Stan Schroeder over at Mashable decided to argue in favor of Mozilla and Opera’s complaints reegarding Internet Explorer 8 becoming the default browser when the user upgrades to Windows 7 RC via Express settings. It took me a few reads to realize he was serious, so I’ll spare you the hassle of reading through his post and summarize it for you:
wwwaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh!
Let’s look at a logic chain here:
- User installs third party browser and makes it the default on Windows Vista.
- User upgrades to Windows 7 down the road, chooses express upgrade options.
- IE8 replaces the Vista default as the new default browser.
So, Mozilla and Opera are arguing that a new Microsoft browser which was installed onto Microsoft’s OS shouldn’t become default when the user just wants to install Windows and be done with it? Think about it this way: A user chooses to go with express configuration settings because the user doesn’t want to deal with setting anything up on his/her own. The user, therefore, consents to using Microsoft’s default settings, and Microsoft’s defaults include setting up Internet Explorer 8 as the default browser. If the user really wanted to customize any settings, the user would go ahead and do so without any problems. Keep in mind that installing Windows 7 also means, by extension, installing Internet Explorer 8.
There is no problem here; all I see is whining, and it’s getting ridiculous. Mozilla and Opera should work on creating a compelling product, and while I agree that Opera is better than Internet Explorer 8 in many ways including memory management (Mozilla’s RAM issues prevent me from considering it for anything), the point is that Windows belongs to Microsoft, and thus, Microsoft can do whatever they want with it. These “dominant market position” arguments don’t fly because Mozilla and Opera are both using the argument selectively; you don’t see them making nearly as much noise about Apple and the iPhone/iPod touch/Mac.
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I agree, but what can you do? The browser war is mostly politics anyway.
The problem with Mozilla’s, Google’s, and Mozilla’s arguments here is that any changes in browsers to Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, and Opera to a minor extent increases the ad revenues to Google. Google aleady has a monopoly in ad search revenues. So we want to break one monopoly only to help create a second? Besides, Microsoft’s marketshare in Internet Explorer has been dropping steadily. It will eventually lose its monoply status thanks to changes in the browsing market.
However, helping Google enhance their market position by using this very selective browser argument doesn’t make things right. Two wrongs do not make a right. If anything, if Microsoft is forced to debundle I.E. or forced to carry Chrome, Safari, and Opera in Windows, I think Microsoft should start making Internet Explorer for Apple OS-X, Ubuntu, other OSes and other carriers. Then Microsoft uses its legal power to force ALL OF THEM to carry I.E. in their OSes. Lets see how they like those apples when Apple, Cannonical, Red Hat, Sun, and others are “forced” by EU laws to carry I.E. as well as their own. This is one potential example of the proposed laws that could backfire and help Microsoft re-establish browser dominance.
@SolidJediKnight: It’s not going to happen (obviously, especially since Microsoft discontinued IE for Mac), but that is a very good point.
I agree with Bryant, though. If you choose the Express setup, you’re choosing Microsoft’s definition of Express. That’s just how it works. Windows setup developers have much more important things to worry about/work on then integrating all sorts of third-party support.
@SolidJediKnight: It’s not going to happen (obviously, especially since Microsoft discontinued IE for Mac), but that is a very good point.
I agree with Bryant, though. If you choose the Express setup, you’re choosing Microsoft’s definition of Express. That’s just how it works. Windows setup developers have much more important things to worry about/work on then integrating all sorts of third-party support.
Jason: “I agree, but what can you do? The browser war is mostly politics anyway.”
I love Opera and use it as my primary browser, but this whole case is a political stunt. Opera gets more press news and the EU gets to look like it is important and means something. Unfortunately for Opera the success of non default browsers like Mozilla’s Firefox and Google’s Chrome make it hard for Opera to have a strong case. I listened recently to a podcast where they mentioned that while Firefox’s and Chrome’s market share went up Opera’s did not. Maybe the team working at Opera were upset a little and wanted to complain to the EU.
Opera has a great browser and many browser firsts were done by and seen in Opera browsers. They need to stop wasting money in the courts and spend it in more marketing or something to get people’s attention if they want increased share.
Opera’s mobile browsers kick butt compared to the competition. My Opera Mini browser beat my friend’s iPhone Safari in buying concert tickets, and we were both AT&T.
Big deal… Opera and Firefox already keep their own damn “Check if I’m a default browser at startup” checked by default, so users will be asked again if they actually want to run Opera or Firefox. What’s the problem here, *really*?
Also, the “Express” mode was pretty clear to me it used predefined web browser settings for the search engine etc, so it’s not a long stretch of logic to assume it applies to the browser as well.
Having said that, I by quite a bit prefer other browserse than Internet Explorer 8, but I’ll join the defense here since I think it’s due.
@ SolidJediKnight: Not going to happen, sir.
Microsoft ditched IE for MacOS a long time ago because they couldn’t compete with Safari. Now that was a rather bad mistake (yes, a BAD mistake), Tasman was a far superior engine to Trident (at the time, this was really close to the dawn of the new millennium). MS really needed to utilize Tasman across the entire board (Windows, MacOS, and UNIX) and perhaps today, IE could be loads better than what it really is.
(Off Topic: IE needs SVG support, I can honor a bit of whining from others just because IE8 does not support SVG).
@Stitch,
If you haven’t been paying attention to the CanSecWest Conference, Safari was easily compromised by Charlie Miller twice. 2 minutes in 2008, and less than 10 seconds in 2009. Nowhere did I read that IE was compromised at that speed at the CanSecWest Conference. Technically on paper Safari might be better in some areas, but for general all purpose browsing, IE gets the job done. I seriously doubt that Microsoft would open IE up to other platforms, however if Microsoft is put in a position to have to carry at least 3 other browsers, this opening of IE to other platforms would be a logical retaliatory response to the EU’s move.
i disagree. ive already setup FF once, why should I have go out of my way to make it dafault again.
Evo, if that’s the case, don’t express-install.
It’s not a matter of going out of your way. If you want to install the OS but don’t want it to make certain changes which you would otherwise allow it to make in Express mode, simply tweak the settings instead of flying express… or just don’t install it. It’s up to you.
Evo, your being lazy. Just pure lazy, it would take less time to make firefox default again than for me to finish writing this crap.
Jedi, the 2008 safari exploit was ALSO due to lazyness on Apple’s part to build safari&webkit against the latest pcre.
I can sort of see where Mozilla/Opera are coming from.
This upgrade is for the Windows operating system. Microsoft are meant to have cut the ties between Windows and IE, so an upgrade to the OS shouldn’t be changing web browser settings. Update IE7 to IE8 by all means, but they shouldn’t really be changing user settings unless they have to.
Though TBH, I personally wouldn’t mind taking 20 seconds out of my life to change the default back to Firefox. Not that I will be doing any way as I’m still on XP and am getting a new machine for W7.
And talking about the “Firefox/Opera etc is not your default browser, do you want to change this?” box, anyone noticed how Safari have Yes and No the other way round? Is this this common practice for Apple apps, or a sneaky trick?
Hmmm… just loaded Safari 4b and noticed they’ve changed that actually!