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Firefox Growth Slowing?
ninja_assault_kitten writes "Silicon.com has an interesting article on the apparently slowing growth of Firefox. To quote the article, 'The slackening of Firefox's growth could mean that the browser has converted a substantial proportion of its natural constituency, thought to be early adopters and the technically savvy. It could also show that the browser's widely publicised security flaws have begun to undermine the foundation's argument that people should switch from IE to be safer.' One thing's for sure, with the release of 1.0.3 and now 1.0.4 we can probably expect to breach the 80 million download mark shortly."
80 million I'm assuming a composite...
Arash Partow
Arash Partow's Philosophy: Be a person who knows what they don't know, and not a person who doesn't know.
All the geeks on planet earth are now using Firefox.
That was just warmer days coming and more people going outside.
Why are the download pushed as if they somehow indicate the number of firefox users. Ask yourself, how many times have you downloaded firefox?
...Firefox will reach the 80.592 million mark. Then we have a long wait until the 94.68715 million mark.
What's with the arbitrary "marks"? 80 million? What about 75 million? That's 3/4 of 100 million which is much nicer than saying 4/5 of 100 million. Better yet, what about 100 million being the next "mark"? That's 7/7 of 100 million.
It seemed like the publication of those security flaws came from Mozilla itself... and a fix was out in about a week.
Who tells us about IE flaws and how long does it take for them to get fixed?
Simple Machines in Higher Dimensions
And IBM is encouraging in-house employees to use Firefox.
There are still several "business" websites such as financial services, B2B and corporate intranets that rely on ActiveX and IE.
While Firefox's growth may be slowing, it is still growing -- just not as fast. When the IE-only sites start to get more complaints about usability from their customers, then you will start to see a steady stream of corporate support for Firefox.
-Charles
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
Slashdot Reports Non-Events as News?
According to this article on silicon.com, Firefox is still growing! As of April 29th, Firefox had captured 6.8 percent of the browser market and IE slipped to 88.9 percent market share. Break out the champagne, folks!
Uh yeah, nice article. Glass half empty...
It could also show that the browser's widely publicised security flaws have begun to undermine the foundation's argument that people should switch from IE to be safer.
Um... I don't think that's it. While the security flaws might be causing some to think twice, the real issue is market saturation. There does not exist a desktop computer sold in the last 10 years that didn't come with a web browser. They are essentially entering a 100% saturated market. Nonetheless, I think their accomplishments are stunning.
Early adopters, tech savve, and their family. I know I've gotten pretty much anyone related to me on Firefox. My grandmother loves it and has since suggested to others to have me install it for them. I haven't been evangelizing it as much lately, as I've converted most of my target audience. Myself, I just recently switched to mac (well, sorta, I still have my Windows desktop which is using Firefox), and I've been using Camino. Works quite nicely.
download firefox 1.0.4 and have it say version 1.0.3 on help->about?
Well, that's one way to do it - if you keep releasing security fixes, you drive the download count up.
.. paranoid crackpot leftover from the days of Amiga.
Don't forget about "sensitive dependence upon initial conditions", and inherant unpredictability.
I think that's completely made up.5 13459
To see some Alexa graphs for Firefox, Mozilla, Microsoft, etc. see what I posted earlier today:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=149252&cid=12
Over on http://simpy.com/ I see this:
Netscape/Mozilla 29971 (36.3%)
Unknown 24985 (30.3%)
Explorer 22249 (26.9%)
Safari 2441 (3.0%)
Opera 1560 (1.9%)
Opera CEO's cross-Atlantic swimming trick didn't help the browser's market share. Safari appears stagnant. Mozilla % keeps growing slowly.
Simpy
I'm apathectic about firefox.
IE works, both have holes and the taskbar is my 'tabs'
The only thing that nearly made me switch was mouse gestures. But then I found strokeit http://www.tcbmi.com/strokeit/
So here's a geek with ie instead of ff.
Could it be that Firefox users are blocking marketing firm WebSideStory's tracking images? These guys are just as evil as DoubleClick in assembling a massive database of information on web users' browsing history. Wouldn't ignorant IE users be more likely to allow WebSideStory to track them?
nuf said.
They're coming off a major publicity push. 1.0 is settling in. When 1.1 comes out, or something happens to make people excited, they'll start gaining people in a swell again.
I can't get over how minute these things get. It isn't about Firefox losing people, or about trends changing. It's about Firefox growth "slowing"! Possibly! If our statistics are right! Well gee.
So, the rate of growth of the number of Firefox users is slowing, or for you calculus geeks out there, the second time derivative of the number of Firefox users is presently negative.
The good news is, the *third* derivative is positive, which means that the change rate of the growth rate is increasing. Soon enough, the growth rate will even out and eventually start increasing again!
Oh, and don't even get me started about the 5th derivative...
"In a 32-bit world, you're a 2-bit user. You've got your own newsgroup, alt.total.loser." -Weird Al
...that more people are buying into Apple computers than ever. True, Firefox is available for Mac OS X, but most Mac fanatics such as myself using OS are discovering Camino, which is also produced by Mozilla.
Ever since 1.0, FireFox has felt sluggish running on Linux. Its cpu usage is much higher than before, and goes to 100% when it's waiting for a server response. I've noticed this on both Ubuntu and CentOS, so it's not likely a distro-specific issue (unless they're shipping debug builds or something). I might end up switching to other Gecko based browsers like Galeon, Epiphany, or just the plain old Mozilla as none of them seem to be afflicted by this problem.
Also, I bet their counts don't include all the Linux distributions that now come with FireFox in their repositories. You used to need to download and install it yourself, which could explain at least a bit of the slowdown. That and the fact that even the tiniest FireFox vulnerabilities seem to make headlines.
Personally I install it on any friends or familys computers that require my support. Its part of the price for free tech support.
If I find they have been using IE they get a 1 strike & they're out. If I find they have been using it a second time.
