The End of Netscape
posted on july 16, 2003, tag: software
Wow. I honestly thought it would never happen, but AOL has finally destroyed Netscape. Yesterday they laid off remaining Mozilla workers, and got rid of the rest of Netscape (I love how "they've even pulled the logos off the buildings"). As of July 15, 2003, Netscape is dead.
This is a huge disappointment to me, even though I've not been a fan of the Netscape browser for a long time. We all have our stories, of using Netscape 1.0 or 2.0 or whatever, 'back in the day,' when the Internet was fresh and Netscape was one of the few companies serving it to regular people. I remember building my first web page ever with Netscape's composer. But, somewhere along the line, things just ended up going the wrong way. After years of "Browser Wars," in 1998 Netscape's Communicator finally lost advantage to a growing Microsoft Internet Explorer. In November of 1998 they were purchased by AOL.
All the while, however, something else was growing in the background: Mozilla. In a letter written by Jamie Zawinski entitled "Fear and Loathing on the Merger Trail," just after the announcement of AOL's purchase of Netscape, Jamie wrote the following which I find to be appropriate to reread today:
So, assuming that they [AOL] still want to have a Netscape Navigator, it is not unreasonable to assume that they will adopt the same attitude that Netscape has: that open source works, and that the best way to have a top-of-the-line web browser is to keep it open.
But let's think about some worst-case scenarios. Let's think about the nightmares. What if AOL hates "open source"? What if they want to undo everything we've done, and make Mozilla be evil and proprietary again? What if they just think that browsers are a waste of time, and that they should just use MSIE forevermore?
Well, they simply cannot undo what has been done. The Mozilla code is out there, and it cannot be recalled. It has been distributed under an open source license, and nobody can ever take that away from you. Ever.
It's unfortunate that AOL did end up deciding to use Internet Explorer 'forevermore,' and even more unfortunate that the decision will hurt the Internet more than closing Netscape ever could. Regardless, the point of Jamie's article is more important: Mozilla cannot be destroyed by AOL. It cannot be destroyed by anyone. It's open, it's free, and it belongs to everyone.
Does it matter now that Netscape was pushed out by Internet Explorer in the 90s? Does it matter that Internet Explorer kept pushing, and pushing hard, and made it's way to the ridiculous 90-something-percent market-share? Yes, of course it does. But does it matter than Netscape is dead? Not at all. Netscape was a means—a means to Mozilla.
Frankly, I'm glad Netscape is gone. I'm glad because eventually people will stop using Netscape 4x now (hopefully). That's a good thing—it gets more people using standards-compliant browsers. Now the point is to make sure the market for standards-compliant browsers contains options, not Internet Explorer and Mozilla. Camino, Safari, OmniWeb, Opera—they're all important to the future of the Internet. Never again should there be a 'war' between two browsers. Never again should the victor of that war be able to effectively control the market and it's future and it's direction.
Mozilla will live on. A newly formed Mozilla Foundation, a [soon to be] non-profit corporation will now manage the Mozilla project. They've released a new version of their website, and continue to work on all of their projects. The good news is, though, that they don't have AOL looking over their shoulders. Obviously it's never good when a bunch of people* lose their jobs, but I say good riddance to Netscape. Let's move on.
* If you're interested, you can visit Ex-Mozilla to read posts from Netscape employees who have left the company over the years (including yesterday).
Comments
There are 9 comments, comments are closed
Shawn on 07/16/2003:
Hmm, to me things look even more bleak than ever. Not that Netscape was really imporving anything but now it's just more clear. When people are eventually forced to choose a new browser, they're going to choose IE. Especially now that MS is integrating IE even more tightly into Windows. You won't even install it, it will just be there. And it's not standards compliant. Netscape was at least offering a standards complaint browser with a name that people were familiar with. The good browsers you mentioned were all Mac browsers. Sure, there's firebird, but besides the power users, who's going to use that? And I know a lot of people don't like the Mozilla browser. They want something with a bit more gloss and polish. Which is IE.
I mean, right?
Garrett on 07/16/2003:
No, actually, wrong...
First of all, those are not all Mac browsers. Camino, Safari, OmniWeb are... Opera started as (and is still primarily) a PC browser. So is Mozilla. So was Netscape. I didn't realize I just happened to mention three Mac browsers, sorry about that.
Netscape was offering (at least since version 6.0) Mozilla with a few changes. That's all. It was based on Mozilla, it looked like Mozilla, it was Mozilla. Hell, Mozilla proper still looks like that today. Before 6.0, Netscape wasn't a standards-compliant browser. Netscape 4.0 is terrible (there is no 5.0).
Mozilla Firebird is going to be the future flagship browser of the Mozilla project (so I've heard). In the future, everyone who downloads Mozilla will be getting Firebird (and Thunderbird—the Mozilla mail client—if they want it).
