Internet Explorer Users, Listen Up
My browser stats have been moving around a little recently. Firefox is usually in the low 70 percentile (browser stats since ate April ‘07) for me, with Internet Explorer recently edging up to almost 20%! Gah! The worst part is that most of the IE users are on IE6! What is this?! This is an open letter to 20% of you. That’s a lot, seeing as I just passed 10000 unique visitors since late April.
Listen Up
Right now, look up at the top left of your browser. If you see the Internet Explorer logo, read on. This article details why you’re likely in ignorance of web browsers and how your life could be easier.
What is IE, FireFox, and a Browser?
Internet Explorer is the very first gateway to the net for many of us, unfortunately. Microsoft can afford to write inferior software, such as IE 6 and 7, because it comes stock on most of the computers sold, world wide.
IE is just a web browser. One of many. I believe IE serves one purpose in life- to be used to download FireFox or another superior browser. FireFox provides a faster, easier, safer and all around better experience to browsing the web than IE. An IE7 user? Don’t worry, FF has all the features you know and love. In fact, IE stole them from various browsers anyways.
Why Should I Switch from IE to FF?
Did you know, that it is an undisputed fact that IE kills babies.
Keep in mind, I am promoting FireFox here, but there are other alternatives to IE, and they will be listed at the end of this article. The following is a list of some of the reasons you should switch from IE. There are many more, but those are for another day. Email me if you’re skeptical.
- FireFox is more secure. Secure isn’t exactly a word I would use to describe any release of IE, but I’ll give it the benefit of the doubt. IE might as well be a virus in the first place. FireFox leads the industry in staying on the cutting edge of security and preventing phishing (people trying to scam you).
- FireFox is faster. You can also tweak FF for better performance. FireFox is like a Lion, preying ninja-like, on IE, a Two Toed Sloth.
- Make it yours. FireFox is totally customizable. FireFox is also open source, but you probably don’t know what that means. If you’re a developer of some sort, you don’t use IE.
But those are totally the generic points! I digress. Users need to see that first. There’s more.
- Fight the man. You know what, this isn’t about sticking it to the hypothetical overlords, it’s about competition in an industry dominated by a bully who puts out sub-par software because they can.
- Help your friends, the web developers. It is not advised for web developers to have children or small animals, as IE can cause so much stress and anger, over time, it can be fatal.
- Internet Explorer does not display websites properly. Yes you read that correctly. IE runs on an inferior display engine. Do you want to see what you’re meant to? Make switch.
- The IE team makes no effort to improve any of this. IE7 crushed hopes of users everywhere. A simple UI overhaul and introduction of features all other browsers have had for years. Tabs and RSS? OMIGOG!1 Don’t let them do this.
Myths and Why You Might not Want to Switch
Not sure? Maybe one of these points fits you:
- I will loose all my data! Bookmarks, history, oh no! Myth. All your data can be imported at any time, and you’re prompted to during the installation.
- I don’t want to clog my hard drive and slow my computer down. Spoken with true ignorance, if this crosses your mind. IE7 and FF2 are roughly the same size.
- I don’t like change. Well, I bet you don’t like viruses, slowness and overall suckage either.
- I can’t get used to FF. Try some themes, get some cool plugins that make it better for you, make it your default browser and give it a week or so. After a while you won’t even notice.
- I won’t notice? Why does it matter then? Everything above is what matters. You won’t notice because you were dumb enough to be using IE in the first place and the good stuff is going on behind the scenes.
Other Browsers Superior to Internet Explorer
Like I said, FireFox isn’t your only option. It is the most popular alternative, most supported, and most competitive, but you make the call.
Download one Today
Right now. You will not regret it, in fact you’ll thank me. Then one day you’ll be a total browser snob like me. Then you’re set.
FIREFOX!!
So now I’d like to hear from you. What browser do you use? IE is required for testing, but if you use it as your default browser, why? Do you know of the alternatives? I want to know the thought process here.
Leave a comment
Henry
September 1st, 2007 at 3:31 AM
YAY, i’m so glad you finally did this post. All of his words are true, and Connor i use safari. I have ‘pimped’ it out so i’ll post a screenshot, email me {[AT]} henrylegge {[DOT]} co {[DOT]} uk, if you are a mac user and want your safari like this.
The link to the screenshot is http://www.imagewasp.com/uploads/Username/82Picture 4.png
Henry
September 1st, 2007 at 3:32 AM
Sorry to double post, no edit function here’s the link again it didn’t work last time.
http://www.imagewasp.com/uploads/Username/82Picture%204.png
Nils
September 1st, 2007 at 8:25 AM
Hey there. I’m not sure if I ever commented before, but here goes. And I’ll cut right to it: were you drunk or overdosing when you wrote this?
Okay, that’s overstating it a bit, but if I’m honest, I didn’t think this was a very good post and it misses the mark completely.
People use IE because they either like it (?) or because they don’t know any better, i.e. the majority. But you’ll never convince people who don’t know a lot about computers or the web when you start out using words like UI and engine. It certainly won’t work when you tell them they’re dumb and ignorant.
Add to that the poor and rambling structure of this post, the shaky spelling, the nonsense phrases, the OMGs and exclamation marks… and no one’s even going to know what you’re talking about.
