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Wednesday 3 September 2008

A Chrome Herring


The difference between a good blog and a bad one is focus: know your audience and stick to the program.

Alas, I feel a slip coming on. A red herring.

Make that a chrome herring.

As we all know, the Evil One, the Adversary, Lucifer, Satan is revealed as Microsoft's Internet Explorer, the browser of the Beast. Yes, I'm fully aware that some of you - more than will confess and repent of it - are enslaved even now to this vile demonic entity. IE was a murderer from the beginning, and the blood of the righteous Netscape still cries out from the ground!

Until now the forces of light have gathered around Firefox, the Web's best hope. Safari and Opera are lightweights by comparison, but each user who switches from the Empire of Darkness lights a small candle of hope, and now there's a new front opening in the battle for the Gates of the Enemy: Google Chrome.

Have you been vacillating? Held in thrall by fear of the unknown, mindlessly worshiping at the temple of Microsoft? Now is the moment! Break free! Call on Providence to strengthen your resolve and download Chrome. Do it now... NOW is the hour of salvation!

There - that's the closest I've ever come to issuing an altar call. Sorry about the absence of sawdust, but I couldn't find any at short notice. And remember, even if Chrome isn't for you (it's still in Beta), there are still others who have yet to bow the knee to Bill/Baal. Hush, wipe away that tear, as well as Chrome your free Firefox download is waiting, calling, softly and tenderly...

Amen and amen.

18 comments:

Anonymous said...

I use Safari. Only a dweep uses Internet explorer.

Positive Dennis

Bill said...

Of course, if one desires not to be tracked by Google either, there is this little "tool" that will allow you to google without them gathering information on you in regards to what you went to look at:

http://www.scroogle.org/cgi-bin/scraper.htm

BH

Anonymous said...

I've never been able to understand why people hate Microsoft so much. XP is a solid performer.

There are other options in terms of both OS and browser. Don't buy a PC if you don't like Microsoft and don't mind the extra expense of a Mac.

I use both IE and Safari without any problems. I tried Firefox a year or so ago but quickly came to the conclusion that it blows.

Anonymous said...

Whaaaaaaaaat?

I refuse to bend knee to the horrifying, monolithic, Orwellian, unethical information-gathering, tells-you-what-you-want-for-breakfast-and-is-usually-wrong, data-compilation-on-every-citizen-with-an-Internet-connection edifice, otherwise known as g00gle.

The only upside to the company's monopolistic control, is that GMail addresses are untraceable (by n00b plebs at any rate), but in the meantime, every word of every email typed is monitored, stored, monitored, analyzed, monitored, re-analyzed (did I mention monitored), and can and will be spit back for whatever authorities request it, should they be so inclined.

And don't even get me started on the whole "Store your personal, confidential MEDICAL RECORDS online with Google!!!" debacle. You want to talk the Number of the Beast? OH yeah, I gotcher number right here, gaggle......

FireFox forever! The revolution is dead! Long live the revolution!

;-)

Anonymous said...

I've tried some of these like Opera and Firefox, thay are fast and generally work well but had problems loading pictures to ebay, won't work with Yahoo Music, had problems with Google maps. So IE is still best for me.

Anonymous said...

Gavin reassures,

"Hush, wipe away that tear, as well as Chrome your free Firefox download is waiting, calling, softly and tenderly...

Amen and amen."

The hymn "Softly and Tenderly Jesus is Calling" by Will Thompson, 1847-1909, was yer actual Herb's
theme song for his radio broadcasts
in the 40's and early 50's. It was
sung by his daughter Beverly Armstong Gott (as she was referred to). This was of course dropped later on for being too "religious
sounding". Even for XERB.

ConnedNoMore

Anonymous said...

Chrome is based on the WebKit engine which is also what Safari uses. It's too bad you're such a fan of Chrome as it has numerous issues. It's much vaunted process separation for each tab is broken for example:
http://evilfingers.com/advisory/google_chrome_poc.php

It's incognito mode is not quite as advertised.

The WebKit engine Chrome uses is older than Safari's and thus is vulnerable to recent Safari vulnerabilities, like the "carpetbomb" vulnerability.

I will stick with Firefox/Opera for now thank you very much. :)

Anonymous said...

Purp, I tend to agree.

