Off To A Good Start

In 1993, when the Internet was just beginning to grow popular, the default navigator was good old Mosaic. The choice was narrow at the time and Microsoft wasn't even interested in the Internet at all. The main attraction at the time was Internet surf, although people still talked about Gopher, Veronica and the news and even about the IRC (Internet relay chat). Then came the celebrated Netscape 1.0, which became very rapidly popular with the public. It all went so fast that in 1994 on the A 40, in the West of London, one could see billboards promising us a brighter future : "today stuck on the A 40, tomorrow on the information superhighway!". (I wonder what the car drivers who are still stuck on the A 40 everyday in 2002 have to think about it?)

Everything went well for Netscape and its creators (Jim Clark and Mark Andreesen), and the Netscape brand was the symbol of the whole Internet. Let's be honest, Netscape's 80 percent market share was a quasi-monopoly. And at that time, nobody raged against that monopoly.

Microsoft: Are They Really Responsible?

In 1996 Netscape went into the intranet market with its range of servers and software (named Suite Spot in October 1996). Netscape's future promised to be bright. Microsoft only started to move during the summer of 1996, ie when Internet Explorer 4.0 began to ship. Internet Explorer was Microsoft's new navigator and it was a true competitor of Netscape's who were at that time dominating the market with Netscape navigator 3. Before that date, Bill Gates had declared that the Internet wasn't quite strategic for Microsoft (1995). The launch of Internet Explorer 4.0 in 1996 was to change all that.

So, how can we explain Netscape's current position (see statistics per below) whereas they were a pioneer of the navigator market right from the outset?

Around us, fingers point almost unanimously at Microsoft and its monopoly because of the delivery of Internet Explorer 4.0 as a standard feature of Windows 95 and -- later -- Windows 98. However, the reasons for this failure may be a little bit more complex than that. Let us delve into the history and carry out the post-mortem of the Netscape flop.

1994: Netscape Refuses to Cooperate with Microsoft

The highly hyped Microsoft trial unfortunately can hide the forest for the trees. I wish to remind the reader that in 1994, Netscape did refuse to cooperate with Microsoft when they were asked to embed their navigator to … Windows 95! When Netscape refused to work for Bill Gates, they also declined the opportunity to embed their software with the world's most popular operating system and therefore maintain their leadership. Netscape refused this deal on the grounds that they did not want to hand over the technology to Microsoft and that Microsoft's proposal was grossly undervalued. However, this decision proved unlucky for barely a year later, Microsoft delivered the navigator that was to deal such a severe blow to Netscape.

Microsoft Signs Deals with ISPs and Manufacturers

Microsoft went into some very extensive partnerships with manufacturers who installed Internet Explorer on their equipment by default; this is actually what upsets so many people. But they also signed deals with many ISPs (Internet service providers). Just imagine how many copies of Microsoft Explorer AOL (we will talk about AOL again a little bit later) has delivered together with its installation kits! These installation kits are at the heart of the problem, that is to say in greater proportion than the preinstalled versions of Internet Explorer 4.0, at least when we talk about the consumer market (we will see later that the statistics for B2B users are more favourable to Netscape). Indeed, installation kits were a branding issue for ISPs. Only advanced users (therefore a minority) were capable of configuring their Internet connections without using the co-branded installation kits.

Another very common explanation is that Microsoft's navigator was delivered for free whereas Netscape's had to be paid for. However, I will not keep this assumption for almost everyone was free to download Netscape's software. Besides we will house to believe that this restriction was applied systematically to professional buyers and that wasn't true either.

Low Switching Habits

A 1997 study that was carried out by GVU shows that users, whether they be European or American, very seldom change navigators more than once. Once a navigator is installed and the user is getting used to it, it's very difficult for him/her to get used to another one. Netscape did not succeed very well in signing partnerships and deals to embed its navigator with ISPs' installation kits, if one excepts IBM and Sprint.

