[PCWorld]

Post your comments for Projection: IE?s Days of Domination Are Numbered here

[bjbj]

This isn't news. Firefox has become the preferred browser for most younger people, even those who aren't tech savvy. Most of the people using IE still just don't know any better.

[pflagdad]

Not just the 'younger' folks. I'm almost 70 and have used it for years. For those sites that 'demand' IE, Firefox has a neat add on that you can use to change the window you're in to an IE window and continue to use the website.(e.g. QuickBooks online service)

[ChillerBaggins]

Agree with 'pflagdad'. I'm 58 and have used it from day one. the IE switch add-on is good. In fact, all the add-ons to choose from give Firefox superior strength.
This is the feature to push for 'new' downloaders - customize the way you want.
My FF 3.0.5 even has 'stylish' and a customization that makes it look like Google Chrome. (I like the top tabs)
---------------------------
Here's a good one:
FEBE 6.0.3
by Chuck Baker
Categories
* Privacy & Security
FEBE (Firefox Environment Backup Extension) allows you to quickly and easily backup your Firefox extensions. In fact, it goes beyond just backing up -- It will actually rebuild your extensions individually into installable .xpi files. Now you can easily synchronize your office and home browsers.

[KenSaunders]

Great article. I thoroughly enjoyed it. So much so that I decided to register here.
I'm another old one (41) using Firefox since 1.0.
I was having a conversation with an 18 year old administrator of Vivaty Scenes and she was telling me that younger visitors like 13 and up sometimes complain that there are older people using the service and I said that they need to understand that it's the older ones (for the most part) that are developing and running the Internet. She agreed telling me that the ones that developed Vivaty are 30+.
It's like I always say, the Internet is for everyone.
By the way, I dugg this article. :D

[mpheadley]

Maybe so, but IE still seems to be the standard when you have to download stuff. I often have a lot of trouble with various web sites when I try to download with firefox.

[rupaa62]

I agree with the older people who have blogged on here I am 47 and I like firefox. Its like MS lost the fire in the belly for IE. I've had IE crash my system but not firefox. With the new direction of MS they are looking at bigger fish to fry with thin client systems and cloud computing. but with the brower wars MS killed Netscape's market. Now its stepping aside for someone else to take care of it and firefox is doing that. There will be other browsers out there too but these two will be the top dogs for the next 5 years.

[campbell2644]

Google Chrome has a long way to go yet to match Firefox but even it might overtake the ailing IE before too long.Very few people who have used the two main browsers would now choose IE over Firefox.

[ChaosClone]

I suspect the author is right that IE will continue to loose and Firefox, Safari, and some others will continue to gain. But that's where the reasonableness of the article stops.
To be fair speculating about the future path of technology is always tricky business; as they say, prediction is difficult, especially about the future. And it's even harder when the model used is totally inappropriate.
To see this, just carry out the method used two more years. That gives IE 39.2% and Firefox 70.6%. I don't think those market shares will be achieved in 2014 :-)
BTW I'm one of those old people (64) who doesn't use Firefox much -- but not because I'm old, it's because I use Safari on a Mac.

[KenSaunders]

I can't really think of anything that I have not been able to download in Firefox in the 4+ years that I've been using it. I can even get Windows updates through it directly or indirectly through IE Tab, and Firefox add-ons allow for downloading just about any type of content from nearly any site.

When I do come across sites that requires a visitor to use IE, I first send them an email about why that is bad for both the Internet and their business, and then I never return to that site again if they have not brought themselves up to date and catch up with the rest of the World.

There are well over 65 million web sites on the Internet with every imaginable service, software, and product and so I don't HAVE to be forced to use something that I do not choose. It's not my idea of freedom as an American or as a world wide Internet user and consumer.