I’ve been using FF for a number of years too now and I try to convert people whenever I can. But I honestly believe this kind of ADHD-style writing could actually work counter-productive.
Overall, I like your blog and what you’re saying here, but before you send something out that others care about too, sit on it for a day and try to write it the best way you can. Not in between shots of caffeine concentrate, okay?
David Hopkins
September 1st, 2007 at 9:57 AM
I love you point:
“I believe IE servers one purpose in life- to be used to download FireFox or another superior browser. ”
When i’ve just re-formatted, FF comes straight after installing Nod32. Althought once I had to download it through the command line because I used some program to delete loads of Windows crap like IE and those pesky ‘My Videos’ folders that just wont go away.
Connor Wilson
September 1st, 2007 at 10:06 AM
@Henry: Did you really have to plug TT? :\
@Nils: Drunk, no? Late, yes. As dumb as this may seem, it was an awesome idea when I wrote it. I’ll run through and fix the poor spellings and stuff, but the points will stand. I guess I type too fast for my own good and misspell words into other actual words.
I don’t know, maybe I was fishing for those kinds of comments. I think what I was really aiming for is to see a lower IE % in a couple of days. I guess the one thing I left out was that a majority of the IE users are IE6 users (here), and the whole “upgrade your browser” thing really gets to me.
Plus, someone who doesn’t care enough to get the new, shiny browser, and keep up to date shouldn’t really find a blog about web development and stuff. I know I’ve been writing about blogging lately, but I wonder what would happen to those stats is I went more in the web dev direction.
Nils
September 1st, 2007 at 10:43 AM
Actually, that is the one point that surprised me the most. IE6 readers on a ‘tech’ blog? Now that is worth a post.
Look, I’m not saying you’re not an okay guy or even that your thinking is dumb. I just think it’s a pity that a good idea, like this is, drowns in what I believe is sloppy writing.
Anyway, at work we’re preflighting an educational web site using screencasting (with Flash movies) as a training tool. I’m going crazy about all the ‘what if’ and ’should we do this’ issues we encounter preparing it for people using all kinds of obsolete settings and apps. I’d like to say ’screw them’ too as a matter of fact.
The thing is, you can’t teach people who know nothing about computers, how to use computers, by using computers… Dilemma
Cheers
Ryan
September 1st, 2007 at 7:15 PM
I noticed that Wordpress displays a ‘better browsing” button when you view it from IE. I spotted in when I was in my admin panel at a hotel a few months back.
Razor
September 1st, 2007 at 8:22 PM
In my opinion opera beats firefox for speed as ff is a memory hog. though opera has its problems its still my browser of choice
Andy
September 1st, 2007 at 8:40 PM
Skipping the point about writing standards of this post, I think it’s an interesting point.
However if people want to use IE it’s not worth worrying about in my opinion.
IE will ultimately have to appease developers with better standards support in order to maintain their market share as less and less developers are putting up with IEs rendering errors.
Firefox has memory issues I’ve always found. Infact, I find it crashes more than IE. Now that I’m on Mac I use Safari. It’s much quicker. I still use Firefox to debug javascript and fix errors when coding but ultimately I find that Safari is much better for regular browsing and seems quicker to respond.
David Hopkins
September 1st, 2007 at 8:41 PM
Opera has some similarities to IE in that it ignores some important standards and has poor support for margin and padding. The most standard compliant browser in Konqeror, which alreaady supports most of CSS3.
Adam Mckerlie
September 1st, 2007 at 11:27 PM
Before I went to university I was totally oblivious to what Firefox was. When I went to university we were using Fedora Core 4 which only has Firefox so I reluctantly began using it. It wasn’t until I downloaded FF onto my laptop that I truly began using it.
Firefox is awesome and I love it. While it does have pretty bad memory management issues I can deal with it. FF would be using 160k for something IE would use 40k.
Anyways Firefox is definitely the better browser of the two.
Daniel Johnson
September 2nd, 2007 at 7:38 AM
I can understand your frustration with IE. It truely is a moern day nusiance. But I agree with the others in that you kinda messed up in your execution.
I personally use Opera and swear by it. Opera was and still is the true innovator, long before Mozilla showed up.
Ever since I switched a few years back I hardly ever need to check for Spyware because Opera is that safe. And yet I have increased my internet usage substantually. Opera also managed my email, rss, contacts and notes. Its fantastic.
I have gone back and found this forum post from Sitepoint, that you will probably find useful. Tell me what you think Connor.
http://www.sitepoint.com/forums/showthread.php?t=483778
Deron Sizemore
September 2nd, 2007 at 9:01 AM
Good thing I wasn’t drinking a soda or something because if I had been, after reading that quote, I would have ruined my laptop. lol
Tomos
September 2nd, 2007 at 2:11 PM
I love firefox, and the web developer plugins that are available are a godsend, but I find that firefox is faster than IE, but slower in opening etc than Opera.
Adnan
September 2nd, 2007 at 6:47 PM
LOL. I’ve gotta say Connor, this was one of your best posts I’ve ever read - very humourous, and I agree 100% with you. IE totally sucks, and I absolutely adore Firefox. IE just messes up all of my sites which is annoying to have to fix!
Nathan
September 3rd, 2007 at 11:19 AM
“Now that I’m on Mac I use Safari.” I’m still with windows, and i’ve started using Safari. I think it’s good so far.
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