RockMelt: Google Chrome, Only Better 144
Barence writes "PC Pro has an in-depth review of RockMelt, a new browser which it claims is better than Google Chrome. RockMelt is built on the same Chromium core as Google's browser, but adds a host of social networking, news feed and search features that elevate it above Chrome. The App Edge, for example, 'allows you to set up feeds for anything from your Twitter or Gmail accounts to your favourite news sites, and get a little iPhone-style numeric reminder of the number of items awaiting your attention.' It does, however, lack Chrome's built-in Flash, PDF and audio players."
...the social browser? (Score:3, Interesting)
This is how marketing works (Score:5, Interesting)
A company will send out press releases to media outlets (magazines, newspapers, tv shows / stations, bloggers) to inform them of new products or offerings.
In some cases, marketing people will directly contact the magazine or newspaper by calling up and pitching a story based on their product or offering.
Depending on the media outlet, thinly veiled advertising is achieved by the marketing person making a good impression on the media outlet, or by offering a free unit, and in some cases gifts. In some seedier situations money is exchanged so that the media outlet will portray the product in a favorable light, so that the reader's distrust of direct advertising can be circumvented through the illusion of new or useful information.
And while I certainly don't mean to suggest that RockMelt paid off PC Pro for this story, more-so, I'd posit that PC Pro is just happy to get the hits.
Too many browsers. (Score:5, Interesting)
I would be happier to learn that I had less choices in browsers. But that is the developer bias. Still, it seems to me that you really have to raise the bar if you want to be taken seriously, not just be Chrome+1. And I'm resistant to features which are tied in to services offered by certain companies (Facebook, Twitter) instead of just standardized services (RSS, FTP).
Larger question... would we not be better served if we started treating the browser more like a commodity item? Basic, standard features in an unglamorous browser, and... that's it. And then with a nice stable development platform that doesn't change around every 2 weeks, the real interesting features can start arriving at the web application layer. Standardize the browsers so we can forget about their individual features.