People who don't like Mozilla don't know enough about it. It has plenty of spit and polish, and it renders pages cleaner and better than Internet Explorer.
And speaking of Internet Explorer—I think you're going to see a negativity to IE in the near future because of the end of the stand-alone product. No one is going to stand for having to buy a new version of Windows to upgrade to a better version of Internet Explorer, and I think it's going to drive people elsewhere.
You're making blanket assumptions—that people will choose IE no matter what. I just don't think that's the truth any more. And I think the death of Netscape will help Mozilla in the long run, and that helps everyone.
Shawn on 07/16/2003:
Boy, I just can't seem to present ideas without you thinking I'm pissed off. Anyway, my point was that I don't think most people care about which browser they use, let alone web standards. That's what I see. Most of my friends and coworkers don't care. Standards are a very noble and important cause that I support. It's a battle worth fighting for by those of us who care. But it doesn't sell T-shirts. Something is going to have to compell people to change. What will that be? Hopefully something, but what? And I don't think people will be pissed about IE being part of windows cause it seems to me like IE is just going to be absorbed. Transparent. No one will care or notice. Thoughts, opinions?
Jenna on 07/16/2003:
I sure am glad I jumped on the Safari bandwagon...
Garrett on 07/16/2003:
I'm not angry, I didn't think you were angry. From now on, to deal with this confusion-based anger-placement, let's make a rule that you have to write angry comments as such:
ANGRY: Comment follows here...
Okay? Perfect. So then, back to the topic:
This isn't all about standards-compliance, but I see your point none the less. I do, however, think the removal of a stand-alone IE will cause problems for two reasons: 1, it forces people to purchase full versions of an Operating System to upgrade a web browser (money, money, money); 2, it will cause significant stoppage in development (even more so than now) on Internet Explorer.
Microsoft only releases a new version of Windows every 4 years or so—this is going to cause a problem if IE updates with the same pattern. People will be yearning for new features and better technology, and other browsers will provide more instant access to that technology.
IE will never be transparent because it will never be perfect. It will still render pages incorrectly, it will still crash, it will still do all the things a program does—and because of that, you'll never forget you're not using the OS, but IE to view web pages.
Carol on 07/16/2003:
I think one way to try to get people to care about which browser they use is to download it on their machines for them. Then, once it's on their desktops, they can make a comparison themselves... and discover that, hey!, it's only IE that keeps crashing all the time, etc.
For the majority of users, they only use what is at their fingertips. And IE has come as part of a package on many machines along with other Microsoft products. Which means that the end-user doesn't have to do any work to get a browser.
But, if I take the initiative to load Camino, Mozilla, etc. on my parents', friends', etc.'s computers, and they start using it, perhaps they will in turn convince others to use it, too. In other words, it is up to those who know the other browsers are better to help spread the word to those who don't.
Courtney on 07/16/2003:
Lackadaisical: Comment follows here ...
Garrett, I'm with Shawn on this one. Maybe if we lived in a world filled with pink, magical bunnies I could sit back and believe that everything is fine, or hell, even better than before. Unfortunately, however, we don't. You're ignoring the reason that MSIE became so popular in the first place: it was there. The masses didn't flock to the browser because it was better than Netscape 4.x. Web standards had nothing to do with it, nor did the look and feel or anything else. To think that for even an instant would be complete silliness. Similarly, the masses don't give a flying fuck about Mozilla since Joe User equates the E icon on his desktop with the Internet. It's not a Web browser. MSIE is the Internet. Now, as wonderful as it would be to say that thousands of geeks can change the world by invisibly switching users to Mozilla with an IE theme (it's been suggested dozens of times already, I'm sure), such a change won't have much of an effect on the larger population. Joe User isn't going to tell anyone how wonderful his browsing experience his.
I'm not saying that we're stuck with IE forever or that Mozilla is going to disappear. All that I am saying is that this shouldn't really have much of a change on anything at all. The people in the know will keep using the "best browser", while the masses will use whatever's installed on their machines. No one else cares just as long as they can view CNN.com and read their e-mail. To topple Microsoft there needs to be more than a grassroots effort and that's all you've got right now.
Garrett on 07/16/2003:
Okay, first of all, I don't know why this has turned into another "you can't kill IE" commenting spree. That was not the point of this entry.
My point was that I'm glad Netscape is gone, and I'm glad Mozilla will live on. It wasn't really an anti-IE entry.
Either way, I'm sure you're all right—IE is a problem that will be around for a long while. I agree.
Brice on 07/21/2003:
When I originally read this I thought of an article that I had read a few days ago (after the mozilla news), but I couldn't find it at the time so I didn't bother commenting. Seeing as how just about everything has already been said, I think I will abstain from comment and just provide the link that I finally found: