Opera Software's CEO Jon S. von Tetzchner explains why they will not release the Opera browser as open source, arguing that open standards are more important than open source. Von Tetzchner also talks about the company's antitrust complaint to the European Commission in which it accuses Microsoft of abusing its dominant position by tying Internet Explorer to Windows.
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Member since:2005-11-10
Firefox is up to 40% in some European countries. It cannot be ignored.
Firefox also proved that people will download a browser, even when one is bundled.
Firefox basically proves you, and Opera wrong.
Mozilla have not been crying afoul of IE, they have simply been getting on with doing the best job they can.
Mitchell Baker, and the new CEO David Ascher are smart, driven people who care about end users, not market-share and politics.
If Opera want to play a politics game, they will lose.
Member since:2005-07-06
http://www.mozilla.org/about/
"The Mozilla project's launch by Netscape in 1998 ..."
Microsoft settled for 750 Million with AOL over Netscape :
http://money.cnn.com/2003/05/29/technology/microsoft/
Edited 2008-02-21 19:38 UTC
Member since:2005-11-12
Member since:2005-07-06
I use Firefox over Opera. Just didn't care for the interface. I absolutely HATE the new IE interface. It feels like they are hiding all the damn buttons. I've had the unfortunate side affect of running across individuals using Vista and the new IE asking me to make it work like XP. The first thing I do is install Firefox, remove all the IE icons and replace them with the Firefox icons (labeled "The Internet" for the slow ones).
So far every single person still uses Firefox; it updates itself, just like vista and its easy to use with fairly obvious interface.
Member since:2005-12-15
I think this is a very good point. There's no way I would go for Opera whilst Firefox exists. Besides that, my decision to not choose Opera goes back well beyond Firefox's existance.
I simply do not like the way the browser looks and feels. I could probably get used to it (heck, I've gotten used to the OSNews skins) but I really couldn't be bothered.
Member since:2006-09-01
It's worth adding to that, that Netscape 2.x - 4.x used to come pre-installed on windows and mac machines, back when it was top dog.
There is today good reason for OEMs to choose an alternative. The question is, why don't they choose the alternative.
My money's on unfair licensing deals that Microsoft gets them into. There is the chance though that they simply have a better product in the eyes of most OEMs. Then again, when is the last time you saw any group of people always agree on anything - I mean besides conservative republicans (-ducks-). :-D
A good fair hearing should help to bear this all out, so Opera has my complete support.
Member since:2006-01-02
Special deals with OEMs are specifically against the rules and probably aren't happening. The reason OEMs don't include anything other than IE is that adding something else would increase their testing burden. Right now, IE comes with the OS and is proven to work (some people differ on how well it works, but almost everyone will agree that it's good enough). OEMs have nothing to gain from including something else.
"In the first episode of Microsoft's new film series 'On the Whiteboard', Editor Pamela Woon chats with two-time Oscar winner Randy Thom about the (often underestimated) importance of sound in human-technology interactions. Thom, the lead sound designer at Skywalker Ranch who worked on films such as The Incredibles, Castaway and Forrest Gump, says that people rarely consider the significance of those signature sounds that come from their trusty devices, whether it be a cell phone, a computer or a tablet."
"Microsoft has sensationally abandoned its controversial plans to restrict the sharing of XBox One games, and has also removed daily online authentication requirements for its forthcoming console", reports The Guardian. They had no choice. Still a good move."A snippet of code in the Steam digital distribution platform has revealed that Valve may be planning to let users easily share their games with friends in the future. The Verge has verified the code's authenticity, which was originally spotted by a member of the NeoGAF gaming forum; the code references a 'shared game library' and a notification that would alert a user when their games are currently in use by a borrower." This would change the, uh, game.
Official Apple statement on PRISM and privacy: "Regardless of the circumstances, our Legal team conducts an evaluation of each request and, only if appropriate, we retrieve and deliver the narrowest possible set of information to the authorities. In fact, from time to time when we see inconsistencies or inaccuracies in a request, we will refuse to fulfill it." This is basically Apple re-publishing their earlier statement in a more official manner. You either believe it, or you don't.
The open source Contiki operating system and its commercial Thingsquare distribution are making strides towards the connected home. According to a Computerworld article, a new LED light bulb manufacturer is putting small computers into their light bulbs. Each computer runs the Contiki OS, which gives each bulb an IP address and allows them to be controlled with a smartphone application. To connect the bulbs to the application, the bulbs use both Wi-Fi and the much lower power IEEE 802.15.4 mesh technology.
"Google asked the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court on Tuesday to ease long-standing gag orders over data requests it makes, arguing that the company has a constitutional right to speak about information it's forced to give the government. The legal filing, which cites the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech, is the latest move by the California-based tech giant to protect its reputation in the aftermath of news reports about sweeping National Security Agency surveillance of Internet traffic." Draining the ditch after the cow has drowned in it."I can't find one person who has been using the Nexus 7 for an extended period of time, and hasn't seen a massive downgrade in performance. Just what kind of downgrade are we talking here? I cannot pick up my Nexus 7 without experiencing problems like a lag of ten seconds, or more, just to rotate the display; touches refusing to acknowledged; stuttering notification panel actions; and unresponsive apps." Fully and utterly agreed. My Nexus 7 was blazing-fast and awesome for a few months, and at some point, it just started sucking. Just like that. I've tried loads of ROMs, and nothing helps.A new release of the hobby operating system MenuetOS! The release notes are a bit non-descript, but you'll have to take what you can get: "updates and improvements (picview, httpc, ehci, ...)"."The Internet is one of the most transformative technologies of our lifetimes. But for 2 out of every 3 people on earth, a fast, affordable Internet connection is still out of reach. And this is far from being a solved problem. There are many terrestrial challenges to Internet connectivity - jungles, archipelagos, mountains. There are also major cost challenges. Right now, for example, in most of the countries in the southern hemisphere, the cost of an Internet connection is more than a month's income. Solving these problems isn't simply a question of time: it requires looking at the problem of access from new angles. So today we're unveiling our latest moonshot from Google[x]: balloon-powered Internet access." Insane."MineAssemble is a tiny bootable Minecraft clone written partly in x86 assembly. I made it first and foremost because a university assignment required me to implement a game in assembly for a computer systems course. Because I had never implemented anything more complex than a 'Hello World' bootloader before, I decided I wanted to learn about writing my own kernel code at the same time. Note that the goal of this project was not to write highly efficient hand-optimized assembly code, but rather to have fun and write code that balances readability and speed. This is primarily accomplished by proper commenting and consistent code structuring." Just cool.
Member since:
2006-01-14
So just because we have endured 20 years of Microsofts monopoly we should be content to just keep on doing it? And I would hardly call Firefox sucesssful. Don't get me wrong, its the only browser I use. But it only has 10-15 % market share and it became popular during a time when IE was really crap and had been pretty much abandoned by Microsoft. Even then they could do better than 20%. Why? Its all about the pre-installs. The only reason that is changing now is because of the many people putting Linux on the desktop. You can't compete with just a browser. You need to have it be part of the entire OS package. Thats why firefox and Safari are anywhere on the map.