"Sorry, my time is more important to me & I prefer not to keep fixing the same ol' same ol'"
Go Away! Not for Sale
If you have to look at the second derivative before you start finding bad news, maybe the news isn't really all that bad
Simple version: if you used the Firefox upgrade mechanism, they don't.
IIRC, it's slightly more complicated than that. Even so, the number is incredibly hard to guess: lots of people download more than once, and lots of people (think office rollouts or the like) download only once fore many machines. It's a guesstimate, and even if it were a good guesstimate it still is pretty meaningless, since it doesn't take into account how much people actually use the browser.
One of the people on http://planet.mozilla.org/ had a good post on this recently (that I can't find right now), what I've said here is pretty much a ripoff of my memory of what they said.
There are 11 types of people in the world: those who can count in binary, and those who can't.
Or it could mean that firefox's growth just isn't exponential, 'cause that would be pretty hard to keep up for very long...
There are 11 types of people in the world: those who can count in binary, and those who can't.
For once, I'd like to actually see some empirical evidence.
Every mega-corporation hires it's own sub/pseudo company to do an "audit" of the market saturation/absorbtion rate.
Much like politics, it's not newsworthy to report that candidate X has lost +/-4 points. Let's see what browser the people choose.
Unlike the US election, I'm sure that the people will make the right decision (when it affects them directly - [ex. No Popups, No Spyware, No viruses, etc.]).
People may be stupid and they should be guided, but they should never be abused or manipulated.
Don't think that a small group of dedicated individuals can't change the world. It's the only thing that ever has.
I downloaded it multiple times, and am still using Maxthon. It has two problems for me: 1. substantially high load. When browsing some sites it's constantly running at full CPU load. 2. unstable. Configuration dialogs freezes, bottons strangely grey out, etc. Users like me are picky. So keep up the good work, and work harder.
Nobody cares about Firefox's exploits (that last like what? 2 days? stfu already
They'll soon hit 200 million mark. I've downloaded firefox no less than 30 times myself. I have two machines at home, and four at work and on all firefox is the default browser. Plus, I download upgrades to each machine every time they come out.
Village idiot in some extremely smart villages.
For some reason, extensions refuse to load on my powerbook, giving me an error about mozilla/chrome permissions or some crap. I've deleted everything in sight, still does it.
Safari is my browser now, for everything.
Fellowship 9/11
Using IE instead of Firefox over security concerns is like keeping your eyes closed when hooking up with a drugged up bag of herpes prostitute.
Just stick with Firefox. It's like using a rubber, which at least is 90+% effective at keeping out the herpes.
Let's see YOUR top executive swim across the Atlantic! Oh, wait...
I was hoping that the growth rate would keep on growing forever...
Lasers Controlled Games!
as the link would always dl about 2 megs then drop with teh message it was complete...
So I tried wget and it ended up dling what seems to be the wondows version, regardless of teh fact I was requesting the linux version...
Finally gave up and dl'd the english GB version,,
So yeah, at least 80 million this way...
that you need to chill the fuck out.
"oh no, slow growth for 5 days!? firefox is over!"
that's what it sounds like to me. stop seeing trends in white noise.
__________________________________________
Take comfort in your ignorance.
Grandmaster Plague
The big picture is that people are realizing there are viable alternatives to Microsoft products, and they are using those alternatives. For a long time it was essentially IE reigning supreme, and now there are a variety of alternatives, with Firefox leading the pack and picking up new users by the millions.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
They are a very good service, don't get me wrong... But don't mis-represent others hard work. Secunia usually just collects and [re-]publishes other peoples work.
tuytumadre's post to FD was the first that hit mainstream AFAIK.
argan0n
If every person reading Slashdot and having a web site made their respective sites compliant with the standards (and thereby with Gecko/KDE browsers) and completely ignored IE, Firefox growth would really explode. It is a common mistake thinking that the mega portals drive the development in the market; it is actually the many many less important sites combined that make a difference.
But even Slashdot people (and other tech savvy people) are so conservative as to still respecting the impact of IE, and since even their web sites generally don't require Gecko/KDE, there's no reason for the more clueless masses to switch. Extensions for spoofing and such do not appeal to the non-savvy people.
It is that simple. We have these great new cars (the Fox, Safari, Mozilla, etc.), but the roads need to be rebuilt to allow these cars to utilize their full power.
Dang, now I've got to break out links so I can post with two browsers at the same time.
Dang, now I have to break out links so I can post with two browsers at the same time.
/. didn't make me wait two minutes.
Well, I could have done that if
Heh.
Okay, back to work.
Yea I'll troll: if MSIE didn't have all those exploits FF would have browser share equal to netscape today.
Bugs which annoy me (YMMV):
- After some browsing FF windows may stop redrawing (including browse buttons)- you need to resize/scroll down or restart windoze. All other progs work just fine.
- Java don't work here on my FF. Works in msie, Opera and standalone. Maybe I just have too many different java installs. No biggie but occasionally I just have to fire msie (I noticed almost everyone using FF *HAS TO* go msie for some sites and it is not only for activex stuff)
- http authentication is a mess - FF don't understand there can be more then one authentication within one url (it just seems to remember one set of user/pass per url)
- FF grabs wrong icons for sites occasionally.
- worst bug I stumbled upon twice: if you happen to hard-reset a comp with FF open you may lose all your bookmarks.
- FF wants to save everything in same directory. How about remembering where I last saved pics, html or zip/tar files? How about title of document becoming saved file name? msie is a bit better about that.
There are some nice features, sure. Personally I don't care about tab browsing. I love being able to search within wikipedia or IMDB. I love developer plugin and DOM inspector. But for today FF is still ridden with bugs annoying the shit out of me.And my point is? You can't expect everyone to love FF as it is. And you can expect (fear?) MS will learn a lesson and top FF. Let's be more humble and critic about FF and less in love with its success, please. Remember, FF success lies more in msie bugs then in FF greatness.