[lionroar]

Really, I find that hard to believe. If you see sites that are problematic, I would steer away from them. The least you could do is to leave them a note and tell them how unconfortable it is to go to their site and them not following the correct html standards. By the way this is something that is bound to change and IE reshaping itself to proper coding is an idication of uniformity among cross browsers. The other one is with Chrome killing the page if it is codeded incorrectly. I guess IE has alot of work ahead.

[Jesant13]

I honestly am not surprised to see Internet Explorer losing market share. It's a shame though that this is happening. I have been using Internet Explorer for years, and to see its market share drop every single month, let alone year, saddens me. I have used Firefox before, I even installed and used it on my PC. But then I uninstalled it. I just couldn't use Firefox. I'm one of those people that prefer Internet Explorer over Firefox. I felt (and still do) that if I used Firefox I would be helping Internet Explorer lose its market share and become less-popular. When I use a Mac, I use Safari. When I use Windows, I use Internet Explorer.

Windows Internet Explorer 8 looks to be a significant improvement over Windows Internet Explorer 7, but personally I wouldn't be surprised if Internet Explorer continues to lose market share to the other browsers, specifically Firefox. =/

[ChillerBaggins]

My Firefox 3.0.5 just downloaded update to 3.0.6 and I restarted it - AND - have lost all my add ons and customizations, eg. top tabs like Chrome.

It's still a Firefox BASIC browser - but it's now a virgin and exposed to ads and ugliness ... it has no pimple cream anymore! How could this happen???? But then, if Google can brand the whole net malware, then, anything is possible :-)

Using Windows 7 beta permanently with Vista on the old PC as emergency..

I could uninstall 3.0.6 and try to reinstall 3.0.5 but the thing would probably just auto download ... update again.

THE STINKER RELEASE THAT IS FIREFOX 3.0.6

[bilalakhtar]

I will be happy to see Firefox and other browsers take the place of Internet Explorer. However, one thing which is slowing the migration from IE to others is that many users (in fact, most) of the Internet don't know that browsers other than IE also exist. FF sould do something like an advertisement campaign.

[GoneFishing]

I'm 60 and used to use FF, but I noticed that it always took forever to open my E-Mail, then I found out that it was datamining so I switched to Opera and will never go back

[number6]

I'm interested in what said and did some looking around, but the only relevant page I found on Firefox and data-mining was this one which is about Firefox 2. Can you tell me more about the subject and if they're still doing it in version 3?

[GoneFishing]

Actually, in retrospect and thinking about it, I may have just remembered that Google was the problem with FF, but anyway, all you need to do is open several pages, regular ones so you get a feel for the browser, and then if you have online mail service, like I am using Mail.com, MSN, and Yahoo, then open the pages and see how long it takes to open the page, time it with Opera, IE and FF, what I was seeing was that any mail page that I loaded took a lot longer than IE and Opera, perhaps you say not scientific but it was a consistent problem with any of my mail accounts MSN, Yahoo, or Mail.com, I have 6 at Mail.com, 3 at Yahoo,and 3 at Hotmail/Live accounts that are main and maybe another 15 accounts for various and asundry projects, always sustantial delays in opening my mail, and I get a lot of mail, when I am really busy answering mail can take over 8 hours a day(no BS, my wife sits and looks and reads my mail with me to help keep abreast of what I am doing, maybe even to be sure I don't have a GF stuffed in a corner, just joking, she trusts me and since I am retired and stay home all day she understands), and if the pages don't open faster than IE for the mail and opens in half the time in all other pages it is noticeable, and for me it is unacceptable, but Opera is faster and more consistent results, as for FF3, don't know, don't care,

[number6]

Wow, you have a lot of email accounts. I would think you'd get a desktop application to manage them all. Something like Mozilla Thunderbird.
As you said, I think Google is the main problem with privacy when using Firefox. I think I've managed to minimize those concerns to a great deal, though, so I'm not worried about it.

[number6]

I found Mozilla Firefox Privacy Policy which explains what you said about data mining. I'm glad I found it. There isn't much in there to worry about.