Well, I know there are many others, but Firefox, IE, and Opera are
really the top 3 browsers around. Opera has never been 100% free,
because it's ad-supported, but now Micro$oft is saying that the
latest version of IE will ONLY run under Windows XP! That means
to use it, you'll have to upgrade... making IE no longer "free".
Source:
http://tinyurl.com/3ktm2 (Cnet news article).
I'm glad I use Firefox.
There are many freeware IE shells that enhance IE and add additional
security. I personally use Avant and find it to work quite well.
There was an interesting sidebar on the article posted above:
"Should Ford have gone back and retrofitted every Pinto with anti-lock
brakes when the technology came out? Should OnStar be available for 1989
Dodge Aries K cars? If you want the new technology, you have to stay current
with the new products."
--unknown
This is certainly an opportunity for other browsers to make inroads.
Another quote from the above article:
Rosoff agreed that Firefox and other second-tier browsers might benefit from
Microsoft's IE distribution policies, but he noted that the vast majority of
consumers are far less likely to download a browser than the typical Firefox
early adopter.
"From a consumer standpoint, I think evaluating other browsers makes
sense," Rosoff said. "And Microsoft is going to face more and more users who
are on dual platforms, who won't see any reason to upgrade once they see
that Firefox offers the pop-up blocker and other features they'd have to pay
for in IE. But most consumers don't download anything if they can avoid it."
