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Is Safari the New Internet Explorer?

An anonymous reader writes: Software developer Nolan Lawson says Apple's Safari has taken the place of Microsoft's Internet Explorer as the major browser that lags behind all the others. This comes shortly after the Edge Conference, where major players in web technologies got together to discuss the state of the industry and what's ahead. Lawson says Mozilla, Google, Opera, and Microsoft were all in attendance and willing to talk — but not Apple.

"It's hard to get insight into why Apple is behaving this way. They never send anyone to web conferences, their Surfin' Safari blog is a shadow of its former self, and nobody knows what the next version of Safari will contain until that year's WWDC. In a sense, Apple is like Santa Claus, descending yearly to give us some much-anticipated presents, with no forewarning about which of our wishes he'll grant this year. And frankly, the presents have been getting smaller and smaller lately."

He argues, "At this point, we in the web community need to come to terms with the fact that Safari has become the new IE. Microsoft is repentant these days, Google is pushing the web as far as it can go, and Mozilla is still being Mozilla. Apple is really the one singer in that barbershop quartet hitting all the sour notes, and it's time we start talking about it openly instead of tiptoeing around it like we're going to hurt somebody's feelings."

7 of 311 comments (clear)

  1. Already covered over at Hacker News by carlhaagen · · Score: 5, Funny

    The unisonous response is "no". The author is trying to balance the needle on its tip.

  2. hit one sour note by turkeydance · · Score: 5, Funny

    and most won't notice. hit two and they do. hit three, that's jazz.

  3. New internet explorer by Dan+East · · Score: 5, Funny

    If Safari is the new internet explorer then that's not bad. If Safari is the old internet explorer then that's really bad.

    --
    Better known as 318230.
    1. Re:New internet explorer by ArcadeMan · · Score: 5, Funny

      Your comment is quite Edgy.

    2. Re:New internet explorer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Mobile safari isn't safari. It's safari's retarded little brother.

  4. Re:I think Apple's glory days are over by jbolden · · Score: 1, Funny

    When Steve Jobs was alive high end Android phones were from a hardware perspective usually quite a bit more advanced than Apple / iOS. Today the opposite is true and high end Android are often quite a bit behind by most metrics. If anything Android has been falling further behind Apple phones since Steve Jobs died.

    On OSX Apple was mostly ahead than and is ahead now. How far is Microsoft towards retina only systems? While Apple has converted over most of their major lines and likely around 2017 is selling 0 or very few non retina machines. How far is Microsoft towards taking advantage of SSD and CPU freezing to increase battery life? Etc..

    Your estimate is silly.

  5. Re:Why all the Safari/Apple hate ?... by exomondo · · Score: 5, Funny

    So I guess you still live in your basement? There is a world out there. And Macs have very low adoption (single digit) within corporations.

    But he has anecdotal evidence!