I very much dislike it when a company engages in phony accounting. Can you imagine if Microsoft claimed each patch download as a new sale of Windows? Likewise, I dislike it when people misrepresent facts.
Hitting 80 million downloads is not as impressive as it sounds when a lot of those downloads are because FF does not have a patch infrastructure in place.
Please try not to misrepresent. Yes it's true, FF may be downloaded 80 million times, but a certain percentage of those downloads are users upgrading a minor revision, which is effectively downloading a patch.
The Mozilla foundation is not (or should not be) interested in maximizing the number of downloads of the software, but maximizing the number of happy users of their software. That's how they will accomplish their mission: "The mission of the Mozilla project is to preserve choice and innovation on the Internet." ref: http://www.mozilla.org/about/
Saying the recent security flaws in Firefox is causing people to stay with IE is like saying people would rather drive a Ford Pinto because they realized that BMWs aren't completely safe. No one with an ounce of intelligence said Firefox is completely safe. The advantage to Firefox and OSS in general is the process. There's a great deal more transparency. If Firefox has a bug, at least I would know about it and can take actions on my own initiative to mitigate it. With non-OSS software, however, I'm at the mercy of the people who wrote the software.
EvilCON - Made Famous by
Firefox is just coming off of a growth spurt.
Most things do not grow evenly through their whole life. Firefox grew explosivly in part due to the Wall Street Journal ad and a lot analysts pushing the security benefits. Now that there's been an equal amount of noise about the near-trivial exploit, people are getting cold feet.
I mean, some of the people who were considering switching are now asking about the exploit. One that did switch is asking how hard it is to switch back.
I say that it's a theoritical exploit that nobody has actually used to compromise a computer. If they're still listening, I add a joke contrasting IE's real world exploits. The news has hurt adoption rates of Firefox, but that's just because it's bad news, not because it's real.
People want to hear "Firefox is a pancea for all your ills", not "Every piece of software can have problems". Expect Firefox growth to pick up again after people don't remember this recent bug, and expect a few people to remember this bug years from today.
----
Evil will always win because good is dumb. -- Spaceballs.
It is natural for the first iteration of the Firefox browser to approach a limit for its market penetration, due to compromises made in order to get a v1.0 release out the door. The next iteration will build on this great beginning, and hopefully prove that the Open Source development (and marketing) model is a force to be reckoned with in the commodity software marketplace.
Nothing to see here, please move on.
Of course, Firefox grew quick at the begimnning through the efforts of Firefox geeks and fans, as well as people who were really fed up with MSIE. What comes now is a slower, more tedious process: Get Firefox to a) corporations b) schools and univeristies c) governmental institutions and d) non-techie private users.
Firefox 1.1 is expected in June, and it will be a far more polished version than 1.0. There will also be an automatic installer that will make it easy to roll out Firefox in a big network. Firefox is already bundled with many Linux distributions, and more are to come. It would be good if OEMs packed Firefox on new windows computers and if ISPs distributed it to their customers (perhaps along with Thunderbird to combat spam and e-mail malware).
Meanwhile, the fight against MSIE-only sites continues.
Here are some running percentages for IE and Firefox over the past year:
2004-05: IE 94.1%, Firefox 0.6%
2004-06: IE 94.0%, Firefox 0.9%
2004-07: IE 93.1%, Firefox 1.3%
2004-08: IE 93.1%, Firefox 1.8%
2004-09: IE 92.6%, Firefox 2.0%
2004-10: IE 92.5%, Firefox 2.5%
2004-11: IE 91.9%, Firefox 3.1%
2004-12: IE 89.3%, Firefox 4.5%
2005-01: IE 88.0%, Firefox 5.6%
2005-02: IE 87.9%, Firefox 5.7%
2005-03: IE 88.0%, Firefox 5.9%
2005-04: IE 87.3%, Firefox 6.2%
2005-05 (first 12 days): IE 88.8%, Firefox 5.9%
The big jump towards Firefox occured late last year with the Mozilla Foundation's marketing blitz. Since then, there does indeed appear to be a slowing up in migration towards Firefox. This month's stats so far actually show a reversal.
-> People like me forcing everybody around to switch, by installing from my downloaded installer? -> Distributions on free CDs along with IT magazines? Security flaws that get fixed within a day, even if they are critical, should not be used as red herrings. There would be a large number of people who haven't updated their Firefox installation just because it's too much of bandwidth. So the 'composite' argument does not hold too much of water. With a proper campaign in semi-IT literate markets, you can achieve much greater penetration for Firefox. You just have to get the lay user overcome his/her inertia to try another browser. You might not be able to convert Opera users, but IE lock-ins are prime target. I know. I have converted many, only it doesn't show in my Spreadfirefox score. My next target is the new IT administration team: I'll get them to install Firefox on every PC they get called to administer, at my workplace. What should really be counted is the pagehits by FF on various mainstream sites that measure and report such things.
Chat with other atheists http://secularchat.org
"There are still several "business" websites such as financial services, B2B and corporate intranets that rely on ActiveX and IE.
While Firefox's growth may be slowing, it is still growing -- just not as fast. When the IE-only sites start to get more complaints about usability from their customers, then you will start to see a steady stream of corporate support for Firefox."
Ummm...if these are are either specialized sites (read: only available to a few), or intranets? Then you may see little to no change. After all, the only reason those IE and Active X sites would be getting complaints, is if either the site wasn't performing as needed to begin with, even before there was a Firefox. Or they somehow decayed into a non-performing heap. In such controlled environments, IE's shortcoming aren't as big a problem. When it's exposed to the "Wild, Wild West", that's when the issues show up.
