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Microsoft confirms IE10 won't run on Vista, millions of IE9 users shrug

engadget.com

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Re: Microsoft confirms IE10 won't run on Vista, millions of IE9 users shrug

#11

Post by billswift »

cookiecaper wrote: post #4
lmkg wrote: post #2

IE9 not supporting XP at least had some sort of justification, regardless of whether it was a good decision. Vista was a large platform upgrade/rewrite, and they mentioned particular features IE9 was using that they didn't want to bother re-implementing for XP (graphics stack, security). But Win7 is not such a drastic upgrade over Vista (architecturally, anyways). So what's the explanation for this?

The explanation is probably, "We want to sell licenses for the latest version of Windows". Microsoft played the lock-in game too well and they can't even get their customers to upgrade to new versions of the same software. Since Windows is a one-time purchase, if no one is buying the new versions of Windows, Microsoft is making much money off of these new versions.

I've been using Windows and Linux side-by-side for different things since 1996. Some things have just been more trouble to set up in Linux than I wanted to bother with, with Windows available and easy to use. But Vista annoyed me enough that I am gradually switching more of my work to Linux, hopefully by the time this Vista box dies, I will just switch everything over to Linux.

Re: Microsoft confirms IE10 won't run on Vista, millions of IE9 users shrug

#12

Post by Rodek »

You have to consider several things that probably went into this decision:

1. Small and declining user base for Vista means it becomes less important for Microsoft to target those users. In fact Windows 7 already has twice the market share that Vista does and it's still growing rapidly. http://gs.statcounter.com/#os-ww-monthly-201003-201103

2. If you project what some likely release window for IE10 and the next version of Windows will be (Win8) Microsoft is positioning itself to only have to support two operating systems. The cost of investment into a 3rd OS, especially one with small and declining market share (relative to it's other OSs), could just be too costly.

Re: Microsoft confirms IE10 won't run on Vista, millions of IE9 users shrug

#14

Post by blhack »

Why does microsoft still spend money building a web browser? I understood this in the 1990s because it locked people to windows, it was a feature, and hopefully it sold MSN subscriptions.

But it's not the 1990s anymore.

Let google spend their money on this, or let mozilla spend their money on this.

Is there any reason microsoft doesn't bundle firefox with their operating system, and just EOL Internet Explorer?

/admitting ignorance here

Re: Microsoft confirms IE10 won't run on Vista, millions of IE9 users shrug

#16

Post by icey »

blhack wrote: post #14

Why does microsoft still spend money building a web browser? I understood this in the 1990s because it locked people to windows, it was a feature, and hopefully it sold MSN subscriptions. But it's not the 1990s anymore. Let google spend their money on this, or let mozilla spend their money on this. Is there any reason microsoft doesn't bundle firefox with their operating system, and just EOL Internet Explorer? /admit…

There are still mountains of money available on the web.

Since Microsoft controls the OS, they can ship a browser with defaults set to sites under their control, like msn.com and bing.

My assumption is that they consider those properties as revenue (or potential revenue) sources.

Re: Microsoft confirms IE10 won't run on Vista, millions of IE9 users shrug

#18

Post by gscott »

mxavier wrote: post #13

I bet the people who spent good money on a Windows Vista license are feeling really good about Microsoft right now.

There were few people dumb enough to buy it but plenty who were stuck with it as a default install that didn't want to then shell out $150 for Windows 7 so soon.

Re: Microsoft confirms IE10 won't run on Vista, millions of IE9 users shrug

#19

Post by idonthack »

blhack wrote: post #14

Why does microsoft still spend money building a web browser? I understood this in the 1990s because it locked people to windows, it was a feature, and hopefully it sold MSN subscriptions. But it's not the 1990s anymore. Let google spend their money on this, or let mozilla spend their money on this. Is there any reason microsoft doesn't bundle firefox with their operating system, and just EOL Internet Explorer? /admit…

They're still following the policy of "embrace, extend, extinguish"; the browser market just got away from them for a bit. Once they ship a browser good enough to shove out the other players with a bit of extra leverage from their desktop near-monopoly, it will become more obvious.

It's already beginning to happen. For example: http://www.winrumors.com/bing-powered-u-s-searches-rise-to-o...

Re: Microsoft confirms IE10 won't run on Vista, millions of IE9 users shrug

#20

Post by heyitsnick »

icey wrote: post #16
blhack wrote: post #14

Why does microsoft still spend money building a web browser? I understood this in the 1990s because it locked people to windows, it was a feature, and hopefully it sold MSN subscriptions. But it's not the 1990s anymore. Let google spend their money on this, or let mozilla spend their money on this. Is there any reason microsoft doesn't bundle firefox with their operating system, and just EOL Internet Explorer? /admit…

There are still mountains of money available on the web. Since Microsoft controls the OS, they can ship a browser with defaults set to sites under their control, like msn.com and bing. My assumption is that they consider those properties as revenue (or potential revenue) sources.

Hypothetically speaking, they couldn't ship windows OS with firefox preloaded with these same defaults?
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