Microsoft has celebrated the
imminent demise of version 6 of its Internet Explorer browser by baking a cake.
The software giant held the
light-hearted celebration as it revealed that the program was used
by less than 1% of US internet surfers.
It is keen to kill off the old
version of the browser and persuade users to move to IE8 or 9.
Meanwhile rival Google has been
forced into an embarrassing climbdown on the promotion of its Chrome browser.
Chrome climbdown
It has downgraded Chrome in its
search listings after the discovery that a marketing campaign paid bloggers to
promote a video about it.
The search giant has distanced
itself from the campaign, blaming third-party marketing firm Essence Digital.
The issue was discovered by Aaron Wall, who wrote
in his SEO Book blog, how he found that a search for "This post
is sponsored by Google" threw up more than 400 pages written as part of a
marketing campaign.
Search expert Danny Sullivan said
the revelation was "jaw-dropping".
"Google, the company that has
been fighting against paid links and 'thin' content seems to be behind a
campaign that's generating both on behalf of its Chrome browser. File this
under 'what were they thinking?'" he wrote on his SearchEngine blog.
In its own statement, Essence
Digital said: "Google never approved a sponsored-post campaign. They only
agreed to buy online video ads. Google have consistently avoided paid postings
to promote their products, because in their view these kind of promotions are
not transparent or in the best interests of users.
"We apologise to Google who
clearly didn't authorise this."
Celebration
Over at Microsoft headquarters, the
mood was more upbeat.
"Time to pop open the champagne
because based on the latest data from Net Applications, IE6 usages in the US
has now officially dropped below 1%," blogged Roger Capriotti, Microsoft's director of
Internet Explorer marketing.
"We hope this means more
developers and IT pros can consider IE6 a 'low priority' at this point and stop
spending their time having to support such an outdated browser," he added.
In dropping below 1% of usage, the
United States joins Austria, Poland, Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Norway, which
have already seen usage fall to very low levels.
In the UK, IE6 usage remains at
about 1.4%, although some countries have far higher usage levels. In China, for
example, it remains at about 25%.
Richard Edwards, a principal analyst
at research firm Ovum, is unsurprised Microsoft is glad to see the back of IE6.
"I think it was rated one of
the worst software products of all time by one tech magazine at the time of its
release," he said.
The browser was plagued by security
issues which has its own knock-on effect, he thinks.
"In many ways, corporate
computer networks have been locked down since partly because of the
vulnerabilities found in IE6," said Mr Edwards.
Mobile battleground
Industry watchers have predicted
that despite Google's current marketing woes, Chrome could overtake IE as the
leading global browser in 2012.
Many had previously said that
Mozilla's Firefox would be the most likely candidate to end Microsoft's
dominance.
According to data from measurement
firm StatCounter, Chrome increased its market share from 15.6% in January 2011
to 27% by the end of the year. At the same time, Microsoft dropped from 46% to
38.6%. Firefox also fell, from 30.6% at the beginning of 2011 to 25.7% by
December.
Mr Edwards is more cautious.
"As long as Windows dominates,
IE9 will remain the number one browser," he said.
He added that the browser wars were
moving to mobile.
"That will be the next
battleground. That's where Microsoft has to focus because that is its Achilles
heel. Its mobile browser is some way off those for Android and iOS
devices," he said.
