Is IE Usage Share Collapsing? 575
je ne sais quoi writes "Net Applications normally releases its statistics for browser and operating system usage share on the first of every month. This month, however, the data has not shown up — only a cryptic message stating they are reviewing the data for inexplicable statistical variations and that it will be available soon. Larry Dignan at ZDNet has a blog post that might explain what is happening: Statcounter has released some data that shows a precipitous drop in IE browser use in North America, to the benefit of Firefox, Safari, and Chrome. At the end of May, StatCounter shows IE usage share (for versions 6, 7, and 8 combined) at around 64%; at the beginning of June it is now about 56% — an astounding 8% drop in one month. We should keep in mind the difficulties in estimating browser usage share: this could very well be a change in how browsers report themselves, or some other statistical anomaly. So it will probably be healthy to remain skeptical until trend this is confirmed by other organizations. Have any of you seen drops in IE usage share for Web-sites you administer?"
Re:Not Surprising (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:My statistics (Score:5, Interesting)
Does your web site not work on Safari or are you reading your statistics wrong?
Re:It was to be expected (Score:5, Interesting)
What I noticed is a dramatic shift in the listening to your IT guy lately.
People actually listen now instead of blowing me off and going right back to their porn surfing with IE.
The bad economy makes people actually listen when the IT guy says "I'll be back in 30 days to collect another $250.00 if you dont change your internet habits."
I love a bad economy, it forces people to be less stupid.
MJ Factor, plus, it is summer (Score:3, Interesting)
First, the MJ factor - these stats my be low, but I bet they will rise again once all the web-surfing born-again Michael Jackson fans are reflected in the stats for July.
Also, the summer factor is huge - at $WORK (Public school district) we have over 1,000 windows boxes that are now sitting idle through August, their IE 7 and IE 8 browsers aren't flipping through the most popular websites anymore. There are likely MILLIONS and MILLIONS of idle Windows machines at Universities and public schools skewing the stats down for IE 6, 7, and 8.
Re:My statistics (Score:3, Interesting)
Firefox:
June 6, 2009 - July 6, 2009 63.55%
May 6, 2009 - June 5, 2009 63.77%
Internet Explorer
June 6, 2009 - July 6, 2009 20.83%
May 6, 2009 - June 5, 2009 21.68%
Opera
June 6, 2009 - July 6, 2009 5.86%
May 6, 2009 - June 5, 2009 6.48%
Chrome
June 6, 2009 - July 6, 2009 5.62%
May 6, 2009 - June 5, 2009 5.07%
Safari
June 6, 2009 - July 6, 2009 3.44%
May 6, 2009 - June 5, 2009 2.33%
Re:Proliferation of mobile browsers... (Score:5, Interesting)
The perception of myself (and finally! lately!) my non-technical friends...
is that using IE
a) has a ton of obnoxious ads- some are loud- some take over the screen.
b) is like walking around with a huge "kick me" sign on.
c) is frustrating because of the lack of many useful plugins (where would I get all these glorious HD Videos-- FINALLY "Blues Travellor" without firefox).
d) is frustrating because "they" own your browser-- not you. It's behavior serves "them", not you.
But mainly the virus/kick me thing.
After my bud clicked on a link (just a frikkin link!) on the yahoo message boards, he had to reinstall his entire computer!?!?!
With Firefox, Flashblock and Noscript- you are pretty darn safe.
Chrome got a lot of press- and to be honest, I've been looking at Safari myself. (once you break yourself of IE, you ask-- okay, but is there something else EVEN better than this?)
Re:My statistics (Score:2, Interesting)
2001 called and said you can't use that tired old argument anymore. The default install of Firefox since 2.x (I believe) does not spoof IE in the user agent string. Firefox being the largest market share aside from any version of IE, the weight given to any other browser would be a statistical blip at best. In fact, if I remember correctly Konqueror in KDE3 and 4 actually spoofs Gecko by default. And Opera stopped spoofing MSIE after 6.x, IIRC.
Re:My statistics (Score:1, Interesting)
Well, his site is the Ballmer fan-zone http://www.ballmerzone.com/content.htm [ballmerzone.com]
so what do you expect?
Is this New York Post for nerds? (Score:2, Interesting)
I'm not on MS payroll, but honestly, is this article worth any attention?
I hope FF gets 99% of the market soon, but this type of baseless speculation certainly does not help.
Re:MJ Factor, plus, it is summer (Score:3, Interesting)
Plenty of time to go install FF3.5 on all those machines so the students will enjoy working in the lab again... ;)
Re:hmm.... it's summer? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Proliferation of mobile browsers... (Score:3, Interesting)
The important number is not so much the current percentage, but what the rate of change is. I've seen sites where IE has held steady at 80% and sites where it was never over 30%.
