Let the Firefox death-watch begin!

The latest browser market-share figures from NetApplications have set off a firestorm about the future of Firefox. Seems that the Fox actually lost market share in July, with its overall share slipping from 8.71% to 8.07%. Meanwhile, Internet Explorer was up to 87.2% percent in July, from 86.56% a month earlier. Analysts have been wringing their hands, saying that recent security problems in Firefox could have undermined growth, and that the shift represents a resurgence for Internet Explorer. However, cooler heads have pointed out that a shift of 0.64% in one month hardly means that it's time to start the Firefox death watch (though I couldn't resist the headline). As at least one web site has pointed out, in checking their own logs, both Firefox and IE have shown an increase, at the expense of other alternatives like Opera. However, given the  relentlessly upbeat coverage of Firefox over the past few months, the market-share news gives pundits a chance to bash the browser, something they've clearly been itching to do.

 

Tags: firefox+market+share+internet+explorer, FirefoxMarketShareInternetExplorer, news, opensource