Firefox's 'retreat' ensures Microsoft excels

Contractor UK ^ | Aug 22, 2005 | Contractor UK

[Bush2000]

Firefox's 'retreat' ensures Microsoft excels

Open source web browser Firefox has lost the momentum it has steadily gained since it was unleashed last year, according to Web analysts at Net Applications.

The online portal’s unique Hit List service reveals a slump in the Mozilla browser’s market share, falling from 8.7% to 8.1 % in July.

Coinciding with its demise, was the advance of Microsoft's IE that has gained some of the ground surrendered in June, climbing back from 86.6 % to 87.2% last month.

The revival for the dominant browser comes on the back of average monthly losses of between .5 to 1% for Redmond, as Firefox started to gain acceptance among a wider audience than just tech-savvy users.

When asked by Contractor UK whether Microsoft’s sudden gains were from the unveiling of a new IE, Net Applications said a re-launch tends revive industry interest, and could have bolstered Microsoft’s market share of the browser market.

When a company launches a new product, there is always renewed interest in what the company has produced and it would also be fair to say that this may have had an effect, said a member of the Hit List team.

Although, there have been browser issues with Windows 2000 in the news, so it is possible that again you may see a dip [in Microsoft’s market share]. Right now, people are looking for security and whenever there are issues with the security of one's system, they will use what they feel will be the most secure.”

Besides Net Applications, web developer site W3 Schools, confirms that adoption of Firefox is falling, just as IE is reaching its highest share of the market in 2005.

According to W3's data on specialist users, Microsoft IE (6) enjoyed a 67.9% share in July, improving to 68.1% in August matched against Firefox’s top share of 21% in May, which has now dropped to 19.8% for the last two months.

Observers noted that both sets of analysis concur that Microsoft’s loss, up until now, has been Firefox’s gain, but over the last month roles have reversed.

Security fears concerning Mozilla and its browser product have recently emerged, coinciding with Microsoft’s high-profile trumpeting of its new safer browser product (IE 7), complete with glossy logo.

Experts at Net Applications said they were surprised at Firefox’s sudden retreat, saying they expected a slow down before any decline.

Yet they told CUK: “Whenever there may be problems with security, there always is a decline with users changing browsers.”

Data from the Web analytics company is based on 40,000 users, gleaned from their global internet operations, prompting some commentators to question the so-called ‘global decline’ in the Firefox market share.

The Counter.com reportedly finds that between June and July, Firefox actually increased its share by two points, and overtook IE5 for the first time ever.

The Web Standard Project suggests webmasters should treat data from web analysis providers with caution, before rushing to make service changes.

So what can we conclude?” asks the WSP, a grass roots project fighting for open access to web technologies.

“Not much: Mozilla-based browsers are probably used by just under 10% of the web audience and their share is growing slowly. IE5.x is probably used by somewhat less than that and its share is declining slowly. IE6 is roughly holding steady.”

Meanwhile, Spread Firefox, which measures actual download rates of the browser, reports that it took just one month for the Mozilla Foundation’s showpiece to reach 80 million downloads in August – from its July total of 70 million.

At the time of writing, Firefox had been downloaded 80701444 times, meaning adoption rates of over 10m occurred one month after Net Applications says Firefox bolted in light of the dominant IE.

[chronic_loser]

"FETCH, SPOT!"

Good boy.

[thecabal]

Communism is hilarious. What better way to kill 65 million people...

Do you freak out when you're channel surfing and run across Hogan's Heroes by accident? Cuz Nazism is no joke, no sir...

[Loud Mime]

Tell me of a good alternative to outlook......I use it for lots of stuff.

[thecabal]

He said MS web server, which is of course *IIS* You took that to mean Operating system which nobody who works with web servers would do. If I said Sun's web server nobody would think Solaris (well nobody with a clue to spare), they would think SunOne.. If he said MS browser would he still be talking about windows? does MS database refer to windows? does MS office suite refer to windows?

Why bother arguing? Obviously these are the same geniuses that call up PC tech support and complain "Hey, my Microsoft ain't workin', FIX IT!!!"

[chronic_loser]

Tell me of a good alternative to outlook...

Ximian Evolution

[Golden Eagle]

No he didn't, he threw out a graph of Apache which can run on Microsoft servers and said that proved they were declining. It doesn't add up, he didn't properly explain himself or use correct terminology, but of course nothing you two ever come up with ever does.

It's all about smoke and mirrors and bending the truth, that exact Apache chart has been thrown out countless times by you guys even saying it represents Linux servers, ShadowAce did it again just the other day. Give it up, it's an old argument that's been shot down countless times, and was again here.

