A
ppleis hot new Safari now sports tabbed browsing and other cool features, and many a Mac now sports Safari as the default browser. Safari is fast, lean, and is giving more established browsers and real challenge for the hearts and minds of Mac users; something that should bring a slight smile to S. J.is lips given that Safari is still just beta code.
Browsers are so much a part of the computing environment that most people expect to find a browser of some sort on nearly any device that has a CPU and a display. Next week the ubiquitous browser becomes 10 years old and C|Net has posted an article titled Mother Of Invention which offers an in-depth look at web browsers and how they revolutionized computing and our world. Hereis an excerpt:
In mid-1993, Microsoft was thinking hard about how Apple Computer might still become a threat.
The brainstorming sessions were run by then-Senior Vice President Brad Silverberg, who would ultimately head the companyis Internet and Windows 95 strategies. He concluded that Apple would be dangerous in only one way: if it put all its resources behind making the company synonymous with this powerful medium called the Internet.
It was the right fear, but the wrong company. Two years later it would be Netscape Communications and its Navigator Web browser that would epitomize the young mediumis explosive potential.
"Microsoft ran the risk of being made irrelevant as the technology advanced," said Silverberg, who left Microsoft in 1999 to found Ignition Partners, a venture capital group. "Netscape was a real competitive threat. Platform leadership for the PC was at stake."
The C|Net piece is lengthy, but reading it is time well spent, so stop by and check it out.