All posts tagged internet

Microsoft send flowers to the funeral of Internet Explorer 6

By On March 6, 2010 In article With No Comments Permanent Link to Microsoft send flowers to the funeral of Internet Explorer 6Permalink

It appears that Microsoft is as happy as anyone to see the death of IE6.

At the browser’s “funeral” held yesterday by a web design company in Denver, organisers received a bouquet of flowers from the Internet Explorer team at Microsoft. The flowers were accompanied by a letter of condolence, saying “Thanks for the good times, IE6. See you all @ MIX, where we’ll show a little piece of IE heaven. Internet Explorer Team at Microsoft.”

It’s nice to see Microsoft has a sense of humour about the funeral, but it also reveals that Microsoft is about as sick of IE6 as web designers are.

It’s not hard to see why. Although IE6 is still their product, it’s positively archaic compared to the browsers that the IE team have released in the past couple of years. While IE7 and IE8 aren’t the best browsers on the market, they’re at least able to render unicode without crashing. IE8 in particular (especially when paired with Google Frame) is a legitimate competitor to Safari 4, Firefox 3.6 and Chrome.

Despite their hard work, neither browser has a commanding lead over IE6 in market share. IE7 and IE8 each have between 20% and 25% market share, the same amount as IE6 does.

The IE team’s note does reveal an interesting bit of information. They talk about revealing a “little piece of IE heaven at MIX” which suggests that they’re going to be showing off IE9 at the conference, which is less than a week away.

The IE team is no doubt tired of patching up the broken old machine that is IE6 at the expense of focusing on IE7, IE8 and IE9, but they have no choice in the short term. Even though Google no longer supports the browser, there are still too many business systems based off of IE6 for the browser to die right away. Indeed, Microsoft has said they plan to support the browser until at least the planned 2014 end of support for XP SP3. Here’s hoping that day comes quickly.

From the nextweb.com

BT study Internet “noobs”

By On September 18, 2007 In article With No Comments Permanent Link to BT study Internet “noobs”Permalink

BT is setting up an initiative to find out why some people resist using the internet. The project will employ psychologists to closely study a small group of people to reveal what stops them joining the net-using majority.

Early research done for the project suggests that, for some, using the net is as stressful as a bungee jump. Official statistics on UK net use suggest that 39% of households do not have web access.

Net losses

Dr David Lewis, the lead psychologist employed on the project, said that for many people the biggest barrier to getting online was mental as many of those avoiding the net lived in homes with a dedicated connection. He said: “More often the barriers are internal, stemming from a fear of the technology.” “It will be interesting to see whether the trial will be enough to build the participants’ online confidence, or whether more needs to be done in terms of support and guidance to help them to become tech savvy,” he said.

By contrast to novices, many seasoned net users find the experience of going online very relaxing, said Dr Lewis. The psychologists on the project will take readings of physiological changes reluctant net users undergo when they go online. BT has chosen four subjects who will be studied closely as they are coached to use the net to find out why they fear using it.

To acquaint them with online life, the four subjects have been given a broadband link, a laptop, webcam and a digital camera. A two-month training plan has also been developed that will introduce them to what they can do on the net. The participants will also be encouraged to record their experiences on video or in still images and comment on what they discover. Their videos and images will be shown on the “Journey to Inclusion” website documenting the project.

Gavin Patterson, a spokesman for BT said: “The gap between the competent internet user and those who have never been online has never been greater.”

Primary Role of the Internet shifting from Communications to Content

By On August 14, 2007 In article With No Comments Permanent Link to Primary Role of the Internet shifting from Communications to ContentPermalink

People are using time spent on the Internet to actually engage themselves in reading content more now than ever before, according to new data presented by the Online Publishers Association and Nielsen/NetRatings. The association released its four-year-long Internet Activity Index (IAI) today, which gauges people's use of e-commerce, communications, content and search services over time. And while activities like e-commerce and communications still remain popular, reading and viewing content has skyrocketed between 2003 and today.

According to OPA, about 34 percent of Internet users' time was spent reading content in 2003—at that time, content came in second to "communications," which measured at 46 percent of Internet users' time. However, as of May 2007, OPA reports that those numbers have practically reversed: content now commands 47 percent of Internet users' time, and communications only 33 percent.

"The IAI has identified a very significant and sustained trend in where consumers are spending their online time," OPA president Pam Horan said in a statement. "The index indicates that, over the last four years, the primary role of the Internet has shifted from communications to content."

This dramatic shift in focus toward content is explained by the transition of offline activities—such as reading news, browsing TV or movie listings, and checking the weather—to online, according to Horan. "Quality content sites see a consistent pattern—major news drives traffic spikes, but traffic remains consistently higher even after the event. Major news events such as Hurricane Katrina and high-profile seasonal events such as the NCAA Final Four Basketball tournament are clearly driving consumers to engage more deeply
with online content," she said.

But online video and social networking sites also deserve some credit, says the report, for driving traffic and keeping users there in order to watch and communicate with each other. But wait, doesn't social networking count as "communication?" Well, yes, but not under OPA's metric, which appears to only categorize e-mail as quot;communication." Instant messaging also counts as content, according to OPA, which could also help explain content's explosive increase in popularity in recent years. "IM is a more efficient communications vehicle than e-mail," reads the report. Thank you, Captain
Obvious.

However, it seems that e-mail's popularity isn't actually going down, but rather the availability of content to consume is going up. Anecdotally, my colleagues and I agree that we conduct more of our everyday lives online than ever before, by getting driving directions, checking movie listings, reading reviews, news and blogs,  and creating content of our own. So much so, that our ratio of content consumption to e-mail communications actually is skewed heavily in favour of content, even though we send more e-mail today than ever before too. As Internet access becomes more and more ubiquitous, we will likely continue to see this pattern in the years ahead as people continue to shift their offline activities online. Now, if there was only a way to wire up our brains to access WiFi…

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