The Netscape Boys Become Paranoid

Another reason that could explain the Netscape fiasco is the high level of paranoia which developed within the company when it came to its relationship with its main challenger. Netscape's engineers and managers were so possessed by the fear that Microsoft might abuse its dominant position on the market of office products and PC operating software, that they ended up forgetting to improve their own product and differentiate from Microsoft through quality and innovation. At the end of the nineties, Netscape's incantations -- often reproduced and amplified by SUN Microsystems - really gave the impression that they had all lost their head off.

I do remember an International seminar in 1996 in Brussels which owed nothing to George Orwell's 1984 hate weeks, when video clips were used to make Bill Gates and his firm appear as the devil incarnate. The aim was not to be positive or prove that Java was bringing real technical benefits for its Clients, the enterprise and the development of the Internet. The real objective was to spread an ideology of victimisation with regards to the dominant supplier of this market. This paranoia made Netscape lose sight of its own business development objectives and the firm started to fall.

Netscape Neglects its New Products and Loses its Experts and Visionaries

This is how Netscape's version 5.0 ended up being a total failure, so much so that it was never actually launched. And this is why version 4.X survived for years on end until version 4.7 came in, almost stabilised. As a matter of fact, Netscape did not produce any software innovation from 1999 until 2002, that is to say when the almost bearable Netscape 6.2 was officially released.

But the ultimate fiasco was this version 6.0 which only a happy few were able to download let alone install on their hard disks. last but not least, what must we think of Netscape's initial "thin client" strategy? Far from differentiating from Microsoft, the new software produced by the Mountain View company became more and more unwieldy and bulky, and even slower than its Microsoft competitor.

Download sizes: Paul Sciotino benchmarked the Netscape and Microsoft downloads.

I have the feeling that the Netscape story is a huge waste which even ended up deterring Netscape's experts and visionaries from staying within the firm. As they all resigned one by one, Netscape went into a vicious circle which forced its products to deteriorate more and more. Jim Barksdale, Mark Andreesen, Mike Homer, Mike McCue and Angus Davis all departed from Netscape one after the other until the AOL takeover in 1998.

The end result was that it made Microsoft's task even easier. And one has to admit that Netscape did give Bill Gates a good hand.

Because of all we've just described and also because Netscape had become a very mediocre product, even Netscape's most convinced users (among them, yours truly) were deterred, although they tried to hold on until the last minute. However, developing a web site or any online service for a bug ridden and obsolete navigator which didn't even represent a significant portion of the market didn't make any sense at all anymore.

And this is why Netscape's usage statistics started to fall very very low indeed.

In 1998, Netscape's takeover by AOL made us believe that Netscape would pick up again. at last, Netscape would be distributed by the world's greatest ISP network. Alas, AOL did not believe in Netscape's chances for all its gurus and technical people had gone away, as seen previously. Therefore AOL chose to be on the safe side by maintaining its accord with Microsoft and decided to leave Netscape in a closet named AOL @work.

As a result, nothing came out of this takeover and Netscape didn't overcome its woes before 2002 as we will see presently.

At last, one has to admit that Internet Explorer 5 was a very successful product in terms of usage and interface. It was thinner and faster than Netscape, which in itself was incomprehensible because Netscape's finger was pointed at Microsoft's for being too slow and taking over our PCs. It was also more powerful and therefore more dangerous, namely when security issues were unveiled little by little, (which is still the case with version 6). In pure user terms, Internet Explorer was more pleasant to use, its GUI was more up-to-date, and it was also more lenient with new HTML/dHTML development techniques.

It is true that both Netscape and Microsoft contributed to the HTML nightmare when they all diverged from the WC3 standards and when they developed their own HTML tags. But Internet Explorer enabled one to make the most of one's browser in a much bigger way than Netscape ever did. Here are two striking examples:

• The "favicon" trick which enables Webmasters to brand a web site by adding an icon to the URL as soon as it is added to your list of favourites. Far from being a gadget, it is an element of brand recognition. (last minute: this point is now corrected in version 7.0)

• ILINK, which is the standard HTML tag for the Linkexchange banners, and which is still not recognised by Netscape composer today, therefore making it impossible to edit a page with such tags in it.