The story shows an 8% IE drop in a single month, which is so huge that it has to be a change in the sample size or methodology. Just as an example, at an old job we used the Omniture analytics service. They signed up Apple Computer to their service, and instantly the "internet" stats for OS X went from 3% to 12%.
Re:My statistics (Score:3, Interesting)
My stats show an increase in IE 7 at the expense of IE 6 but not much else. Also many spiders like msnbot.
I wonder if some of the stats change is due to Bing? That might change the mix of browsers going to some sites.
Slashdot browser shares?? (Score:5, Interesting)
What I really would like to see is the browser share of the Slashdot logs.
Re:My statistics (Score:3, Interesting)
Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul (partial)
IE 82.2 80.7 79.6 77.2 78.1 77.3 75.3
Firefox 11.9 13.4 14.3 15.8 14.0 14.6 15.5
Safari 3.2 3.5 3.7 4.4 4.3 5.2 6.4
Others 2.7 2.4 2.4 2.6 3.6 2.9 2.8
The site is for a financial company and skews toward an older demographic.
Re:Proliferation of mobile browsers... (Score:4, Interesting)
We still use IE6 where I work. We have too much stuff hard wired to it. Yet we need another browser - one that is up to date and compatible - in order to use a lot of sites and to test new externally facing applications. So we have Firefox installed everywhere too. We can install and run Firefox without disturbing our corporate standard. We can't do that if we upgrade IE.
Some are also running Safari 4 on Windows and Mac OS/X and there are a few other odds and ends around as well, but the bottom line is that if your company must continue to use IE6 for its internal apps, then they pretty much have to support a non-IE browser in order to effectively use today's internet.
Re:It was to be expected (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:MJ Factor, plus, it is summer (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:My statistics (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:My statistics (Score:3, Interesting)
I used to. The Canadian employment insurance website for some inexplicable reason checked the browser and demanded either netscape or IE they fixed that but then inexplicably locked you out if your OS wasn't mac or Windows. My choices were either travel for 45 minutes and file my reports in person, install windows, or spoof my browser ID. Thankfully they have since come to their senses.
St-Hubert ordering system had the same IE or netscape (I need my rotisserie chicken) as did several other food ordering systems. They all got fixed as Firefox gained market share.
Re:In utter disarray? (Score:2, Interesting)
Besides which, if you're going to point to the usage note in your link for "Her", you should also read the usage note for "Him", where the issue at hand is explicitly addressed.
FWIW, you're also mistaken about what kind of pronoun is being used. It IS a personal pronoun being used, not an indefinite pronoun. We are referring to a specific individual (though of indeterminate gender, which has nothing to do with whether it's a definite or indefinite pronoun).
But, whatever, dude/dudette. You can get your panties/briefs/thong/boxers[1] all in a bunch over the fact that some people feel the use of he/him to be sexist, and insist on thrusting[2] a standard of language which offends some people upon the rest of us. Or you can instead just go with the flow[3], not get offended by the fact that some other people get offended, and go on your merry way while still having grasped[4] the idea/s the writer was attempting to communicate.
[1] I know, I'm an insensitive clod, you probably don't wear underwear
[2] My apologies in advance to feminists for using such a gender-typical verb that has connotations of rape.
[3] In no way is this referring to menstrual flow. Again, my apologies in advance to any man, woman, trans-gendered, non-gendered, or multi-gendered individual or group of individuals who read this.
[4] Again, apologies for using a verb that evokes imagery of the oppressive male taking advantage of the less powerful female, for we all know that females are the more powerful, or rather, equally powerful, or rather power is a poor term because it is a male construct.
You want to see PC taken too far? There you go.
I have a guess... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Proliferation of mobile browsers... (Score:3, Interesting)
Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:It's because IE 6 support was droped on some si (Score:3, Interesting)
We stopped supporting it on our site - www.ausgamers.com. If you go to it in IE6 you get a big fat warning at the top advising you to upgrade along with a link to Firefox.
Re:My statistics (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:It was to be expected (Score:3, Interesting)
There's an inexhaustible supply of work thinking for people who can't or won't. (Sort of like there will always be work for sysadmins, because even here in the future nothing works.) The problem is that the work itself resembles being paid lots of money to dredge through sewage by hand.
Better to be paid lots for metaphorically dredging sewage with your hands, rather than next to nothing for actually doing it ... http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/picturegalleries/howaboutthat/5077475/Is-this-the-worst-job-in-the-world.html?image=1 [telegraph.co.uk] (image shows a dude cleaning an Indian sewer in his underpants - they have safety equipment but it's too cumbersome and hot to use).