that Netscape == the Internet, the brand is still very valuable and recognized. Wasn't there a story here a couple of days ago about the top-4 web sites receiving 60% of all clicks. Netscape was one of those sites and it sounds like AOL will start pushing it even more now. It's much easier to build on something existing than starting from scratch. When AOL bought Netscape, everyone assumed it was because of the browser. Even if that was the case, the weight has definitely shifted now and unfortunately, it's much because of the failure of Mozilla.

    And yes, I know Mozilla (1.0) hasn't been released yet so it's theoretically too early to call it a failure. But that's the whole point - three years later, it's still not at 1.0 and Netscape 6.x was a flop of monumental proportions. Neoplanet has backed away from it and now it seems AOL is too.
  • Yes, that's the kind of stats I've seen too. What's even more shocking is that Mozilla and Netscape 6.x combined have less than 0.5% market share and IE 6 beta has above 1%, despite the fact that Mozilla and Netscape 6.x have been out WAY longer. Netscape's market share is hovering around 10% and dropping, IE's is closing in on 90%.
  • ...Netscape will become Pathfinder for the GenX crowd. Only that when Pathfinder was live, only us "GenXers" (I hate that term too) were using the Web in the first place, and you know how Pathfinder turned out.

    The browser war is dead anyway. The coming war will be Web-based services (think IM, stock quotes, money management); MS has the better technology, but AOL has the users... it will be an interesting battle :-)...

  • i am frustrated because people won't pay for quality software anymore.

    ***BBZZZTTT!!*** Thank you for playing.

    From the original message in the thread:

    I downloaded the free version and ended up purchasing it. For $39 it just seemed like a great deal.

    /.
  • I don't mind the idea in general. It's just that Microsoft's cars come with Firestone tires and fail rollover tests. Where can I get the monolithic Toyota or Mercedes?
  • There was a time when netscape.com was the most popular destination on the Internet b/c it was the default start page for almost every browser. This was back in the days when a lot of people didn't understand how the Net worked and were willing to be guided by the hand. Amazingly Netscape did absolutely nothing to capitalize on the opportunity to become the critical portal on the web. Yahoo etc wouldn't have stood a chance.

    I guess they can try to play catch up, but I'm beginning to think that whatever brand-equity is left will quickly be transformed into a negative image. If they can't make this reorganization work, the name will become synonymous with Betamax (if it isn't already).

    For my money 'though, I'm glad that Netscape missed the boat on the web portal opportunity. I don't think the web would be half as interesting a place if everyone had to go there to do anything. The competition and innovation inspired by leaving room for this to be done by others has produced countless successes and failures over the past few years.
    ----------------------------
  • Well, it's about time Netscape got with it and jumped on the dot com [fuckedcompany.com] bandwagon. The whole "media hub" thing is a really cool new idea...I mean nobody's [real.com] doing [apple.com] that [windowsmedia.com].
  • Well, bringing up your point about the homeless would just be meeting one reductio ad absurdam with another, which I'd rather not do. As it happens though, I'm just talking about realpolitik here: I also run some of those "other" operating systems (Yet Another BeOS User going down with the ship... :( ), but I also realize that as a web developer, it only makes sense to devote 99% of my attention to that 99% of the browser market.

    Yes, there is virtue in developing for the lowest common denominator. For a long time, I was only happy when my pages looked good on Lynx, even though I knew Lynx traffic was never more than a couple percent of total web users, because if a page looks good there then it should look okay anywhere. But increasingly, I'm treating Netscape as that lowest common denominator platform, because it's handling of great stuff like stylesheets is so crude that I have to keep everything as simple as possible in order for it to work there. Frankly, Lynx has kept evolving, and it's no longer as necessary to dumb things down for it, but Netscape/Mozilla has only grown uglier and I really can't be bothered with it.

    Someone else pointed out, and I agree, that more often than not the Solaris, HP, &c boxes are used as servers, accessed remotely via other machines that very often are running something much less esoteric, such as (gasp!) Windows or Macintosh. Both of those systems are capable of running a much better browser than Netscape. Counting such proxy users, my guess is that usage of Windows or Macintosh goes even higher than the 95 or 99 percent share they have to begin with.

    With that in mind, I really think that anyone using anything else is just being difficult. Please don't misunderstand me -- I'm looking forward to the brave GNU world as much as the rest of the /. audience is. But if you're rejecting use of IE just as some sort of political maneuver, you're just being difficult and I, as a web developer, really can't be bothered to cater to you. I *like* Linux and its cousins. My main work computer is NT, but I spend all day working on Linux machines via SSH, and I run FreeBSD at home. But I realize that I am the anomaly, and that most users -- the people I want to see my web pages -- are using more typical arrangements.