• layers are still incompatible with Netscape (this point seems to be corrected in version 6.2.2

Following the expiration of the contract between Microsoft and AOL in 2001, AOL decided to retaliate by embedding Netscape (and no longer Internet Explorer) with its Compuserve kits. Having said that, CompuServe only has 3 million uses, which is not much compared to the 34 million AOL subscribers.

But this is a strong warning that AOL is sending to Microsoft.

Thus, should we, the former afficionados of Netscape, rejoice about the rebirth of Netscape? Alas, I am afraid it's a little bit too early. I have been trying to use Netscape 6.2 for the past three months (which is based on Gecko too) and unfortunately, I still haven't found the product very impressive, nor even easy-to-use even though version 6.2.2 which was released last April changed my opinion a little. In the meantime, I have also been able to use Netscape 6.2 on a PC equipped with Windows XP professional and I have to say that is working much better on that platform. when running on a Windows 98 PC, Netscape is still slower when it loads. If your PCs is not so powerful, then the problem is even more visible (people equipped with Pentium II PCs should forget about it altogether). when you first install Netscape you will be asked to install "quick launch "which enables to store Netscape in memory and speed up the loading of the software. That in itself is a sign that there is something wrong with the optimisation of memory usage by Netscape. But this problem is going away too with version 6.2.2. CNET has proven that Netscape was displaying HTML slower than Internet Explorer (But this is also contradicted by version 6.2.2).

• One of the features that the Mozilla camp is bringing forward is the compatibility of its engine not only with Linux, but also with mobile Internet devices whether they be mobile phones or personal digital assistants. Gecko, which is the technological backbone of both Netscape and Mozilla makes all this possible.

• However, Mozilla and Netscape, despite its quest for universality, may find quite a few competitors on the way. Indeed, experts like Ken Smiley of the Giga Information Group are still very sceptical: "I can't see why people would try Mozilla's navigator on their Visor for it's already equipped with a good one by default. I am not convinced their solution is superior."

In fact, according to some opensource pundits, the Mozilla technology is more than just a browser engine. For it is a comprehensive applications development workbench. This is all very well but will it be sufficient to relaunch Netscape amongst the user community? One may be a little sceptical about it for the product is not user friendly enough and the user community doesn't seem to be its main target.

For instance, there is a little shocking detail within Netscape 6.2: display picture, or a logo and use the standard right click of a mouse to display the contextual menu in order to copy the picture and ... No use! you won't be able to do that. (Last-minute: this feature is still not working with version 7.0).

As long as the Netscape people will focus on the wrong issues and unless they start addressing the needs of ordinary users there are very few chances that the browser landscape will ever be able to change. However, it is obvious that the new 6.2.2 version (dated April 2002) is showing signs of improvement and that Netscape is now a possible alternative to Microsoft Internet Explorer.

Let us hope that our praise be heard and that Netscape will begin to catch up with Microsoft in the browser war. Microsoft Internet Explorer 6 security issues are its real weakness and Netscape should be able to use it. For it is a shame that today's Internet users can't have the choice to use the browser they like.

Indeed, I am genuinely pleased to see that Netscape at last managed to produce a usable version of their erstwhile popular browser. We had almost given up hope ...

Netscape 7.0 was released at the end of August 2002. Despite its interesting new features and bug corrections it looks like the CNET commentators aren't convinced yet that you should deinstall Internet Explorer 6.0. It is very likely that Netscape's difficulties will go on despite the continuous and encouraging efforts that its engineers are making to improve the software. It is really amazing how much harm a bad image can do to a product and vice versa. could we venture to say that the technical/tangible elements aren't probably key factors in the success of a technological product? In fact, this is very probably a rhetorical question.