2005 IE 6 IE 5 O 7/8 Ffox Moz NN 4 NN 7
May 61.9% 3.1% 1.9% 24.6% 3.6% 0.2% 0.9%
Apr 62.3% 3.4% 1.9% 23.9% 3.5% 0.2% 0.9%
Mar 63.8% 3.9% 1.8% 21.8% 3.7% 0.2% 1.0%
Feb 64.8% 4.2% 1.9% 20.4% 3.9% 0.2% 1.1%
Jan 65.3% 4.4% 2.1% 19.3% 4.0% 0.3% 1.1%
FIREFOX is spreading like profound epidemic. No less then Computational triumph of human spirt.
I suggest you read Slashdot
Are you suggesting that Firefox -- software which everyone clearly agrees is open source -- is somehow imperfect?
That's crazy talk!
What the heck site am I reading?
let's say that X represents a position the derivative of X is the velocity the 2nd derivative of X is the acceleration the 3rd derivative of X is (I'm not kidding, this is official:) the "jerk" So, what we're actually saying is that the jerk of firefox users is negative.
n/t
Of course the growth rate will slow at some point. It does for every product. Hopefully articles like this won't take away from the momentum Firefox has been building. A drop in the growth rate merely signifies the need for more community activism.
They could have said "reaches saturation point", but that doesn't make a sellable/clickable headline.
Let's not forget that is
a) 80 million, only assisted with a single ad and word of mouth
b) 80 million, DESPITE a pre-installed, um, "alternative"
c) 80 million that saw those features first that may or may not make it into IE7. Note that IE had been going stale for lack of competition - natural consequence of the MS approach to, um, "innovation".
d) 80 million that are not exposed to the bad and insecure excuse for a coding platform that is ActiveX.
e) 80 million that don't care on which platform they browse, which together with OpenOffice represents a good 90% of the end user community.
Now, the last one is where the threat to MS resides. Usability is very rapidly dissappearing as a distinguishing factor.
Insert
Okay when I saw the /. entry, I knew I had to say what I got here. The announcement of a security flaw in Firefox is the cause of the decelerating growth? This is insane; immediately I think that everyone assumed that Firefox is totally safe. Gah! It's not a silver bullet! It's good but it can't be perfect. Nothing is! Oh, so Firefox has one problem which will be fixed pretty quickly like most of the OSS world, but people will go and hide behind IE again since they think that the reports are false.
..'!! Every e-mail I got back from their "support" was garbage; all about searching their "Knowledge Base" (which lacked any knowledge about this by the way) and some FAQ URLs. Screw 'em. Let IE burn, it's garbage ever since it's been forced down Windows's throat.
Ugh, how long does it take for IE patches to come out, if ever??? Only if there's a widely-spreading virus or trojan exploiting it, then you get a patch miraculously within a day or two. Otherwise they just wipe your complaining away like a speck of dust. On top of that I bet IE has a lot more problems to worry about than Firefox could ever have. I know it's possible for IE to wipe out files on the hard disk; I doubt Firefox could do it unless there is some sort of ported ActiveX support forcefully ported to Firefox.
Since I mentioned MS wiping you off like dust, I say that because way back when I submitted a report about the Up button not working when IE was in FTP mode. The Up button was calling the same routine that Back did. I tested it by going down a few directories and dumping the entire history cache. Up did not work as Back did not. I knew that was proof that Up didn't work right because you don't need a history to `cd
By the way, I remember the IE4 alpha PNG on the feature list. I was shocked to see it again for IE7. Took long enough! but wait we don't know if they'll actually do it this time.
Gentoo Linux - Wouldn't have it any other way. And fuck beta.
yes, they should just pack it up, it's all over for Firefox.
at least it will have BSD to keep it company
Well if a recently survey that had been conducted was right, and most people/organisation use OSS because there is less dependancy on commercial software providers. I dont think we'll have much to worry about.
:) But not always.
Slowing down doesn't mean stoping... Somtimes
Giving IE users a taste of their own medicine since 2005 - http://pods.-is-a-geek.net/
I use wget and less. who needs anything else?
My other first post is car post.
...which was triggered by using SpamCop.
SpamCop tells you your average time between the timestamp of the spam message and when you report it.
Add to this situation:
The suggestion original story said the tapering might be because some reported errors have been publicized ala: "Gee, it's not flawless so it's no better than IE".
Why not apply the SpamCop theme to FF bugs? No one in their right mind has ever claimed software is without bugs and the OS world certainly hasn't said that. In fact, one of the assets has been any reported bugs can be worked with because there's a confirm|fix|release development team available twenty-four hours/day. Contrast this with Microsoft's preferences of keeping all announcements offline until they've had a chance to ponder problems on a longer-term scale.
Why not put this resource (global coverage) to use for better promotion (and bragging rights?)
Why not try something fairly accessible (e.g. whereever it's going to be the most prominent for anyone visiting the site, particularly if they are first-timers or press, and provide the option of a rundown - a very, very simple fashion (or an option as to what degree or scale of information the user wishes to see) - you aren't wanting to scare anyone off - quite the opposite. You want this information to be a selling point. You'd want it along the lines of and probably sorted by most recent at the top:
Bug#i Reported: TimeStampj Confirmed: TimeStampk Fixed: TimeStampl available: TimeStampm Confirmed: TimeStampn Total Elapsed Time: TimeStampo
(in TCL)
proc sortit {list} { return [lsort -integer $list] }
I pushed out Firefox at work (university). It on all the machines. I didn't make it manditory, though it did cross my mind.
Well lately, I am reconsidering. At this point I've deicded Firefox stays on all images, and I'll recommend people use it, but I'm not going to push it any harder.
Why?
Well the honeymoon is now over in regards to security. I know as well as anyone that OSS doesn't magically mean secure. Many programmers have an arrogance about them that they think all security bugs are perfectly obvious and if only THEY looked at the code they could get rid of them. No, if they were obvious, probably wouldn't be there in the first place. So you can have a ton of eyes, doesn't mean you are bug free.
