The 'Fox gaining momentum?

[LiamC]

Saw two disperate reports on 'fox usage today, on top of a report earlier in the week that shows fireFox continuing to gain momentum.

First up, Lé Inq

..."Figures using Urchin web counting software show that in the last month, Firefox browsers visiting the INQ represented 46.89%, IE 28.12%, Mozilla "compatible agents" 4.5%, Mozilla 3.27%, Opera 2.80%, Safari 1.85%, SharpReader 1.16%, AppleSyndication 1.04%, "unknown" 0.92%, Konqueror 0.89%. Then there are the others."...

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=25161

and then from a code guru's site:

http://www.azillionmonkeys.com/qed/sitestats.html#browser

where the 'fox goes from 3% to 25% and IE goes from 70% to 49% (all others relatively stable).

 

[Mercutio]

I'd guess that the numbers on just about any techie site would skew heavily to non-IE browsers; we're more aware of the alternatives.
The stats on a widely-known general use site would be much more interesting. Weather.com or Ebay or Amazon, say.

Even at that, Firefox has been downloaded close to 100 million times, and people do use it. I understand IE is very close to dropping under 90% general usage.

 

[tazwegion]

I'd guess that the numbers on just about any techie site would skew heavily to non-IE browsers, we're more aware of the alternatives.

I guess that WebReference.com is just such another anti-IE/techie site? :roll:

Results Summary

Internet Explorer (all revisions) 53.39%
FireFox (all versions) 21.46%
NetScape (all variants) 3.11%
SF (all variants) 2.18%
Opera (all variants) 1.24%

I'll finish this post with a quote from Benjamin Disraeli - "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damn lies, and statistics."

 

[LiamC]

I guess that WebReference.com is just such another anti-IE/techie site?

What you posted does not invalidate Merc's statement. People hitting WebReference would be more likely to be classified as tech literate.

Merc was referring to the "great unwashed"--i.e. (hah, hah) those who don't care, or don't know enough to be concerned by various browsers and their respective pros and cons.

Mr. Disraeli's comment implies a gross misunderstanding of statistics.

 

[Howell]

OH yeah. These guys are definately techies:
http://www.webreference.com/experts/

 

[tazwegion]

What you posted does not invalidate Merc's statement. People hitting WebReference would be more likely to be classified as tech literate.

Merc was referring to the "great unwashed"--i.e. (hah, hah) those who don't care, or don't know enough to be concerned by various browsers and their respective pros and cons.

Mr. Disraeli's comment implies a gross misunderstanding of statistics.

Au contrare... statistics can be used quite convincingly for either side of an arguement, simply find an example and manipulate it to fit your own needs, hence Mr Disraeli was spot on World Governments & International companies are the most creative statistic manipulators, to sway popular thinking/opinion even dare I say... bad press? :lol:

As far as users of webreference.com being 'tech literate' a growing portion of PC users are already 'tech savvy' leaving only those too old or too lazy to care :roll:

Honest statistics are as rare as an unbiased IT product review

 

[Mercutio]

I am very happy that, about three months ago, I finally got to a place where I can say to literally every person I see "You have to use Firefox or I'm not going to help you any more."

Especially when someone thanks me for making them switch the next time I see 'em.

 

[LiamC]

Au contrare... statistics can be used quite convincingly for either side of an arguement, simply find an example and manipulate it to fit your own needs, hence Mr Disraeli was spot on

It seems that you haven't thought the issue through. Statistics are neither left/right/good/evil/truth or lie. They just are. How someone presents the information that a statistic may support or decry is another matter. It isn't the statistic that is at fault, it is the motivation of the individual who may be seeking to support/decry his/someone else's position. That people blame "the statistics" identifies only their own mental short comings. People should question anybody blinding presenting statistics.

Yes you can get biased statistics--either by accident or design. If by accident--then that only supports my argument--the person collecting the statistics don't understand them. And if by design, then again that supports my argument that people don't understand statistics--but in this case, the person presenting them is relying on their audience not understanding.

As far as users of webreference.com being 'tech literate' a growing portion of PC users are already 'tech savvy' leaving only those too old or too lazy to care

Strawman argument. How big is your "proportion"? It is irrelevant to the argument Mercutio raised--because he wasn't talking about tech savvy users--so to offer up a "sample" that is weighted in favour of the users we aren't concerned about is--dare I say it--dodgy statistics. Which opens up the question of the motivation(s) of the person offering them as "proof"--see my comments above.

 

[Mercutio]

Actually statistics related to web-anything seem to be dodgy as all hell. Have you ever looked at reviews for web hosting providers? Or ad services that pay per click?

Everyone involved has too much of an axe to grind.

Google used to have browser stats for main page visits available. Apparently that was dropped recently, but Firefox and Moz were on a big upward trend. Probably at least a bit unfair as a general test, since Firefox ships with google as the default page, but better than if Microsoft published stats for MSN visits.

Also, I understand that the Norwegian whore-browser is about to start correctly reporting its user agent string. And that'll take away another .3% from IE as well.

 

[LiamC]

Actually statistics related to web-anything seem to be dodgy as all hell. Have you ever looked at reviews for web hosting providers? Or ad services that pay per click?

Everyone involved has too much of an axe to grind.

See--you understand. When I said people don't understand, I did not mean to imply that the stats were good and it was people that were at fault in all cases, the thrust of my argument was that people needed to understand stats enough to know when the stats they were being fed was tripe.

 

[Fushigi]

Firefox 1.5 Beta available here.

