Why Microsoft really patched XP

Re:Why Microsoft really patched XP by nivla on Tuesday May 06, 2014 @12:04PM (#7705286)

I wouldn't go as far back as 1995. I remember using Netscape those days and IE was considered the "hip & modern browser" just like we do now for Chrome. It was the best viewed in IE days and since there were no real standards or committee back then, everyone wrote their own feature set including MS. It did sure give us the annoying <blink> and <marquee> tags but remember it also gave us Ajax. The shit only really blew when Firefox came into scene with a faster, secure and more progressive browser than IE.

Although, I personally feel if firefox doesn't catchup with the webkit browsers, we will soon be taking a full circle.

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Re:Why Microsoft really patched XP by ConceptJunkie on Tuesday May 06, 2014 @12:14PM (#7705349)

Yeah, MSIE was the best browser through version 4. The real reason Netscape lost the browser wars was that it became a huge bloated mess. Now it probably couldn't have beat IE regardless of how good it was because of Microsoft's monopolistic practices, but IE was the best browser for a few years in the mid-90s.

Of course, they then proceeded to let it stagnate for the better part of a decade...

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Re:Why Microsoft really patched XP by nivla on Tuesday May 06, 2014 @01:12PM (#7705752)

>they then proceeded to let it stagnate for the better part of a decade...

That is one of the side effects of being on top without the worry of competition AKA being a monopoly. Despite Chrome being my favorite browser, this is one the things that worries me the most when everyone yells "Port all browsers to Webkit!!!", we will inadvertently repeat history.

Southpark best visually described it in one of their episodes [1].

[1]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Something_Wall-Mart_This_Way_Co...

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Re:Why Microsoft really patched XP by dblohm7 on Tuesday May 06, 2014 @04:31PM (#7706903)

+1. I try to figure out where the "Port all browsers to WebKit!" crowd is coming from, but the only reasonable speculative theory that I can think of is that they weren't there for the first go-round.

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Re:Why Microsoft really patched XP by nandhp on Tuesday May 06, 2014 @12:18PM (#7705383)

> <blink>

<BLINK> was from Netscape. http://www.montulli.org/theoriginofthe%3Cblink%3Etag

In related amusements: https://www.google.com/search?q=%3Cblink%3E+tag

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Re:Why Microsoft really patched XP by twistedpair on Tuesday May 06, 2014 @12:36PM (#7705507)

Oh, but let's not forget page transition animations introduced by IE. Thank God those died a rapid death.

The other thing that killed NetScape Communicator is that it had been costing $70 per copy. Remember... people used to pay for browsers.

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Re:Why Microsoft really patched XP by MichaelApproved on Tuesday May 06, 2014 @12:47PM (#7705575)

> that killed NetScape Communicator is that it had been costing $70 per copy.

It didn't kill Netscape to charge per copy, that's how software works. People need to earn money for their work creating software.

What killed Netscape was Microsoft taking advantage of its monopoly by pushing itself into a new market with free software. Microsoft didn't need to earn money directly from the browser, so they could afford to give it away for free and take a loss.

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Re:Why Microsoft really patched XP by WettowelReactor on Tuesday May 06, 2014 @01:05PM (#7705699)

While the monopoly control provided a simplified avenue for distribution the free price tag alone cannot be held to blame. By that analogy any free, open source product can push its way into a new market and kill the paid for competition which is clearly not the case.

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Re:Why Microsoft really patched XP by twistedpair on Tuesday May 06, 2014 @01:05PM (#7705695)

I was jesting. ;) I happily bought several copies back then, which was a lot on an allowance for mowing grass, but FREE was very hard to beat. Of course there was a little Anti-Trust case that came out of those dealings.

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Re:Why Microsoft really patched XP by nivla on Tuesday May 06, 2014 @12:53PM (#7705614)

>The other thing that killed NetScape Communicator is that it had been costing $70 per copy. Remember... people used to pay for browsers.

Yes but mine came free with the ISP's installation floppy diskettes, which was very cool of them. If I remember correctly, wasn't Opera initially a paid browser too?

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Re:Why Microsoft really patched XP by DanBC on Tuesday May 06, 2014 @01:54PM (#7706030)

Opera had paid versions, then ad supported versions.

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Re:Why Microsoft really patched XP by bcbrown on Tuesday May 06, 2014 @01:44PM (#7705978)

Yeah, I actually paid for it back in the day.

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