Initally the low usage was enough to make it worth while. No one was tarrgeting it so who cares? Well now it's getting popular, and the bugs are rolling in. It's not a bad record at this point, but it's enough I want to see how it develops. It's also an increased concern since Firefox won't patch itself. Unfortunately we have no central patch system and it doesn't look like we'll be given money to get one any time soon. The only way things get patched is if they do it themselves, if we do it manually, or if we reghost the system.
So since Windows knows how to update itself, and thus IE gets updated as well, the only concern is that the bugs are patched before they can be exploited. With Firefox we need to worry that they are patched with enough time for us to get the patch out before there's exploits going around.
This is a real concern, and probably much larger than IE only sites. I haven't encountered one of those in ages, and I use Firefox as my exclusive browser at home and work. As of now the only pages it seems to have problems on are ones with embedded video and that's a FF problem, not a design one.
The security issue though, that's a concern. If FF doesn't learn to autopatch and if we start seeing exploits in the wild beofre or a short time after a patch, I'll probably have to pull it and go with Opera instead (our instution just secured a site license for Opera) or perhaps back to IE.
The security isn't much worry to geeks for personal systems, that can patch their own shit with minimal fuss, but it's worrysome to instutions where having to manual deal with a patch to 3rd party software can be a pain.
.. but in this case, it really depends on who is visiting your site. A lot (not sure of the exact proportion, but it's significant) of our web traffic (I work for an Australian Government department) comes from other staff of other government departments, and from staff in large businesses - both of which would be mainly using IE due to software management policies, desktop lockdown, etc.. ;D)
My point? If you could somehow remove the data on visitors from the aforementioned organisations (not including *.gov.au would be a start), you would be left with a more accurate indication of Firefox takeup among users who actually have a choice in what browser they use.
(BTW, this post is partially a rant - we're stuck with using IE here... grrrr
I wash mah-self with a rag on a stick.
When assume that download counter at spreadfirefox.com counts updates. Well, it doesn't.
user@ubuntubox:~$ stfu This server is going down for shutdown NOW!
...a statistic you haven't faked yourself.
I, for one, care about two things. One is that Firefox gains enough market share that most sites make sure they work on non-IE browsers. And two is the distribution of the visitors of my site, which currently stands at:
Firefox 1148966 41.9 %
MS IE 1084645 39.6 %
Opera 205058 7.4 %
Mozilla 181433 6.6 %
Safari 47638 1.7 %
Which shows one thing: My "Spread Firefox" banner is working, at least on the people that play my game.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Only on /.
Mozilla needs to start claiming that Firefox is totally secure, that it accelerates your life, and that men in butterfly suits will spread fairy dust on you if you use Firefox.
Sure, FF is getting lots of news (and equal amounts of hype) recently, so it will grow as a target for attacks, but 7% of the user space (at least half of which are keen to malware - the remainder being grandmas) is still too small a piece of the pie to be worth eating. And no, FF (or any other browser) will never be perfect, but as long as it offers the best features, then people will pick it up and run.
Who's your user, program?
"Der Spiegel" is Germany's most influcencial political magazine, their online presence definitely does not count as a geek-oriented webpage and had 276 million page impressions in April '05, Firefox had 30% percent market share.
, 355494,00.html/
http://www.spiegel.de/netzwelt/technologie/0,1518
Just f.y.i.
Why would the "Highly Publicised" security flaws affect the adoption rate? Internet Explorer has far worse and far more "Highly Publicised" security flaws than ever Firefox could hope to achieve.
Anyone who decides not to install firefox basing their decision on security concerns and instead continues to use IE on the same basis is just plain stupid
Electronic Music Made Using Linux http://soundcloud.com/polyp
Wouldn't it be better or augment the pure download numbers if they also ran some statistics over the 'Check for available updates' requests?
Per default this setting is turned on and it is known at which intervals Firefox checks for new updates, thus it should be possible to calculate a ballpark figure on how many people are actually USING Firefox.
Dyslectics of the world, untie!
IMHO now is the time to make people switch to firefox because of its great web browsing features/potential and not simply by scaring them that their current browser (IE) is dangerous. It was clear that the marketing strategy "we are simply safe" cannot last for ever. Moz is a complicated application and it was just question of time when the major security bugs will be discovered. Now it happened and many people will think that Moz/FF is not more secure then IE... So what about showing other "cool" features that the users will surely love? What about solving those annoying problems with XUL (like Drag&Drop restrictions, remote DTD problems, RDF restrictios) to allow thousands of heated web developers to unleash real Moz/FF potential and let users feel the real internet experience revolution? Isn't it what was the Moz/FF born for? elixon
Well, I've got to get back to work. When I stop rowing, the slave ship just goes in circles.
All I know is that everyone who asks me for computer advice gets to hear about Firefox, Thunderbird and OO. I still meet people who have never heard of any of them, but firefox is a nice easy term for them to google for. I also have a combined mailing list and forum headcount of perhaps 800 people, and they get to hear about these progs too. I don't beat them over the head with it, people can use whatever they like as far as I'm concerned. I just like to point out alternatives, especially decent alternatives.
And I just spotted this in another browser tab: Microsoft share of browser market slips
Hal Spacejock: Science Fiction with Nuts
Windows growth has halted completely.
Copyright and licensing issues serve as barriers to good technical systems. For example, there is no way to make a central repository of upgrades for the entire system. Microsoft is able to do this with its own products (thus Windows update) but the rest of the software has to rot.
Yet another reason that Free Software is required. It is the freedom that allows organizations like Debian to make a central repository of all the available software. This allows the superior technical solution of a central tool (such as apt) that can upgrade everything.
In the non-free world, huge amounts of resources must be wasted and the central upgrade code in apt has to be written all over again for every piece of software separately, not to mention maintaining separate upgrade servers, etc.
Self-upgrading programs are a waste of resources.
