Netscape Is Dead! Long Live Netscape!

Now that Netscape 8 has finally hit the street, we can say with certainty: Netscape, as we knew it, is finally dead.

I’m a sucker for new software, and, of course, I downloaded and installed Netscape 8 (N8) as soon as I knew it shipped. This post is about the first impression from its installation and use.

I Spy

Early in the installation, you are shown a dialog box to prompt if you want to use Internet Explorer’s rendering engine on “non-trusted” sites. There’s also a button for “advanced” settings which reveals that, unless you opt-out, the N8 collects your browser usage statistics:

Now, this kind of sneaky strategy ticks me off. How many ordinary users go for the Advanced settings button? The option for collection stats must be off by default! Also, and it’s a must, N8 should clearly explain what kind of usage stats are collected.

The Scaring Tactics

Now that you happily installed your new shiny N8, you discover it can use either the Internet Explorer rendering engine or that of Mozilla. I have no idea who dreamed this up.

The funny thing happens when you switch rendering to IE’s engine. You are presented with the following scary warning:

You have chosen to view this web site using the Internet Explorer display engine. […] Please be aware that there are known security vulnerabilities with the Internet Explorer display engine.

Really? IE has security vulnerabilities? Hmm… Opera has a history of vulnerabilities. Mozilla and Firefox do too. So does Safari. Baking this lame message into a browser release is stupidity at its finest.

It’s like putting a sticker on every Ford out there: “Warning! Firestone tires explode. Operating a Ford is dangerous to your life.” Even the manufacturer of the most reliable cars, Toyota, has recently announced a recall of 750,000 trucks and SUVs.

All Your Junk Are Belong To Us

While modern browsers: Mozilla, Mozilla Firefox, Opera, IE 7 (early preview)—go for a spartan look with junk hidden out of sight, Netscape 8 is just the opposite. There is no doubt that its look and functionality have been heavily influenced by the loser behemoth AOL.

For example, take a look at this screenshot and tell me where exactly the address bar is (click the image for a bigger screenie):

I think AOL should’ve hired folks from 37signals to help them with defensive design.

There’s a whole bunch of other annoyances, but I don’t want to waste any more time on them.

Loser Empire Strikes Back

The Netscape browser that we’ve known for years, has finally been overrun by AOL “gurus”. At this point it is no different than the AOL browser itself. Ironically, AOL will be licensing Internet Explorer from Microsoft in the foreseeable future. Where does Netscape fit into the picture? No idea. Why keep it on life support? I don’t know. Why do we need Netscape 8, this piece of bloatware? I have no idea either. You be the judge.

I totally agree. I'm also a sucker for new toys and downloaded and installed N8 to check it out. Fortunately I always go for the advanced options so I found the sneaky bit. The whole thing is cluttered and just not very nice to use. I played with it for 15 minutes hating it more and more as I went. It lasted about twenty minutes before being uninstalled.

I forgot about Netscape; I do not even remember the last time I fired it up (only to check site design compatibility).

Joey remember Netscape. Joey don't care one way or the other. Joey don't like aol. Joey like ie. Joey don't like Netscape 8.

Joey like talking in third person. Joey like seeing what he types show up on your blog. Joey like to know what you think. Be nice to Joey.

I think I'm going to let it slide this once. ;)

Why do I need netscape? Having 2 rendering engines in 1 browser makes my life a little easier when testing and surfing.

I haven't tried this release of Netscape 8 but I've tried the last 2 leaked versions. The first was pretty bad, the second much better but not good enough. From the looks of your review, it doesn't look like they succeeded in cleaning up the GUI enough.

And if I can't install Chris Pederick's Firefox entensions, Netscape won't become my main testing browser anytime soon.