Browsers

Life in the Slow (Dial-Up) Lane (Part II)

By Mark Evans in Browsers, ILEC News, Analysis No Comments Tags: , ,

Dial upIt is difficult to appreciate the convenience of high-speed Internet access until you have to live without it. Most people in North America takes high-speed access for granted given it’s available in most locations via cable, DSL, satellite or Wi-Fi.

But if you happen to spend two weeks at a cottage in rural Prince Edward Island, it doesn’t take long to discover how living digitally without high-speed access is difficult and painful.

Faced with the prospect of no Internet access at all after discovering Rogers’ wireless Edge network isn’t data-friendly, we rigged up dial-up access after scrambling to buy the last US Robotics external modem in PEI.

After more than a week of experiencing the joys (sic!) of dial-up, it is obvious the Web is pretty much unusable without high-speed access.

To start, you can forget about video given using a 56K pipe is like trying to squeeze an elephant down a straw.

Browsing the Web is possible but dial-up forces you to become very selective. While Google is fairly dial-up friendly, the results need to be carefully scanned before deciding which Web site to check out. If you make a “mistake”, it can take minutes to recover.

If there a few sites you want to check out, it means opening the browser tabs, and then coming back many minutes later for them appear. The upside is you can really multi-task. For example, you could exercise, make breakfast, fix something around the house, AND still have time before the Web sites are ready to read.

This leaves e-mail, which is where dial-up works best – and that, my friends, is totally relative. It takes time but new e-mail eventually appears in your inbox, although an e-mail client such as Mail or Outlook seems to work better than GMail or Hotmail.

With the PEI holiday over, I’ll miss the lobster, red sand, beautiful sunsets and slower lifestyle. I will not, however, miss dial-up access.

Rockmelt, Anyone?

By Mark Evans in Browsers, Social Media 3 Comments Tags: , , , ,

In November, Rockmelt burst onto the scene as the new (and latest) social browser. It helped the start-up is financially backed by Marc Andreessen, and it’s a browser with a strong dose of Facebook.

Since Rockmelt made its debut, it has disappeared from the scene. There’s no chatter about Rockmelt, no sign it is gaining market share, and no one in my social-happy circles seem to be using it. In other words, Rockmelt seems to have melted as opposed to rocketed.

So what happened? Why has Rockmelt fizzled after such a strong kick-off?

I think part of it is Rockmelt’s heavy focus on Facebook, making it a Facebook browser as opposed to a social browser. It may also be due to the reality the browser market is extremely competitive with Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome and Safari dominating the scene. This makes it difficult to establish a foothold unless a new browser is fantastic or launched by a strong player such as Google.

Perhaps the biggest problem with Rockmelt is it wasn’t launched by Facebook. So while it’s a Facebook-dominated browser, it’s not part of Facebook. My sense is Rockmelt would be a much bigger success if was the much rumored F-browser as opposed to a plucky start-up that was seemingly created to be acquired by Facebook.

If Rockmelt was the F-browser, it would have the backing and clout of Facebook and, as a result, would have an easier time convincing Facebook user to adopt it. It would probably have tighter integration with Facebook and be closer aligned with with Facebook’s new features.

Instead, Rockmelt sits in an awkward place. It’s trying to be a social browser but it’s a difficult place to establish a foothold. For people who remember Flock (aka the original social browser), it’s not clear whether people are looking for a browser that embraces social media.

At the same time, Rockmelt’s biggest obstacle may be people are happy with the other browser choices. It may be Rockmelt was a victim of bad timing in that the new kid on the block status was claimed by Chrome, leaving Rockmelt on the outside looking in.


Is the World Finally Ready for the Social Browser?

By Mark Evans in Browsers, Social Media No Comments Tags: , , ,

In 2005, Flock launched amid extensive…and then is promptly bombed.

Released as an alpha (a dumb idea no matter how you try to slice it), Flock attempted to become the “social browser”. One of its many shortcomings is it tried to be all things to all people, which only confused everyone. While Flock is still around, it never recovered from its inauspicious debut.