> For a given user at a given instant, the browser market is a zero-sum game. I can only post to /. with one browser a time.
But it's not a zero-sum game when you count success by downloads. I imagine 90 percent of Firefox users also have another browser (IE, Safari) installed on their systems, and out of that number 85 percent have no hesitation in firing up the other browser. It's a OSS fanboi's misguided dream that people are using Firefox exclusively.
Since the majority desktop OS is Windows and most computer users don't care which browser to use as long as their browser work (by that I mean, able to browse webpages with a few occassional spyware distractions and virus infection), what else besides IE do you expect them to use?
They don't care if their browser pass the Acid2 or not.
Even if Mozilla pumps out a kitchen-sink Firefox tomorrow, Microsoft will release the same thing the day after. What else do you think MS is releasing IE7 as an independent release before Longhorn?
However, once Linux gains ground on desktop computing (that remains to be seen, however), I think Firefox usage will grow tremendously.
They have fixed the Add Remove Programs duplicates that have been kicking around for a few versions.
:o)
I had 5 versions listed before the 1.0.4 update.
1.0PR
1.0
1.0.1
1.0.2
1.0.3
Thanks guys
I clicked the link to read the article and first thing I see are two ads from Microsoft. Knowing Microsoft I wouldn't be at all surprised if this is just a simple FUD campaign.
:)
Here's the screenshot.
I honestly don't care if Firefox's growth is slowing. All I care about is that it continues to exist because I happen to like the browser, and since I switched to it I don't get stupid popup ads, and spyware like I did using IE. To me, that's what's important.
I realize there are always going to be security issues with any app out there and hackers will always find new and creative ways to take advantage of ever changing software. I just have more faith in the Mozilla group then I do in the IE group to work harder to make their product safe.
You know about Firefox. I know about firefox. But Joe User might not know about it/remember it. And we can't tell everyone about it now, can we?
AFAIK, its growth was pretty much tied to the full-page ad in the NYT. If growth is slowing, they need to pump out some TV commercials, start advertising on google, and keep up the print campaign.
Non-technical people tend to have a very short attention span on things like this. They just need to be reminded that it's out there.
There are 01 types of people in this world. Those that understand binary, and me.
There are still several "business" websites such as financial services, B2B and corporate intranets that rely on ActiveX and
IE.
Verizon, for one. Don't try to pay your wireless bill online unless you're using IE. I paid (or attempted to) using Safari on Tiger and a couple weeks later get a call that my phone was being disconnected.
Two hours of customer service agents later (the ones who didn't hang up or were unable to talk to other divisions of Verizon) I found one clueful guy in tech support that knew about the problem, asked if I could run IE on Mac and understood when I refused to (he actually got why you want security updates). He stayed online and used his uber codes to brute force his way through the broken IVR system they have as an alternative. Surprisingly helpful.
But, they've known about the problem for a while and provide no warning to the users. Booo.
So if you're one of the millions of Verizon Mac users, beware.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
If they're saying that the majority of users are the technophiles and the usual geeks who lead the pack, then how can security be the cause of the problem? These same people should be aware of all the problems of IE, and the oft lack of patches or information regarding the exploits from Microsoft.
On the other hand, Mozilla has fixed patches quickly and hasn't tried to suppress the information. Why would the group that's most likely to be the most well informed about this subject, not be informed about the same flaws in the competing browser?
I will shred my adversaries. Pull their eyes out just enough to turn them towards their mewing, mutilated faces. Illyria
FireFox, after many an upgrade, now loads slower than IE. Once upon a time it was quick to load to mem and bring up the first window, but now I find myself waiting 10 or more second on a 3.06 P4 w/ 512MB ram. Did anyone else notice this as the upgrades occured?
I thought that the title read "Firefox Sloth Growing?", and was really impressed that they were sponsoring animals now to show how caring the Open Source community can be.
"It could also show that the browser's widely publicised security flaws have begun to undermine the foundation's argument that people should switch from IE to be safer." Now that must be a IE lover that wrote this! like IE has not security flaws! At least Mozilla got out and was more secure than IE who's been there for over 14 years! I'd call that pretty good! and they update their software much faster than IE too. As for slower growth! it's normal, it's not new anymore so it's momentum has passed but i dont think people are going to use it less unless they are scared of everything they read!
Firexox stories are we going to have? I am fed up with hearing about every insignificant thing which happens with it.
Yes, it's a browser, get over it.
Geeks have only so many friends.
One reason that I have stopped contributing to its growth, is that I don't know anyone who is not running Firefox anymore (except my supervisor and the lab tech who are running NetScape... never converted to IE, they sure as hell are not going to convert for me... plus it still is in the family). I wish I had more friends, or that they were more into getting their own friends converted.
At least if I could get a girlfriend it might get me a new pool of people to tap into. Now that seems to be a good motivator to try to get one. It might just give me that edge that I was always lacking and that girls probably noticed.
I like my dinosaurs feathery, and my pterosaurs hairy (or is it pycnofibery?)
It can't be a linear function, otherwise everybody would have 12.500 cell phones. But its still a good sign that firefox is still be downloaded.
I've got all kinds of clients. (All remote.)
For more than a hundred, I've got remote access via PcAnywhere or Citrix Server or MS Terminal Server or GoToMyPC.com.
For more than a hundred, one of my staff (or me) must physically be onsite for access to client PCs. For some it is a lack of remote control technology. For other clients (banks and pharma), they have prohibitions on remote access that I'm never going to get repealed.
I know many /. readers want control over what gets updated on their computers, but end user PCs should be something else altogether.
When I hear that FireFox is combating a security flaw by making an update available that requires a human to manually download and install the "new" product, I groan and am tempted back to the MS camp.
Firefox should have some sort of option, (even an obscure option set only by editing an ASCII configuration file) that forces the PC to connect to Mozilla at 3:00 AM local time (or whatever) every day and downloads and installs whatever the current stable edition is.