 

[Mercutio]

There's a nasty bug in Mozbrowser URL handling. Buffer overruns from extra-long URLs with dashes in them that can lead to remote execution. It's probably fair to assume it'll be fixed in the next short while, so be prepared to click your little red arrow and advise your clients and lusers to do the same.

 

[Buck]

I like how Firefox updates are automatically part of Suse 9.3.

 

[Mercutio]

I like that SuSE 9.3 has a nice updater.
I wish it was based on apt, but that's easy enough to bolt on to SuSE regardless.

 

[Groltz]

Has anyone tried v1.5 Beta 1 yet?

Feedback?

 

[fb]

I've tried it and it seems to be OK so far.

 

[Tannin]

It might be worth looking at the trend in the redhill browser logs. (I only have meaningful figures from after I changed service providers).

May
Internet Explorer 65.2 %
Firefox 21.4 %
Opera 6.2 %
Mozilla & etc 4.6 %

June
Internet Explorer 60.8 %
Firefox 25.9 %
Mozilla & etc 5.5 %
Opera 4.1 %

July
Internet Explorer 60.4 %
Firefox 25.7 %
Mozilla & etc 6.8 %
Opera 3.3 %

August
Internet Explorer 63.2 %
Firefox 25.9 %
Mozilla & etc 4.5 %
Opera 3.9 %

September
Internet Explorer 49.5%
Firefox 36.7 %
Opera 4.7 %
Mozilla & etc 4.2 %

Looks like a trend to me.

 

[LiamC]

Has anyone tried v1.5 Beta 1 yet?

Feedback?

I've been running it over the weekend. In combination with JRE 1.5_04, the Formula1.com website will crash every second or so visit. Apart from that, it is fine. page loading is vastly improved (speed wise) over a MOOX build (Athlon 64/P4 specific code optimisations) of 1.06

 

[LiamC]

Just checked a couple of sites that would not display correctly in 1.06 (IE specific code :x ) and they render just fine in 1.5B1.

 

[Fushigi]

Auto-update just had me download 1.0.7.

 

[LiamC]

Could anyone here running a server post some usage numbers? I'm curious to see how FF/IE/Opera/Moz/et al are faring. Numbers from now/three months/six months would be even better

 

[Tannin]

The trend, it seems, is down.

October
Internet Explorer 51.3%
Firefox 33.8%
Mozilla & etc 4.7%
Opera 4.5%

November
Internet Explorer 57.2%
Firefox 28.5%
Mozilla & etc 5.7%
Opera 5.3%

December (partial month)
Internet Explorer 62.8%
Firefox 27.5%
Opera 3.9%
Mozilla & etc 3.2%

It is, however, on dropping traffic as I haven't done an update lately, so there is probably a dual effect going on here: increasing IE base share, and decreased visits from people interested in the site content as opposed to random blow-ins.

 

[Handruin]

SF trends:

October
Internet Explorer 46.9 %
Firefox 43.4 %
Opera 4.7 %
Mozilla 2 %
Netscape 1.1 %
Safari 0.6 %
Unknown 0.3 %
Links 0.1 %
K-Meleon 0.1 %
MultiZilla 0.1 %
Others 0.1 %

November
Firefox 45.5 %
Internet Explorer 41.5 %
Opera 6.2 %
Mozilla 2.4 %
Netscape 1.3 %
Unknown 1.3 %
Safari 0.6 %
MultiZilla 0.4 %
Links 0.2 %
K-Meleon 0.1 %
Others 0 %

December (partial)
Internet Explorer 35.3 %
Firefox 34.5 %
Netscape 21.5 %
Opera 5.5 %
Mozilla 1.9 %
Safari 0.4 %
Unknown 0.2 %
MultiZilla 0.2 %
K-Meleon 0.1 %
Konqueror 0 %
Others 0 %

 

[LiamC]

Thank you Tony, Doug.

My god, where did all the Nutscrape users come from Doug (December)?

And why do I always read K-Meleon as K-Melon? :mrgrn:

 

[Handruin]

Yeah no kidding. What's the deal with all the netscape users. Maybe someone is having fun with their reported browser agent? I could be a flaw in the tracking software...I don't really know how accurate it is.

Ha! I always read it as k-melon also.

 

[blakerwry]

could it be related to the netscape 8 release? I dont know how it reports itself and am not that interested to find out either...

 

[Explorer]

...so there is probably a dual effect going on here: increasing IE base share, and decreased visits from people interested in the site content as opposed to random blow-ins.

Another possibility for rises in IE usage and IE spikes is new Christmas computers (i.e. -- computers that will probably NEVER experience a single security update).

 

[sechs]

What's the deal with all the netscape users. Maybe someone is having fun with their reported browser agent? I could be a flaw in the tracking software...I don't really know how accurate it is.

If it's just checking reported user agents, then I'd show up as Netscape, even though I use Firefox.

Some secure websites will support Netscape 7+ but not the matching versions of Mozilla and Firefox; a little hacking of the user agent solves the problem.

 

[Tannin]

December (partial month)
Internet Explorer 62.8%
Firefox 27.5%
Opera 3.9%
Mozilla & etc 3.2%

Full figures now available:

December
Internet Explorer 60.3%
Firefox 29.3%
Opera 3.7%
Mozilla & etc 3.9%

January (partial)
Internet Explorer 61.1%
Firefox 27.7%
Opera 5.2%
Mozilla & etc 3.9%

Can we say Firefox down, Opera up, IE up as well, and Mozilla steady? No, not really, too soon to say.