Fast-forward five years and we’ve got another much-hyped social browser, Rockmelt. There are two things that differentiates Rockmelt from Flock. One, the world is probably ready for a social browser whereas Flock was likely ahead of its time. Second, Rockmelt is backed by Marc Andresseen, the guy who created the Netscape browser before it was swamped by Internet Explorer.

My first impression of Rockmelt is mixed. I guess the biggest hurdle is the tight integration with Facebook. To get Rockmelt, you need to provide your Facebook username and password, and provide Rockmelt with access to a lot of your data. As a recalcitrant Facebook user, this is far from ideal – it would be better to have a standalone download.

The upside is Rockmelt looks solid, and avoids Flock’s mistake of trying to do too much. It looks and feels like a Web browser, which may appear like a straightforward proposition but, nevertheless, is important given people will compare how it performs to IE, Firefox and Chrome. (See the screenshot below that displays a Facebook stream.)

It also has solid integration with Facebook and Twitter. You can post updates on Facebook and Twitter directly from Rockmelt, as well as check out your Facebook and Twitter streams, and see the status of Facebook friends within a stream that sits on the left-hand side of the browser. I’m not totally clear about feeds feature, which strikes me as a frill as opposed to something that will appeal to many users.

Rockmelt’s biggest challenge, of course, is trying to gain a foothold in the highly-competitive browser market, particularly given that Google’s Chrome has changed the dynamics by stealing Firefox’s title as the hot, new kid on the block.

There is no doubt Rockmelt’s usage and investment prospects hinge on its Facebook integration. If positioned and marketed properly, Rockmelt could become the browser for many of the 540 million Facebook users looking for a browser that meets their need to browse the Web and be connected to Facebook.

By becoming the Facebook browser before Facebook could create one itself, it seems like a no-brainer Rockmelt will eventually be purchased by Facebook.

Of course, this is the way Silicon Valley works when everyone is so connected. A nudge here, a wink there, a few million dollars in venture capital, and, voila, the next hot start-up is purchased by one of the Web giants.

Do Wireless Web Browsers Matter?

By Mark Evans in Browsers, Wireless 7 Comments Tags: , , ,

There’s lot of excitement about the wireless Web, particularly since the emergence of 4G technology is making the “pipes” bigger and faster. This has, naturally, generated a lot of excitement about wireless browsers.

But the question that needs to be asked whether the wireless browser matters or, for that matter, is that necessary. The reason wireless browsers don’t matter is simple: apps – be it for iPhone, Android or Blackberry devices.

Rather than fire up a Web browser to use an online service, it’s much easier and usually faster to use an app, particularly for services that are frequently used. The use of apps rather than a browser means wireless users can personalize their devices to meet their needs rather than having to a use-size-fits-all browser.

The availability and user-friendliness of apps means that my iPhone features apps that run GMail, WordPress, DropBox, Facebook, Twitter, Skype, Yelp and Tungle. The only reason I would fire up Safari or Opera is to use something like Google Maps, searching for a telephone number or doing a Google search.

It means the wireless Web browser has become irrelevant. In fact, I could probably delete the browsers from my iPhone, and never really miss them.

Do you use a wireless Web browser? If so, why?

One Web Browser Isn’t Enough

By Mark Evans in Browsers 5 Comments Tags: , , ,

Here’s a confession: I’m a tab junkie. Not Tab, the diet cola soft drink sold by Coca-Cola, but Web browser tabs.

Without even thinking about it, there can be 30 to 50 tabs open within Firefox, which probably explains why Apple’s ball of death appears on a regular basis. The problem is there’s just too many interesting things to use and read.

So, what’s the solution for having an addiction to too many tabs? Well, you simply use a second browser (aka the secondary browser, according to my friend, Kevin Restivo). The second browser provides access to the services used on a regular basis: GMail, Facebook, Google Reader, Twitter, YouTube, Techmeme, Hacker News, et al).

For the second browser, I’m using Google Chrome. It’s a quick, no-frills browser that serves as nice companion to Firefox, which has all the bells and whistles (and add-ons) required.

Using two browsers probably isn’t the best or most processor-friendly solution but it helps manage my tab addiction. (Note: Hat tip to Cheryl Smith for the tab tweak.)


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