    I'm going to cater to those average users, rather than expect them to meet my esoteric prefernces. Most of them are going to be using IE, and rightly so -- it's just flat out better software than the alternatives. It's easier than Netscape to develop for (hey how about that, software that obeys K&R's "be liberal in what you accept and strict in what you send") and has better support for new technologies like CSS & XML. Unlike Mozilla, IE isn't a bloated mess that crashes all the time. My understanding is that it was developed by a small team of coders, and you can tell -- it feels much more cohesive than Mozilla, and the tight interfacing with the rest of the operating system is no coincidence. Evil monopolistic overtones aside, I *like* that the component services IE provides, like the html rendering engine, can be used all over the system. It makes things much easier & more efficient to work with, and will probably make big "loose coupling / tight cohesion" efforts like .NET, if not easy to pull off, then at least *possible*. I can't see any way that a big monolithic monster like Mozilla can compete.

    IE is just so much better in so many ways that advocating Netscape against it is like trying to make a case for the telegraph against a modern cell phone.

    If that makes any sense, I realize I'm rambling. Sorry.

  • Oh sure, but let's deal with the here & now. IE *is* dominent, overwhelmingly so, and really there isn't any viable alternative on the horizon. As much as people talk about Mozilla here, that's all it is -- talk, here, on Slashdot, where we're weird-o geeks that give a shit about such trivial things.

    The rest of the world could care less.

    I fully expect that there might well be some other dominant browser in five or ten years (if we're even using a tool that could be recognized as a browser by then...), and in my wildest dreams it might even running on something other than a Microsoft operating system.

    Sure, that could happen.

    But the future is the child of the present, and what we will have then will be an outgrowth of what is around today. Whatever that future browser is going to be, it'll either have to reject everything currently existing (not likely), or it'll have to draw on today's standards, both de jure (from the W3C) and de facto (IE compatibility). I feel secure that by sticking to today's de jure & de facto standards, which do *not* include Netscape, then whatever comes I'll be able to handle it, as will the web pages that I've been making.

  • Psst! Hey! Guess what? Apparently no one told you, but Netscape has long since become irrelevant. Roughly 89% [w3schools.com] of users are still running some version of IE, while only 7% [w3schools.com] are using Netscape. The same source tells us that well over 90% of people are using some version of windows, with only 1% running Macintosh, and all others combined don't even merit a mention.

    Looking at another site [mycomputer.com], I find roughly similar numbers -- an 80/10/5 [mycomputer.com] split on IE/Netscape/AOL(that is, IE again) usage, and a 95/4/1 [mycomputer.com] split on Win/Mac/Other usage. I know there are lies, damn lies, and statistics, but I think these numbers are pretty valid -- look anywhere and you'll find roughly similar figures.

    I hate to break it to you, but the list of platforms you describe is basically irrelevant. So Netscape has cornered the dark back alley of the internet. Big deal, they can have it. The browser war, as you seem not to understand, was (past tense) a fight over which software would become the de facto standard access point to the web for the average user, and the result of that war has been settled & done with.

    Having better cross-platform support is a trump card if & only if the other platforms are statistically significant, but they aren't -- just ask anyone that was hoping to see something come of the BeOS. Netscape is finished, IE is in control of the web now. There are fringe browsers out there that might help keep IE honest (Opera, Lynx, W3M, Omniweb, Mozilla, and Netscape), but the're nothing more than fringe players, and for most purposes insignificant.

    Netscape was alright back in the day, but let's not treat this dead horse too badly, ok?

  • Not fantastically interesting. (Score:5)

    by handelaar (65505) on Wednesday June 06 2001, @03:01AM (#173028)
    Without a reasonably strong browser in popular use, how on earth can Netscape.com attract visitors? It doesn't work to simply have other AOL-TW companies plug Netscape.com on air or in print because users associate (for example) CNN with CNN.com. Which, if memory serves, is why Pathfinder was such a roaring success.

    The premise of this posting is wrong. AOL cannot get mega-traffic without browser integration. How else do you think MSN gets so much traffic? It sure isn't the killer search engine.

  • Re:Thankfully... (Score:4)

    by MrEfficient (82395) on Wednesday June 06 2001, @05:30AM (#173038)
    Is it really protected, I mean in terms of it continuing to be worked on. Aren't the majority of developers Netscape employees? Sure the source will be there, but unless someone fixes it, I don't consider it to be a viable browser. On windows, I'd rather stick with IE. On linux, I'll probably use Konq.

  • with math skills like these... (Score:3)

    by mr_gerbik (122036) on Wednesday June 06 2001, @05:12AM (#173058)
    "Netscape.com's base of registered users has grown 37 percent to more than 40 million worldwide from 15 million in February 2000, the company said."