Otherwise, every update becomes months of aggravation as we schedule and charge customers to go onsite, update their user PCs, and then take the grief because they don't see why they should have to pay when they didn't ask for anything "new," just to keep surfing, emailing, and using OO.
When we talk about Total Cost of Ownership (TCO), every FireFox upgrade that costs the customer money is yet another reason for them to return to I.E.
AAArrrggghhhhhh!
Don't blame me. I'm just some guy who shows up, fixes what's broke, and tells you how to run your business.
Live Long and Prosper - Thanks Leonard. You are missed.
holy crap! i must have tempted fate with my previous post (above). i just had firefox totally lock up on me, i had to open up a terminal and kill it.
It is sad but as soon as Microsoft gets around to releasing a new version of IE, Firefox will loose a large portion of their market share.
I think that most people download Firefox out of curiosity, and for the fun of playing with new software. The same 80 million people who downloaded Firefox will download the next version of IE when it comes out.
I had 1.0 installed, and upgraded to 1.04, at which point 2 of my 4 installed extensions stopped working, and apparently there are no 1.04 versions of them available.
Don't get my wrong, I love FF and have it installed on all my machine at home and work. But they REALLY have to deal with this problem. That sort of thing would be completely unacceptable on IE.
There are no problems of extensions breaking on IE updates because there are NO updates. (How old is IE6 ? )
I suppose that would be a way to avoid breakage.
Just think before comparing.
Oh, but that's not good enough, sez you? You want it automated? Well, it would be easy---trivially easy---to set up an update server using an old PC, linux and a few perl scripts. Just jack a little WSH goodness into the login script, and you're good to go.
Yeah, right.
I doubt the security flaws are driving people away. Considering that would make their stance: "I'm not using that security risk called Firefox. I'm sticking with IE." Clearly, they already don't care about security.
Firefox has just proven what I said on May 3rd, here http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=147981&cid= 12419550> and yet they continue to be "the 'Windows 98' of browsers" since the browser continues to get "prettier" but all the security checks and testing don't do a damned bit of good. People are no better off when using Firefox over MSIE.
-- Game Developers: Stop porting badly-textured games from crappy console systems!
How is that a comparison? It's amazing how many people have fallen for the exact same marketing and hype that got Microsoft off the ground.
.03 to .04? Extensions are a MAJOR part of what makes FF better than IE. This isn't a minor complaint, this is like the tires falling off your car when you have a new battery installed.
FF is a great browser but it certainly has more than enough problems to make it not this glorified supreme being everyone makes it out to be.
There is absolutely no reason why extensions should stop working when you go from 1.03 to 1.04. If you went from 1.03 to 1.1 then I could maybe see issues, or 1.x to 2.x definately, but come on what kind of nonsense is going on that breaks a MAJOR function from
I use the LiveHTTPHeaders extension for Mozilla and Firefox. It handily fits in my side bar. I wish it were available for other browsers too.
for a browser that comes pre-installed on computers from every single manufacturer.
i shall now famously proclaim that the number of firefox users will double every x years. this will go down in every source, but this original comment will be lost. then, every other week, ppl can say that matt's law is slowing, but it won't because everytime mozilla release a new version, everyone will redownload firefox doubling the count. save the html now to this page and you can sell it on ebay in 20 years.
no seriously, i wopn't be staying for that long. because i want a browser that listens to its users, rather than writes a program aimed at a completely different audience.
Disclaimer: I am not the above poster, just using a public terminal and don't feel like logging in
For those of you who don't get the above poster (I was going to point this out myself until I saw he beat me to it,) he is pointing out that the grandparent commited a logical fallacy called "No True Scotsman." Explanation can be found here.
Verizon will not change so long as you let them get away with this. Encourage ALL mac users you know to pay with Safari. Force all PC users to use firefox/konqueor. Make sure you print any confirmation numbers. At least print the page that says the payment went though (if any).
Then when they try to disconnect spend the time on the phone to ask what is wrong. Odds are they will see this in statistics and correct their site because phone calls to customer service cost money. (and decrease customer satisfaction) Even if they don't see it directly, the first level techs start to notice problems like that when many people call, and that will get around the office.
It could also show that the browser's widely publicised security flaws have begun to undermine the foundation's argument that people should switch from IE to be safer
The news about the security flaws have pretty much just been released and we already people associating them to the slowdown in the downloads? Sounds a bit premature to me.
"The only thing we learn from history is that we never learn from history." -Hegel (1770-1831)
It's growing like wildfire.
...
There's the western Net, and then there's the majority of the world's population
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Trivialize any security bug in OSS as no big deal and "theoretical". Call any MS bug horrible and say "OMG everyone should switch".
Doesn't anyone else find this hilarious?
I'm not going to "have convictions" just because people have a love fest with FF because it's open source. FF is a tool, period. If it is the best tool for the job, based on all factors (security, cost, performance, compatiblity, etc) then it's what gets recommended. If not, it gets the axe.
I don't have the delusions that somehow the code being open makes anything any safer. It doesn't. Wuftpd is an excellent example. I remember back in 1999-2000 when the venurabilities were so frequent it was sick.
Now for my personal use, I choose what I like best. Generally I can deal with any security issues other ways, however for work I have to consider what is going to be the most secure and that includes maintaining itself. Our users are not good at this and believe it or not "click the button to update" IS too complex for many of them. We need to keep their systems up to date for them.
I really don't care if you agree with me, I'm telling you how it is here, and I can verify we aren't the only place with concerns like this. Like I said, not show stopper, but at this point enough that I'm not making it manditory.
EOm
I run a website that gets 30 million hits a month, and since May 2004, Microsoft IE use has declined every single month since then. Where are they all going? Well, Firefox, which in May 2004 accounted for something like 2% is now nearly up to 18%. All versions of Netscape combined are now at 2%, Mozilla Suite is at 4%, and Safari and Opera are both at about 1%.
