Honest question: if Microsoft didn't bundle IE and the user hadn't received a copy of those ubiquitous AOL CD-ROMs which came in the mail/magazines (and sometimes carried the Netscape Navigator installer), how is the user expected to consume content on the web without a web browser?

Surely, you'll at least need a decent web browser to get online to download a different browser of your choice, no?

> if Microsoft didn't bundle IE and the user hadn't received a copy of those ubiquitous AOL CD-ROMs which came in the mail/magazines (and sometimes carried the Netscape Navigator installer), how is the user expected to consume content on the web without a web browser?

Go to store, by a CD with browser, install. The age when boxed software was a major thing extended past the point when IE started bundling IE.

Of course, with a TCP/IP stack you can get software from the internet a lot of ways without a web browser, too. FTP was a thing, after all.

As a user who has just bought their first computer, would you a) like to go to the shop and spend money to buy more software b) try to figure out this thing called FTP, maybe going to the library to read up on it even though you have never heard of it so don't know what you are looking for c) just use this thing called "Internet Explorer" that sounds like what you want to do, is free and already installed on the computer you just turned on for the first time?

Before, and for several years after, Microsoft started bundling IE, many, perhaps most, ISPs (dialup and what passed for "broadband" at the time) typically delivered software CDs that you were expected to install with their own software (often including their preferred web browser, preconfigured with their preferred start page and other settings.)

If you just bought your first computer at that time, you weren't likely to have internet service to connect it to until you bought that separately, and when you did, you would have software, too.

Keep in mind, many people with a computer might not have the internet at all during this period. Purchasing internet service usually came with software to use it.

You're talking about an era when Gopher was still the dominant protocol on the internet.

Every ISP I used in the 90's sent a floppy or CD-ROM with a setup guide, web browser and some other shareware internet tools (FTP clients, Stuffit Expander on the Mac, etc)

There was a time when people bought software in boxes.

When I was a kid (before the publicly-used version of the Internet that we know and love today) and wanted to download software, I'd log into a BBS for my download.

Thanks for adding your perspective to the discussion though I'd argue that your experience might not have been representative of the larger population.

There is no need for a browser to download something from the internet. You only need the browser to browse the internet. (hence the name) A simple UI with a list of options was all that was needed.

The web is not the internet