Bootstrapped Startup Saves Over $100K By Dropping IE

TechCrunch ^ | 4-1-2012 | Tyler Rooney

[Jeff Chandler]

t’s not every day that you start a business and quickly decide to say “no” to 70 percent of your potential customers. In retrospect, this turned out to be 4ormat’s secret weapon.

At 4ormat, our goal is to provide an easy way for creative professionals to create and manage an online portfolio website. Although the portfolio itself looks great in all browsers, to this day, the portfolio building interface does not support Internet Explorer. And we don’t just mean IE6 or even IE7. We mean every version of Internet Explorer.

[Jeff Chandler]

It would be a wonderful thing if I could do that in my business.

[proxy_user]

If you read the article, they mean they don’t support it only as a development tool.

Developers are supposed to be willing to download and install whatever tools they need to get the job done.

[rawhide]

Went to 4ormat.com and tried to sign up. Here is what I got back:

4ormat Login & Signup

Sorry, Internet Explorer doesn't support the technology used on the 4ormat administrative interface.

4ormat has been built using the latest web based technology, allowing you to modify your website with simplicity and ease. The administrative interface requires that extra kick that is only available on the browsers listed below. You will need to use one of the browsers listed here to create and modify your 4ormat website.

Keep in mind that all portfolio websites created with 4ormat work perfectly across all browsers as well as all versions of Internet Explorer.

Browsers we recommend:

(Safari,Firefox,Google Chrome)

[The Duke]

Well, if they don’t support my beloved Opera browser (mightiest of the browsers!) then that leaves me out!

[Nahanni]

I never used any AOL products for the same reason I will not use any Apple or Google ones. it is the same reason I do not ‘do’ Facebook or Twitter. They are all little more than thinly veiled spyware.

Two of the browsers listed are from companies that are some of Obama’s biggest funders and enablers.

One company (Google) aided and abetted the travesty we are seeing in Egypt. This company thinks nothing of cooperating with the Chinese government to suppress its people and is working with the Obama regime to do the same here. It should tell you something that the Europeans do not trust Google to protect its citizens privacy.

The other has Al Gore on its board of directors and the only thing that is more intrusive into you computer than Apple software is to go to the IRS website and click on that OK button when the box pops up telling you that if you wish to proceed further you give the government the right to basically ‘own’ your computer and everything on it.

No thanks.

[Glenn]

Who, in the profession, doesn't have at least a few of these browsers on their desktop?

If you don't, you should be out of business anyway.

[steve8714]

Google Chrome is crap. It takes up a lot of your memory.

[CodeToad]

Stupid people making stupid business decisions based on emotion. Not everyone will succeed.

[cynwoody]

If you read the article, they mean they don’t support it only as a development tool.

That's correct. And the websites their development tool creates and manages are IE compatible.

Moreover, their app is targeted at visual arts professionals, who are likely heavy Mac users anyway and will therefore have Safari as their default browser. And any Windows or Linux users can simply download Firefox or Chrome (or Windows Safari), and they'll be good to go.

Smart move on 4ormat's part, I'd say, especially given their measured user base:

Whenever you can forget to support IE, you should.

[dfwgator]

I cannot use IE anymore because it’s so slooooooooooow.

[Future Snake Eater]

There are a number of issues with your post.

One company (Google) aided and abetted the travesty we are seeing in Egypt.

How? Twitter was supposedly the big means of getting the word out. Besides which, do you really expect anyone to believe that Google had agents "on the inside" helping to bring Egypt down? Obama and his buddies are far more culpable than the mere existence of technology. Should Twitter have shut down all communication lines in and around Egypt?

This company thinks nothing of cooperating with the Chinese government to suppress its people

You're referring here to Yahoo! and Microsoft. Google made a business decision to move into China to provide better services to the exploding Chinese IT market. They actually were pretty uncooperative with China's methods of doing business. For every 10 or so demands of censorship made on Google, they only implemented about 7. They kept trying to use their muscle as a big MNC to force Chinese officials to compromise. Yahoo! and MS censored anything and everything right away, no questions asked, even when it came to the truly Draconian measures China wanted implemented around the Olympics.

and is working with the Obama regime to do the same here.

Net neutrality is dead. They failed.

It should tell you something that the Europeans do not trust Google to protect its citizens privacy.

Privacy laws are completely different in Europe than they are in the U.S. In the U.S., your data belongs to the company you use it with. In Europe, the laws state that your data belongs to you at all times. Don't like it? Don't bitch about Google and Facebook, bitch at the lawmakers.

[cynwoody]

Supposedly, MS finally gave IE a major overhaul starting with version 9. However, being too cheap to spring for Windows 7/8, I can't vouch for that firsthand.

[Jeff Chandler]

stupid business decisions

Perhaps. Or they could be making a measured judgement of the costs of supporting non-standard software vs the cost of lost business.

As a web developer, I normally cannot afford to leave out hacking for IE, but their customer base is probably different than mine.

[BlueMondaySkipper]

Privacy laws are completely different in Europe than they are in the U.S. In the U.S., your data belongs to the company you use it with. In Europe, the laws state that your data belongs to you at all times. Don't like it? Don't bitch about Google and Facebook, bitch at the lawmakers.

Kind of ironic isn't it?

An artist writes some songs and makes an album. You "buy" the album but really never "own" it as you have only purchased the "rights" to it. Others retain actual ownership even though you might own the physical and electronic media where it's located. Now I myself create some intellectual property and send a copy to a buddy's GMail account and suddenly Google owns it? I'm thinking that the actual ownership trail of this has not been thoroughly tested in court yet.

[Future Snake Eater]

I'm thinking that the actual ownership trail of this has not been thoroughly tested in court yet.

Probably not. There are so many permutations, it's going to have to be challenged practically on a case-by-case basis.