MacMegasite – AOL officially kills Netscape
AOL has cut or will cut the remaining team working on Mozilla in a mass firing and are dismantling what was left of Netscape (they’ve even pulled the logos off the buildings). Some will remain working on Mozilla during the transition, and will move to other jobs within AOL.
Wired News: Mozilla Wants to Rumble With IE
“AOL doesn’t really seem to have a motive for supporting Mozilla and Netscape anymore,” said Jeff Howden, a Web applications developer and founder of evolt.org, a group of Web developers who have followed the browser wars over the years.
Regardless of how many new features Mozilla offers, most consumers are unlikely to switch from Internet Explorer, noted Howden. “Users will use what is on their computer already,” he said. “If they want pop-up blocking, they’re more likely to download a program for it or a plug-in for IE that does it rather than download an entirely new browser.”
“Mozilla won’t win with the general public by having a superior feature set,” he added. “It won’t win by rendering faster or being more standards-compliant. Heck, IE didn’t do any of those things to get where it is today. It’s on top because it’s on every desktop.”
Despite such skepticism, Baker and the team at the Mozilla Foundation say they are ready for a fight. “We’ve got the better browser,” said Baker. “And that’s what really matters.”