I've been quiet for a bit (except for twitter), the day job has been getting in the way of the day job (that makes sense to me). Though I may be quiet on this front, I am not generally a quiet person at the day job. For example, last week I inadvertently (ha! right!) started "the browser wars" here at work with the tech group.
It all started with our blogs not displaying correctly in IE8. I happened to respond that it struck me as interesting that our blogs display correctly in Chrome, Safari (for XP no less), and Firefox...but not IE. Begging the question, what is everybody doing right? (Okay, I actually said, what is Microsoft doing wrong.....).
This prompted a response pointing to browser stats, and a raging discussion on the merits of IE versus the others...browser wars. Someone even suggested that the other browsers were (egads) fads. I'm sure many of you know what I'm talking about...you've had these wars...possibly lost friends to them.....
So this got me thinking. I had a pretty good idea of our own stats for our website, but what about our blogs? Did they both match the browser stats above? I couldn't resist and here's the results:
Onestats (I picked worldwide because I picked worldwide on our stats too):
Our Website:
Our Blogs:
Yes, you've read it right. Firefox wins when it comes to our blogs. I'm sure others have seen this trend on certain types of websites as well (and note that Chrome beats out Safari). My analysis: Our blogs are techie, techies visit them, techies are more open to new technology...hence the whopping change in browser usage.
Which is of course why we had the argument last week...techies care about this stuff. I can bet that the average household isn't having neighborhood arguments with signs on their front lawns declaring browser affinity...but maybe they should. It's gotta be good to criticize technology (that's another longer discussion, but check out this article by John Siracusa on arstechnica.com as a starting point).
I think we'll see more and more change in browsers as more generations rise up that our Internet savvy (and Apple consuming).
And before I launch another battle right here and now, let it be known that I think all the browsers have flaws...which is why I have Chrome, Safari, Firefox, and IE on my desktop and interchange them depending on the site and situation. Ridiculous, I know. But until one of them manages to do it all right....it's the world I live in.
Hence, I predict that we'll actually see more and more a flattening of the numbers as more people start to shift and split their browser usage depending on what they're doing. Currently, I predominantly use Chrome at work (Firefox and me don't get along, though I used to love it, due to a memory glut issue that kept crashing my work) and Safari at home (on Vista no less). On my Linux OS (my Dell Mini 9) I use Firefox.
So now I leave it there. Share with me your own browser war stories or your own stats. I'm intrigued.
Because, let's be honest. It's no fad. And yes, thems fighting words.
UPDATE (June 18, 2009)
Just read another notice about how Google Chrome is rising fast. We'll see if it can hold on past being a 'fad'. Check out this article: Chrome Market Share
It all started with our blogs not displaying correctly in IE8. I happened to respond that it struck me as interesting that our blogs display correctly in Chrome, Safari (for XP no less), and Firefox...but not IE. Begging the question, what is everybody doing right? (Okay, I actually said, what is Microsoft doing wrong.....).
This prompted a response pointing to browser stats, and a raging discussion on the merits of IE versus the others...browser wars. Someone even suggested that the other browsers were (egads) fads. I'm sure many of you know what I'm talking about...you've had these wars...possibly lost friends to them.....
So this got me thinking. I had a pretty good idea of our own stats for our website, but what about our blogs? Did they both match the browser stats above? I couldn't resist and here's the results:
Onestats (I picked worldwide because I picked worldwide on our stats too):
| Worldwide | March 2009 |
|---|---|
| Internet Explorer | 79.79% |
| Mozilla Firefox | 15.59% |
| Apple Safari | 2.65% |
| Google Chrome | 0.86% |
| Opera | 0.54% |
| Netscape | 0.31% |
Our Website:
| www.4Point.com | March 2009 |
|---|---|
| Internet Explorer | 69.09% |
| Mozilla Firefox | 24.67% |
| Apple Safari | 3.96% |
| Google Chrome | 3.67% |
| Opera | 1.07% |
| Netscape | 0% |
Our Blogs:
| blogs.4point.com | March 2009 |
|---|---|
| Mozilla Firefox | 56.16% |
| Internet Explorer | 33.65% |
| Google Chrome | 4.76% |
| Apple Safari | 3.27% |
| Opera | 1.56% |
| Netscape | 0% |
Yes, you've read it right. Firefox wins when it comes to our blogs. I'm sure others have seen this trend on certain types of websites as well (and note that Chrome beats out Safari). My analysis: Our blogs are techie, techies visit them, techies are more open to new technology...hence the whopping change in browser usage.
Which is of course why we had the argument last week...techies care about this stuff. I can bet that the average household isn't having neighborhood arguments with signs on their front lawns declaring browser affinity...but maybe they should. It's gotta be good to criticize technology (that's another longer discussion, but check out this article by John Siracusa on arstechnica.com as a starting point).
I think we'll see more and more change in browsers as more generations rise up that our Internet savvy (and Apple consuming).
And before I launch another battle right here and now, let it be known that I think all the browsers have flaws...which is why I have Chrome, Safari, Firefox, and IE on my desktop and interchange them depending on the site and situation. Ridiculous, I know. But until one of them manages to do it all right....it's the world I live in.
Hence, I predict that we'll actually see more and more a flattening of the numbers as more people start to shift and split their browser usage depending on what they're doing. Currently, I predominantly use Chrome at work (Firefox and me don't get along, though I used to love it, due to a memory glut issue that kept crashing my work) and Safari at home (on Vista no less). On my Linux OS (my Dell Mini 9) I use Firefox.
So now I leave it there. Share with me your own browser war stories or your own stats. I'm intrigued.
Because, let's be honest. It's no fad. And yes, thems fighting words.
UPDATE (June 18, 2009)
Just read another notice about how Google Chrome is rising fast. We'll see if it can hold on past being a 'fad'. Check out this article: Chrome Market Share
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