As we all know, Microsoft have done their level best to completely distort the way you see the internet, for many years now. Their browser, Internet Explorer (a massive misnomer, as is not that great an explorer, it's the one that got lost on the way to the shops and was never heard from again as it couldn't understand the simple directions a kind stranger offered along the way!), is written into Windows in such a way that everybody who uses a Microsoft Windows OS will at some point in their lives have had to use it, if only to download a better browser.

The rare occasions I have used IE in the past have indeed been to download better browsers, such as Firefox. I have only been using the internet comprehensively for the last five years, and I have used IE for a combined total of less than five minutes. I originally used it to download Opera, a fantastic free browser with many cool features like multi-tab browsing, session restore, password saving and of course, it's more secure than IE!

I used Opera for several months of my first exploits on the net, it was fast, reliable and rarely crashed. I found out about other alternative browsers, reports were split on them all, except for Firefox. Here was a browser that all users seemed to get along with happily, with its wealth of built in features, great availability of extensions, security, plug-in availability, it was all thumbs up!

I downloaded the latest version Mozilla Firefox 1.0.2, and I never looked back, it was awesome. I enjoyed adding extensions and playing with themes for my shiny new Firefox, the community that sprang up around it to support its Open Source code are very quick to release updates for new versions too. I used Firefox exclusively for over four years, as part of a minority, a community of people who wanted a better browsing experience.

More recently it seems as though Firefox has crept into the lead in regards to browser popularity, so now we are in the majority! I'd love to say it's official and this is categorical evidence, but it's not. It is however indicative enough for me to want to write a blog on the subject, which I hope is enough to mark the occasion. I believe the most part of Firefox's recent conversion rate success is due to the fact it was endorsed so highly by Google, with their Google Toolbar, and Adwords campaigns. Also the fact it does so well in test such as The Acid tests for browsers. There was also of course "Download Day", to try and take the world record for the most downloads of a new release of software in a single day.

I have been trying out a new browser this last year, Google Chrome, it is remarkably simple to use though it's full of complicated components. Here is how the latest browsers stand up to rigorous testing! I have always been a big fan of Google and their ethos "Don't be evil", and it really shows through browser. I'm looking forward to the time when Google release their Chrome Operating System, that they've been talking about recently. I have been using Firefox as my back up browser though, because it very rarely lets me down!