ftp ftp.netscape.com"Sue, how do I get that browser thingie?"
"Erm, Jane wrote it down for me... here's the Post-It"
"Thanks."
We survived OK.
I'm not aware of any popular OS that doesn't have ftp support on the main UI (except Android, which doesn't have a file management app anyways; not sure about iOS). Nautilus has ftp support. So does thunar, dolphin, konq, etc. You can type ftp addresses into the address bar in osx, iirc.
- Didn't want to open a browser one day but wanted to download the latest version of FF. Thought I'd try FTP. Ultimately gave up on trying to find the right path and Googled it.
Another time (later), I vaguely recall being at a kiosk with IE disabled in various boring ways, and I tried to see if I could download FF (just to see if it was possible) after successfully managing to open the FTP site. I might be misremembering, but I think the only reason I was able to locate the dir properly was because I'd previously made a careful mental note where it was. (It downloaded, but executables were disabled. Those sysadmins did a good job.)
But hammering them for bundling a browser was just plain stupid. If they didn't bundle a browser, how would people download a competing browser? You'd have had to get hold of a browser on CD somewhere and install it manually just to use the internet. How would that have been an improvement for consumers? It was a misconceived, user-hostile decision.