Click Here to run a free Scan for Latest PC Drivers
IE 7 Reaches 100 Million Downloads, Firefox Still On the March
Posted by Raj | Filed under Firefox, Internet Explorer
Don't want to miss a single bit? Subscribe to our RSS Feed!
According to the IE group and WebSideStory, IE 7 has had 100 million downloads. It sounds like a milestone, but the problem is, these downloads were mainly conversions from older versions of Internet Explorer.
As of Dec. 2006, IE accounted for 79.6% of all browsers, which is a notable decline from the 80.6% it held in Nov. This is in stark contrast to Firefox which gained from 13.5% to 14% during the same period.
The quantity of IE 7 downloads is credited to users downloading the software through Automatic Updates in Windows. So does it really matter than IE 7 has been downloaded 100 million times? I’m thinking no.
Tony Chor, IE7 program manager at Microsoft, reported in the company blog that Microsoft passed its milestone on January 8.
“I’m pleased to report that on January 8th, we had the 100 millionth IE7 installation. However, even more important than installations is usage. According to WebSideStory (the company we use to measure browser usage), as of this week, over 25% of all visitors to websites in the US were using IE7, making IE7 the second most used browser after IE6. We expect these numbers to continue to rise as we complete our final localized versions, scale up AU distribution, and with the consumer availability of Windows Vista on January 30, 2007,” said Chor.
According to analysts surveyed by Information Week, however, the Microsoft blog didn’t paint the entire picture. An analyst at WebSideStory, the firm whose numbers were used by Microsoft, confirmed that IE7 was actually taking market share exclusively from IE6.
Another analyst at web metrics firm Net Applications said that according to the firm’s numbers the combined share in the US of the two Microsoft browsers in December 2006 had dropped 1% from November to 79.6%. Meanwhile, over the same period, Firefox browser share, comprising versions 1.5 and 2.0 had risen from 13.5% to 14%.
What’s more, the US has been relatively conservative in its adoption of Firefox compared to some European countries and Australia. In Germany, Firefox market share actually rivals that of Internet Explorer. In a world where Web 2.0 applications are becoming increasingly important to the detriment of the desktop, that spells bad news for Microsoft.
| Related Post |
Comments