Bottom line, as my link above shows (and there's plenty more out there) Windows is shipping on 70% of all new servers these days, and that Apache link in no way tells you how many are what. It could be as many as half are Microsoft servers and you have no way of proving otherwise.

[N3WBI3]

No I like watching your blood pressure rise because of a software license that you have every choice of not using..

[Golden Eagle]

Why are you still posting? You still haven't told us how many nuts are down at Mozilla putting those propaganda posters together.

[N3WBI3]

No he didn't, he threw out a graph of Apache which can run on Microsoft servers and said that proved they were declining.

with the text What's significant in this graph is that MS has stopped growing in its web server market share.

His post had nothing to do with Operating systems, it was about web servers, if you're too thick to see the difference you have to be a phb at best, and a teenage kid at worst..

It doesn't add up, he didn't properly explain himself or use correct terminology, but of course nothing you two ever come up with ever does.

His post said " What's significant in this graph is that MS has stopped growing in its web server market share.

What is Microsoft's webserver

a) Windows
b) IIS
c) Linus Thorvald's father was a communist

[Golden Eagle]

Actually, I have unusually low blood pressure, and can't stop laughing at the idiocy displayed on here by those who try to deny the obvious. Most typically results in bolded fonts, name calling, personal insults and generally ridiculous excuses. Funniest of all is you think it means you're winning the argument, without ever a single link or corroborative piece of evidence of your own. All emotion, no logic or fact. No wonder you love this stuff the DNC is into so much.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x665385

[Hank Rearden]

At the scene of the shooting, police also cordoned off much of the store's parking lot, telling anyone whose car was within a perimeter that they would have to leave their vehicles there.

Eudora for email, Agendus for scheduling - I sync the latter with a PDA version of Agendus as well.

[Golden Eagle]

Any idiot can tell you, Windows with Apache is a "web server". And that graph is probably full of them, since Windows is shipping on 70% of ALL servers.

[Hank Rearden]

IE still doesn't load.

That sure sounds to me like a feature, not a bug. Or a system upgrade.

[thecabal]

Why are you still posting?

Because I will not allow you to silence me because you don't agree with me.

You still haven't told us how many nuts are down at Mozilla putting those propaganda posters together.

Now I think you are just pulling my chain. However, let me try to be a little more succinct.

Or are you denying those are their ads? Wouldn't surprise me, of course.

I deny that this image

is an ad from Mozilla.org. How much more obvious can it be. The image clearly states where it comes from.

I do not dispute that the three banners you posted are from Mozilla.org. I do, however, think that you are as paranoid as Gen. Ripper if you think they indicate that Mozilla==communism.

[Golden Eagle]

Deny it all you want. It exists, and communists created it.

"Free software is how the communism comes..."

[N3WBI3]

So MS office on a mac is not Microsoft's office suite? after all its running on a mac and probably should not be counted towards their market share. That seems to be where you're going with this. Apache is a web server, Windows is an operating system..

What is Microsoft's web server called? This is from Microsoft's IIS page

"Internet Information Services (IIS) 6.0 is a powerful Web server"

"IIS helps organizations increase Web site and application availability while lowering system administration costs."

[N3WBI3]

"The Web sites of Senator John Kerry and the Democratic National Committee run mainly on the technology of the computing counterculture: open-source software that is distributed free, and improved and debugged by far-flung networks of programmers.

In the other corner, the Web sites of President Bush and the Republican National Committee run on software supplied by the corporate embodiment of big business - Microsoft."

Ok so Bush was running IIS and KErry was on a Linux/Apache server... whats communism.org run on?

[Golden Eagle]

Ok so Bush was running IIS and KErry was on a Linux/Apache server... whats communism.org run on?

It runs on whatever their service provider is using, but it's not clear since some of the Netcraft info is "unknown" which is unusual. We do know that within the content of that website, they refer to Linux as a perfect example of communism.

[Golden Eagle]

I already pointed out he never said IIS, and was attempting to smear "Microsoft" web servers which could easliy include servers running Apache. This particular graph is often used to try to smear Microsoft, when in fact half of those systems could actually be Microsoft systems, and there's no way you can prove that they aren't. It's indiscriminate data, and you can't twist it no matter how desperately you want to, and often attempt to try.

[N3WBI3]

Ok So bush running IIS, important. Kerry running Linux, important. Communism running IIS, nothing to see here... I guess you'll give commies a pass for that..

BTW how do you know bush and Kerry were not having someone else host their site like communism.org does?