Downloads are at best an imperfect metric of popularity. Actual usage however is an excellent metric, and Firefox's growth has continued (at least in my experience) to accelerate.
The cold hard fact is that Firefox will never "beat" IE. But it doesn't have to, and it would actually be a bad thing if it did. With anything above a 20% share of the market, that should be enough pressure to get sites to quit using all that god damned Active X and IE-only content, and actually create sites that are navigable by more than one browser.
This is especially true when looking at the relatively strong rates of adoption for other browsers like Safari. The end goal is not to replace one nearly ubiquitous browser with another one. The goal should be to create an environment where EVERY USER can use the BROWSER OF THEIR CHOICE, without negatively impacting their ability to use web sites. In any complex system, whether its an ecosystem or computing, homogenous environments are not "healthy." Natural variation on the other hand is always successful.
Non-technical people tend to have a very short attention span on things like this. They just need to be reminded that it's out there.
I resent that you think we have a sho... ooh shiney!
I've downloaded it and found it wasn't to my liking, so I decided to stick with Opera. In fact, I've downloaded several versions over time just to check and see if it was worth giving up Opera for. It isn't, but I'm guessing my downloads count as much as anyone else's even though Firefox isn't anywhere on my home network.
Max
My god carries a hammer. Your god died nailed to a tree. Any questions?
Firefox is a browser, not a religion - although quite a few people seem to treat it as such. Probably the same folks who think that Google and Apple are worthy of worship and should never be criticized.
Instead of trying to gloss over the bugs and flaws while shrilling "Firefox uber alles!" it'd be of more value to say "yep, it's software; software has bugs, that goes with the territory. Let's identify them, make them public, and fix them." Borg-like geek loyalty to a piece of software is not only counterproductive, it's just plain stupid.
And along the way, try to remember that Firefox is not the browser for everyone. That's actually a good thing; monoculture is bad even if the monoculture is an open source product. While I like the idea that Firefox is taking away IE market share I'd never want Firefox to *replace* IE; I'd much rather see a half-dozen or more browsers all competing at relatively low levels of share, with none of them ever coming close to reaching a dominant position. This is a better situation for all of us, even the ones who treat certain forms of software as their own personal religion.
Max
My god carries a hammer. Your god died nailed to a tree. Any questions?
...that geeks stop fixing people's infested computers for free.
Let's start charging REALLY BIG BUCKS.
The next time some whiney relative, friend or customer starts, you know, WHINING that they don't like the FireFox icon or they don't want to bother installing and learning to use the new "Mozilla Firefox" browser, then say: "Fine!" and when they get infested, charge $200 to fix the mess.
People's behavior would change really quick. Alas, nerds cannot say no.
Use of the word 'meh' instantly identifies you as annoying, and to be ignored.
It is on the level of "talk to the hand" or "what-ev-er."
Please, in the interest of not annoying me, stop.
so I've probably missed somebody pointing this out, but IIRC the Firefox site states that the 50 millions downloads so far DO NOT include upgrades to new releases.
Also they have this:
Seen Online:
> 30% German FF usage statistics
Posted by Lungo on Fri, 05/13/2005 - 09:39
Freshest browser Statistics from the Nr. 1 German Magazine (Spiegel)
Momentaufnahme: Browserstatistik SPIEGEL ONLINE, 10. Mai 2005
MSIE 63.18%
Firefox 30.15%
Opera 2.70%
Netscape 2.47%
AOL 0.74%
Konqueror 0.42%
Andere (inklusive Safari) 0.31%
Browser: Marktanteile im April
Browser Februar März April
MSIE 64,05 63,18 62,85
Firefox 28,27 29,49 30,03
Opera 2,92 2,84 2,82
Netscape2,91 2,68 2,56
AOL 0,98 0,98 0,97
Konqueror0,46 0,47 0,45
Angaben in Prozent
quoted from www.spiegel.de
Also this post is there:
Insights into News Stories
Posted by rebron on Fri, 05/13/2005 - 04:41
Some of you may have read the article Firefox growth slows again. It's interesting to note how some writers take a piece of information and twist things around to make a seemingly positive set of facts, negative. Is it just a matter of interpretation or an attempt to increase readership via a negative headline? All the stories are based on the Web Side Story market share information (which is just one set of data) located here.
Now the Web Side Story data shows that Firefox market share has increased 1% in the U.S. and is 22% in Germany. Firefox market share grew and that's just a fact.
As you can see from these sets of stories, these numbers/facts are translated into something else:
Browser Firefox gains on Explorer
Firefox Now Owns Nearly 7 Percent Of Browser Share
Firefox Usage Continues to Grow
So what to do at SpreadFirefox? Lots of things. Write to the reporter and/or his or her editor and tell that person what you think (for both positive and inaccurate or negative stories). You can also comment in that article or write a blog post about what you think the numbers or facts mean. Remember that reporters don't issue advisories or report just the facts, they write stories. So we have to keep a close eye on these reporters to keep them honest.
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
The Firefox counter is currently reporting a firefox download rate of 9 per second, the biggest that I have seen there. Usually it is between 3-5 per second
In mozilla (or netscape), you middle click each one as you pass, launching new window for each.
I *prefer* extra windows, and thoroughly dislike the tabs.
hawk
is auto-download. People do not want to have to go and download updates, they want it done for them. There should be an option for this. Nowif there is such an option, my appologies - i just haven't seen one.
I mod down so you can mod up. Your welcome.
Yeah, who would want to go outside? There are things like
criminals and terrorists, and girls!
That is one thing that bothers me insanely about Firefox, and I only have 2 or so extensions.
The fact, that they're changing their plugin API's behavior in the middle of a very, very minor revision number, is so completely unacceptable to me.
I'd use IE, but it doesn't have tabs.
Just that it's very far from being grounds to say "Safari has the best support of any browser for W3C standards".