    ... its no wonder why netscape lost the war

  • can't blame them, really (Score:3)

    by neo-phyter (167886) on Wednesday June 06 2001, @06:06AM (#173082)
    I mean, even I back away from Netscape's browser..... "Slowly, slowly......... It's gonna blow!!! RUN RUN!!"
    Allan

  • Future of Mozilla (Score:3)

    by Skuto (171945) on Wednesday June 06 2001, @03:05AM (#173085) Homepage
    How will this affect the future of Mozilla?

    Yes, its under a free license, but let's not
    forget nearly all development is still done
    by Netscape employees.

    If 80% of the developers have to work on other
    stuff, it's going to be Nomorezilla fast enough...

    --
    GCP

  • Re:Why? (Score:5)

    by referee (191944) on Wednesday June 06 2001, @03:25AM (#173098) Homepage
    First they ignore you...
    Then they laugh at you...
    Then they fight you...
    Then they become a portal?

  • The Tech Company Life Cycle (Score:4)

    by tenzig_112 (213387) on Wednesday June 06 2001, @04:15AM (#173109) Homepage

    1. Start-up -> Overnight Success
    Start telling everyone that the old economy is dead and that you're the only one with any new ideas. When your stock options mature, put your hand over your winnings and tell the dealer, "let it ride, my man!"

    2. Failure of the Core Business
    Your competition has eaten your lunch. Those bridged you burned in step 1 are starting to look like mistakes. Maybe your mom was right, giving stuff away is no excuse for a business plan.

    3. Bring in the Cavalry
    If your customers abandoned you, perhaps the federal government will be more sympathetic. It may take years to reach any kind of legal satisfaction, but hey, at least history will remember you better this way.

    4. Become an Internet Portal
    During your hard road to financial catastrophe, you may not have garnered much cash, but you have earned a commodity far more important in today's economy: name identification. Parlay your fame into portal success until the money runs out completely. This is also a great way to lay off large numbers of employees quietly- in the same way that letting the air out of a balloon slowly makes less noise than a pop.

    I think I know the next big dot-com to go under [ridiculopathy.com].

  • Re:The Death Knell (Score:4)

    by mr_goodwin (220609) on Wednesday June 06 2001, @04:11AM (#173112)
    Actually this probably isn't the case. The vast majority of java development (for a couple of years now) has been server-side. For many companies, the main strength of java as a language is not platform independance, but the comprehensiveness of the APIs available for it.

  • Let's all be monolithic (Score:4)

    by pkesel (246048) <pkesel.charter@net> on Wednesday June 06 2001, @03:42AM (#173135) Journal
    The browser war, Microsoft versus software vendors, Microsoft versus OSS, these are all variations on the idea of a monolithic computing environment versus the standard computing model of an OS and apps. Microsoft wants to make its Windows environment a complete system where users are not inclined to add or replace components. Like a car today. Few people replace the radio or the seats, or even wheels and tires. It comes as a unit. Microsoft wants your computer to work this way. That's why it's bundling everything in XP. The rest of the world, especially the Linux/OSS camp, wants to have the computer be a skeleton on which they hang all their neat toys.

    I can't imagine why a browser will remain a viable tool in the next few years. Microsoft and others will be putting little pieces of net content into very app, serving small pieces of data content rather than pages and links. The browser and page-based content is a cumbersome way to do business. It's going away some time soon, I'd bet. It's another step to the monolithic computing environment.

  • Thankfully... (Score:3)

    by emn-slashdot (322299) on Wednesday June 06 2001, @02:59AM (#173154)
    Mozilla is protected. This is what Open Source software is all about. I wonder if this will tip the tides in the konqueror/mozilla battle. I, personally, don't use Mozilla (was never impressed too too much) but I'm glad it's OSS/Free Software.

    Thanks Netscape,

    -EvilMonkeyNinja
    a.k.a. Joseph Nicholas Yarbrough
    Security Grunt by Day
    Programmer by Night

  • Re:Future of Mozilla (Score:3)

    by leifb (451760) on Wednesday June 06 2001, @03:19AM (#173170)
    How will this affect Mozilla?

    Not at all, but not because of any licensing protection. To quote:
    "The browser is a crown jewel. However, six months from now, you won't consider Netscape to be a browser company"

    That's nowhere near a statement that they're dropping the browser. If anything, that's close to saying "the browser is *done*! We're going to start developing to it as a platform now!"

    And hey, here's a surprise: that fits with the Mozilla roadmap! We should have been expecting this, and many people were.

    From further on:
    "Netscape is by no means a rejection of its software legacy, as components of its browser technology will continue to power new features of Netscape's media services aimed at office workers, small businesses and sophisticated Web users."

  • It takes a community browser and builds services on that infrastructure, almost as though the company had realized that software is not a product, not an end in itself, but rather a tool, in this case a means of distribution.

    Isn't that how they're supposed to make money with open software?

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