IE Market Share Drops Below 70%

Mike writes "Microsoft's market share in the browser dropped below 70% for the first time in eight years, while Mozilla broke the 20% barrier for the first time in its history. It's too early to tell for sure, but if Net Applications' numbers are correct, then Microsoft's Internet Explorer will end 2008 with a historic market share loss in a software segment Microsoft believes is key to its business."

Re:Layoffs

[Anthony_Cargile]

Oh yes, chairs are a-flying in Redmond now, and if you listen slightly to the West, you just might hear some of them land...

Re:Layoffs

[Anthony_Cargile]

Well we could economize the situation by placing the stockbrokers in the chairs before handing them to Ballmer.

This isn't my fault...

[PFritz21]

I continue to use IE on a daily basis. Although I was forced to upgrade to 7 at work, I still continue to use 6 on my home Windows PC's. I still need to put it on my Mac and Linux boxes, but I'm lazy.

Re:This isn't my fault...

[ColdWetDog]

You're going to put IE6 on your Mac and Linux boxes? Doesn't sound lazy - sounds insane.

Re:Layoffs

[sveard]

Or buy IKEA shares

Re:Who's history?

[Tubal-Cain]

Last time it broke that barrier, it was going in the other direction

Re:Layoffs

[David Gerard]

I'm just waiting for Microsoft to go to Washington for a bailout.

Most people using IE are altering user-agent

[Anonymous Coward]

Since Internet Explorer is the primary target at this point most people using IE are changing the user-agent to read

Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.1.2) Gecko/2008122803 Firefox/3.1.0a

and this skews the statistics.

IE market share animation

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C3C54E7HWLI [youtube.com]

Re:Layoffs

[Stormwatch]

I had a Microsoft keyboard. Trust me, I will not be getting another one.

Agreed, that and

[Anonymous Coward]

if you're calling MS Office overpriced, buggy, and full of security flaws, you must've glossed over the fact that OpenOffice is a POS.

They have been trying to

[WindBourne]

for the last year. But it was in a ford prototype that runs XP, and then Vista. Sadly, it kept getting BSOD before hitting Idaho. Heard that on the last attempt, they made it to Illinois last night, but then the car locked up in high speed, doing nothing but wasting energy. Who knows, they may actually make it to congress before they have had a chance to give away our great great grand children's money (reagan gave away mine while W has given away my children's, grandkids and great grandkids).

Re:Layoffs

[Anonymous Coward]

because of the strong footholds that I have in other markets.

Oh what the hell, it's Slashdot - I'll bite.

Bill, is that you?

Re:Good Exchange Replacement

[mikaelhg]

Yes. Lotus Domino / Notes.

That's like saying that suicide is always an option.

Re:Who's history?

[ari_j]

The obvious solution to this controversy will incidentally save a beloved icon of computing history from bankruptcy and demise. Let's hire SCO to consult on this, and find out exactly how much current Mozilla code is stolen from Mosaic.

While we're at it, we may want to get the analysis of how much Mozilla code is stolen from SCO Unix, too.

Netcraft confirms it.

[Anonymous Coward]

It is now official. Netcraft has confirmed: Internet Explorer is dying.

One more crippling bombshell hit the already beleaguered Internet Explorer community when IDC confirmed that Internet Explorer market share has dropped yet again, now down to less than a fraction of 1 percent of all browsers. Coming on the heels of a recent Netcraft survey which plainly states that Internet Explorer has lost more market share, this news serves to reinforce what we've known all along. Internet Explorer is collapsing in complete disarray, as fittingly exemplified by failing dead last in the recent Sys Admin comprehensive networking test.

You don't need to be the Amazing Kreskin to predict Internet Explorer's future. The hand writing is on the wall: Internet Explorer faces a bleak future. In fact there won't be any future at all for Internet Explorer because Internet Explorer is dying. Things are looking very bad for Internet Explorer. As many of us are already aware, Internet Explorer continues to lose market share. Red ink flows like a river of blood.

Internet Explorer 8 is the most endangered of them all, having lost 93% of its core developers. The sudden and unpleasant departures of long time Internet Explorer 8 developers Darth Vader and Patrick Bateman only serves to underscore the point more clearly. There can no longer be any doubt: Internet Explorer 8 is dying.

Let's keep to the facts and look at the numbers.

Internet Explorer 8 leader Steve Ballmer states that there are 7000 users of Internet Explorer. How many users of Internet Explorer 6 are there? Let's see. The number of Internet Explorer 8 versus Internet Explorer 6 posts on Usenet is roughly in ratio of 5 to 1. Therefore there are about 7000/5 = 1400 Internet Explorer 8 users. Internet Explorer 5 posts on Usenet are about half of the volume of Internet Explorer 8 posts. Therefore there are about 700 users of Internet Explorer 5. A recent article put Internet Explorer 7 at about 80 percent of the Internet Explorer * market. Therefore there are (7000+1400+700)*4 = 36400 Internet Explorer 7 users. This is consistent with the number of Internet Explorer 7 Usenet posts.

Due to the troubles of LOL, abysmal sales and so on, Internet Explorer 7 went out of business and was taken over by Apple who sell another troubled browser. Now Apple is also dead, its corpse turned over to yet another charnel house.

All major surveys show that Internet Explorer has steadily declined in market share. Internet Explorer is very sick and its long term survival prospects are very dim. If Internet Explorer is to survive at all it will be among browser dilettante dabblers. Internet Explorer continues to decay. Nothing short of a miracle could save it at this point in time. For all practical purposes, Internet Explorer is dead.

That crippling bombshell sent Internet Explorer fans into a tailspin of mourning and denial. However, bad news poured in like a river of water.