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I run two different sites, both of which are far from being tech-oriented - one is a music site, and the other is a movie review site. The stats on both sites consistently show an increase in FF usage from month to month. I know I don't bring in a fraction of the hits that Google and the other "major" sites do, but if this is any indication...

Thus far this month, we're looking at the following:
MMMDI
1,867,564 hits
64.1% IE / 29.6% FF / 1.9% Safari (the big three)

MvMMDI
186,191 hits (yes, this site is still relatively new and unestablished)
59.9% IE / 34.5% FF / 2.1% Safari (the big three)

I run two different sites, both of which are far from being tech-oriented - one is a music site, and the other is a movie review site. The stats on both sites consistently show an increase in FF usage from month to month. I know I don't bring in a fraction of the hits that Google and the other "major" sites do, but if this is any indication...

Thus far this month, we're looking at the following:
MMMDI
1,867,564 hits
64.1% IE / 29.6% FF / 1.9% Safari (the big three)

MvMMDI
186,191 hits (yes, this site is still relatively new and unestablished)
59.9% IE / 34.5% FF / 2.1% Safari (the big three)

There are still some companies out there who have very reasonable policies in regards to their material. For example, I recently rented City Of Rott, and the disc begins with the typical FBI warning. However, this is a different type of warning: it basically says "rip this if you want, distribute it to your friends if you want, do whatever you like, just don't profit from it" (from memory, not a direct quote, but the idea is there).

You're not going to get that from the latest Hollywood blockbuster, but there are plenty of alternatives out there.

It's funny, I just wrote a small commentary on my experiences with Netflix last night. You can read the entire thing here, or just read my blurb about throttling below:

While I don't have access to any hard numbers or proof one way or the other (nobody outside of Netflix does), I can say that the conspiracy theories about this so-called practice are hugely exaggerated. I would imagine that something like that is in place for users who receive three movies on Monday morning, rip them to their computer, ship them back Monday afternoon, and repeat the process every day, all month. However, from personal experience, this is not the case with average or even above-average users; I watch a movie every other day or so, sometimes more, and have never been "throttled". I ship out a movie, they receive it the next day and ship me a new one, I receive that the next day... so simple, very fast, and no "throttling" to be found.

And no, I'm not a new user; I've been with them for over two years now.

This makes the third time someone has allowed me to pimp this link out:

My thoughts on Wal-Mart: The High Cost Of Low Price.

I watched and reviewed that some time ago, in case anyone out there cares to hear another opinion of it. Excellent movie.
</Cheap Plug>

Why do you (or anyone you know) put ads on your page?

I use Google ads on my sites. I also use Amazon's webservices on album pages. Why? It's quite simple. The hosting bill is $90 / month, and I'd rather not have to pay that out of pocket.

On a good month, I make enough from ads to cover the bills and buy a CD or two. On a bad month, I make enough so that I only have to pay around ten bucks out of pocket for the hosting.

As far as annoying / flashing / flash / click the monkey ads go, I never have and never will use them. Making cash from the site to pay the bills is nice, but I would rather shut the sites down than be just another site overloaded with that crap.

I've picked up a few decent ones that I haven't seen mentioned yet.

The Severed Arm (1973) - Decent is the best word here, but worth the buck.
Swamp Women (1955) - Cheesy, very cheesy... but strangely entertaining.

I've picked up a few decent ones that I haven't seen mentioned yet.

The Severed Arm (1973) - Decent is the best word here, but worth the buck.
Swamp Women (1955) - Cheesy, very cheesy... but strangely entertaining.

Then again, there's always a small minority of users who will blame the webmaster instead of the browser for their lousy web experience.

Amen. My newest project (shameless plug) is still small in terms of popularity, but I receive numerous "why does this look weird / not work in IE" messages regardless. Trying to explain to people that the site is standards compliant and that IE doesn't properly support standards is somewhere in the range of explaining the laws of physics in terms of how much people grasp the concept.

According to the stats for this month, 14.7% of viewers are still using Windows 2000 or lower. That number was 16.2% last month, but I'm sure the small drop is thanks to only four days worth of data being in the system for this month. Combine this with 75.3% of viewers using IE (0.5% using IE 3.0!), and I can only imagine the feedback I'll be receiving when the site grows in popularity.

Disclaimer: the site is standards compliant unless you check out a review where one of us has used an & symbol in the review text. MySQL character encoding, been busy, need to fix it, blah blah blah.

Then again, there's always a small minority of users who will blame the webmaster instead of the browser for their lousy web experience.

Amen. My newest project (shameless plug) is still small in terms of popularity, but I receive numerous "why does this look weird / not work in IE" messages regardless. Trying to explain to people that the site is standards compliant and that IE doesn't properly support standards is somewhere in the range of explaining the laws of physics in terms of how much people grasp the concept.

According to the stats for this month, 14.7% of viewers are still using Windows 2000 or lower. That number was 16.2% last month, but I'm sure the small drop is thanks to only four days worth of data being in the system for this month. Combine this with 75.3% of viewers using IE (0.5% using IE 3.0!), and I can only imagine the feedback I'll be receiving when the site grows in popularity.

Disclaimer: the site is standards compliant unless you check out a review where one of us has used an & symbol in the review text. MySQL character encoding, been busy, need to fix it, blah blah blah.

Then again, there's always a small minority of users who will blame the webmaster instead of the browser for their lousy web experience.

Amen. My newest project (shameless plug) is still small in terms of popularity, but I receive numerous "why does this look weird / not work in IE" messages regardless. Trying to explain to people that the site is standards compliant and that IE doesn't properly support standards is somewhere in the range of explaining the laws of physics in terms of how much people grasp the concept.

According to the stats for this month, 14.7% of viewers are still using Windows 2000 or lower. That number was 16.2% last month, but I'm sure the small drop is thanks to only four days worth of data being in the system for this month. Combine this with 75.3% of viewers using IE (0.5% using IE 3.0!), and I can only imagine the feedback I'll be receiving when the site grows in popularity.

Disclaimer: the site is standards compliant unless you check out a review where one of us has used an & symbol in the review text. MySQL character encoding, been busy, need to fix it, blah blah blah.