While on my employer's computer, a screen goaded me into installing Chrome (chrome-plated, with whitewalls and tail fins). After being taken through marketing screens, I realised I was in a loop. Mr Know-it-all software didn't tell me when I tried to download it wouldn't co-operate.

I love network support - the first question is "what browser are you using?" and the first solution is "try using ...". Later, they find the real problem is someone kicked the plug out of the DNS server...

Anonymous said...

PH, and I thought it was a coincidence ... I did a Google search on my name the other day, and ran it twice. The next day, I got junk mail that I apparently "solicited" because 2 people were "looking for me."

At least the spam titled "Real Truth" wasn't from Dave.

Anonymous said...

I use Opera. I like it. Hate IE. IE would be my last choice out of all browsers mentioned. It stinks. Did I mention that I loath IE?

  said...

Browsers are like denominations, people use different ones for no good reason.
I'm using Chrome right now because it's new, no other good reason.
It took a while to solve the User Account Control problem with Vista.
I hear the siren call of IE....
Help...

Anonymous said...

The hymn "Softly and Tenderly Jesus is Calling"

Once'ah Herbert founda'ah out there were'ah other verses, he felt'ah uncomfy with'ah it.

"Softly and tenderly Jesus is calling, don't make him yell if you can
Turn of this station and go out and play now
He's not inspiring this man.

Louder and louder, Jesus is calling, turn off that station right now.
He's trying to help you and save you a heartache
So you won't become a cash cow.

Now he's a screamin', he told you to listen, not to this man on the air
'Click', aahhh that's better , now Jesus can call you
With soft and tender like care.

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa...mmmmeeeennnnn.

Anonymous said...

To Anon at Thu Sep 04, 11:45:00 AM NZST,

It was no coincidence. If you must go out of the GMail screen for any reason at all, by all the Elder Gods, SIGN OUT FIRST.

Looks like someone beat me to the punch with the link to Scroogle, but it bears repeating.

I also installed the Firefox add-on that lets me use Scroogle as the default search engine, instead of the monolith's leviathan. It seems to work like a charm: Even when I am logged in on another tab, the dread Orwellian Big Brother does not recognize me, nor record my information when I search through Scroogle.

WRT Firefox, I have noticed no such problems as reported here, other than a few transitory restart-required or key-error glitches, since I have installed it --- which is a far cry from Exploder, which died on me on almost a weekly basis, at times. Uploads and downloads are also much improved.

As far as Micro$oft's evil OS, I agree that XP is the more stable version; Vista, however, can be made to perform essentially like XP, with a little tweaking and elbow grease, and the disabling of unnecessary additional services and various and sundry bloat that was attached to it.

Especially the graphical interface, which serves literally no purpose other than to slow the machine down --- I'm running a Core Duo processor, and Vista has been running like a charm *knock wood* since I disabled the Aero schema.

Anonymous said...

Yes, leave it to the Armstrongs to destroy any of the love or tenderness associated with Jesus! They idolized and imitated the butt kicking Revelation Jesus, just as their fantasized ancestors did.

The hymn is absolutely beautiful.
http://www.cyberhymnal.org/htm/s/o/softlyat.htm

BB

Anonymous said...

I resent that I MUST have IE on my computer. I cannot delete it!! Why??? Because microsoft demands that I must have it. Anyway I use Opera or Safari.

The arrogance of it all. Microsoft is Satanic!!

Anonymous said...

You don't have to resent anything. There are other operating systems for you to choose from that don't require IE Explorer.

Anonymous said...

I do have something to resent. I purchased the operating system XP. I do not want a browser called internet explorer from the microsoft corporation. I want it off my computer. Explorer is being forced on people for the sole purpose of increasing market share for their crappy browser, and eliminating its competition. This is illegal in some quarters.
A few years ago General Moters was sued successfully for putting Oldsmobile engines in Chevy's and Pontiac engines in Buicks. The point is one may want a Chevy without being forced to have a Buick engine in it. I like XP, but want internet explorer off my machine!!! I want it removed! and seemingly it cant be done.

Anonymous said...

I tried Chrome and for a while it seemed okay -- to a degree. Then too many anthropmorphic messages with bad news... I went back to IE7 (no add-ons). I wish I could go back to IE6. Maybe I'll try Firefox again for what it can do rather than comparing it to IE6. Sounds like a COG/splinter experience, doesn't it?

Happy browsers are all alike; every unhappy browser is unhappy in its own way.

-- Tolstoy