From nothing to the most popular browser on the planet
For July 2012, StatCounter pegged Chrome’s global market share at 33.8 percent, up from 32.8 percent in June and from 22.1 percent in July 2011. According to StatCounter’s data, IE remains strong with a 32 percent share, while Firefox is steadily losing ground and currently hovering around 23.7 percent. Apple’s Safari browser comes in fourth with a 7.1 percent worldwide market share.
Google has done it. And they have done it by rapidly and continuously developing a browser from nothing. And by making it fast and offering it on all main platforms. I remember how four years ago I installed the first beta and was amazed how much faster than IE it was. Microsoft’s innovation cycle on 18+ months simply could not keep up with Google’s machine. And let’s face it — Chrome is a way better browser than IE is. Hands down. In fact I will go as far as saying that a good chunk of IE’s current share is in fact because of large corporations forcing their employees to use it. Well, let’s see if IE10 can revert this trend… I remain skeptical.
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App pricing
Only a few years ago the concept of a mobile app store did not exist. Or at least not in a sense as we know it today. Yes, it was possible to get third party apps for your smartphone (mainly Symbian or Java), but the experience was quite lame — no integrated environment, no common policy, no app reviews or ratings, very difficult traceability, no updates, complicated installation. The list goes on and on.
Today, on the other hand, every smartphone platform has its own app store — be it Apple’s App Store, Google’s Market, RIM’s App World, Nokia’s (now almost dead) Ovi, Microsoft’s Marketplace or Amazon’s Appstore. With varying degrees of success and major differences in user experience and app selection, all these app stores* aim to provide a seamless and integrated user experience for discovery, purchase, installation and updates of applications for a range of mobile devices. App stores truly revolutionised the way we perceive value of our mobile devices and the mobile ecosystem as such. And a completely new domain of the SW industry evolved from it.
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