RSS: When It Isn’t Convenient February 22, 2006
Posted by theexpress in internet, rss.2 comments
Since blogs have really dominated the web culture recently, everyone has jumped aboard the RSS train. RSS is a great technology to accomodate all of the weblogs out there and it is especially helpful for someone who checks a lot of blogs in one day. When I first downloaded Firefox in November 2004, I was not really sure what the RSS hype is all about. I guess it was because I only checked a few blogs a day and many sites still did not have RSS up and running. Over the past year and a half, I have switched sides.
I am all over the blogosphere now, and it is really hard to remember all of the sites you would like to see in one day, but henever I was making my way around a few dozen sites, I started to realize how much of a help it really is. I quickly subscribed to all of my favorite blogs and RSS-enabled sites and I didn’t regret it at all. I was able to check wired.com and my friends sites and I could do it a lot quicker. Now that I am checking out tons of weblogs, it is almost getting to be an inconvenience to see the long list of posts I should check out. I realized that I bit off more than I can chew.
Now it isnt very fair for me to blame RSS for my increased blog appetite, but I need some kind of scapegoat. Getting through the loads of new updates is beginning to be a chore. The only relief I get is on the weekends when most new sites are posting and some bloggers are taking some time off. The technology is great, but maybe I was better off trying to remember sites because I usually would only check a handful of the total blogs anyway. My desire for all of these RSS feeds is going to have to stop growing sometime, but unfortunately the web wont.
Browser War (no, not that one) February 22, 2006
Posted by theexpress in browser, internet, open source.8 comments
Until 2004, it had been many years since anyone had really cared about a battle of the web browsers. The famous Netscape versus Internet Explorer duel was old enough for the history books, and no one seemed to mind the winner…for a while. Then, like a golden-winged ship, Mozilla released Firefox 1.0 and the overthrow of Microsoft dominance began. Immediately people began calling for the downfall of IE and the beginning of the open source revolution. Since then, Firefox has remained in second place and is making steady gains on IE. The battle is still raging even though most of that original spark (which I was gladly a part of, and I assume many of the readers were too) has died a bit. The Fox is still hungry for more of the market share, but the pioneer movement that was palpable in late 2004 and early 2005 has ended. The only competitor of Firefox for second place is sitting in the choir at about one percent of the market share. That of course would be the Opera browser, who is making it a goal to out Mozilla as the open-source leader and try to lead the take down of IE’s empire.
When it comes to popularity, Firefox has Opera easily outdone. The success of the browser is owed to the group of devout fans who got out there and spread the word from the beginning that there was a new sheriff in town. Just because they have the popularity doesnt mean that Mozilla has the better browser on all accounts. When you look at the amount of features that each browser comes with, you’ll probably see that Opera is the clear winner. But there are other factors in a browser, such as which one makes the internet more fun to be on. That question relies more on opinion, but I believe that more websites have accepted Firefox and it has been made easier for the users to get around. It may be unfair to Opera because they haven’t yet gained the popularity to be more accepted, but that is how the cookie crumbles.
If you read this article wanting to know which browser to chose, you’re probably in the wrong place. Each one has their own highlights and pitfalls, but I believe that it’s safe to say that Mozilla wont have to worry about the Opera threat. Opera didnt get the same movement that Firefox got, so it can’t really blast into the market. Unfortunately for Opera, Firefox has enough extensions that if anyone really wants to have certain features that only Opera offers, they can download them for FF and still have the function of the soon-to-be number one browser.
