5 ms·

http://www.ie6countdown.com/ http://www.ie6countdown.com/ <-- 10% of the world still uses IE6. I would imagine most obsolescence conversations go like this: "

by veyron 15y ago

http://www.ie6countdown.com/ http://www.ie6countdown.com/ <-- 10% of the world still uses IE6. I would imagine most obsolescence conversations go like this: "We should stop supporting IE6" "What percentage of people use IE6?" "10%" "Hmm, 10% sounds like a lot of people ... let's support it!"

melling 15y ago
Hmmm... Let us look a little closer at that map. 2% of the US uses IE6. The numbers in Europe are pretty low too. This doesn't make sense..oh wait... China and South Korea are skewing the numbers. They're not important for our site, it's ok to drop IE6 support.
Technicolour 15y ago
A good proportion of that 10% is in China however. So it's likely that you could easily cut that percentage in half, which is easier to digest.
marakas 15y ago
I would love to stop supporting ie6 but I develop for customers in China and on the last count from our logs over 60% accessed the service with ie6. ( which, surprisingly, is about double of what is shown on your link )
w1ntermute 15y ago
Well, 10% of the world also uses Macs, but people don't seem to support that as much. Why not? Because it depends on the target demographic. IE6 usage is probably a lot higher in the corporate environments and thus matters to websites targeted at the corporate world, just like how if you're not targeting hip 20somethings, Mac support is unnecessary.
- jhamburger 15y ago
  I do consulting and have been in many offices of large corporations in NYC, and I have not seen IE6 on a corporate PC in maybe 5 years. Macs on the other hand are practically neck-and-neck with PCs from what I have seen. My image of an IE6 user is a 50 year old housewife with a spyware-invested eMachines they bought in 2002. I'm sure in other countries this could be very different but that has been my experience in the US.
- ricardobeat 15y ago
  Since there isn't a crap browser like IE on a Mac, you don't need to "support it", things will work fine if you follow standards. If you're targeting developers or technology/art/design/movie professionals Mac usage is way above 10%.
bmunro 15y ago
10% of the population of the world use IE6, but that is heavily weighted by countries such as China (34%) and South Korea (22%) If your target audience is English-speaking or European countries, the relevant proportion is 2% to 3% or less. That's a pretty good level to start to consider whether supporting that small percentage is actually making you more money than you would if you didn't support their browser.
- w1ntermute 15y ago
  Does anyone know why Asia has such a high level of IE6 usage? I don't think it has to do with the computers being old, because IE6 usage is relatively high even in developed places like Japan, Hong Kong, and Singapore.
  - kingkilr 15y ago
    My understanding is that it is very common in China because people mostly use a browser supplied by their ISP which is a rebranded IE6.
    - w1ntermute 15y ago
      Well, that makes sense for China, but not for Japan, Hong Kong, or Singapore.
  - veyron 15y ago
    I imagine there are a large number of pirated windows xp copies in china
    - w1ntermute 15y ago
      See http://hackerne.ws/item?id=2830887 http://hackerne.ws/item?id=2830887
  - bmunro 15y ago
    A major reason in South Korea is that in the late 90s, the government mandated the use of ActiveX for online banking. This was only recently repealed, and the Korean government is now encouraging people to move on. The government mandate encouraged many websites to also use ActiveX. South Korea is probably the only country where ActiveX is still in use. Internet Explorer has a browser share of 90-95% in Korea. IE6 is about 15-20% of this.
Morcane 15y ago
Heh yeah... We had a DOS client program for one of our services, written in abouts 1985, and we had to support that one until 2-3 years ago, when the single one user in our country (the single one user globally for that matter) retired. So remember when you put funny comments in your software: it lives longer than you expect.
buro9 15y ago
A better argument than the figure today, is where it will be in a year. From ie6countdown.com, click the line graph icon: http://www.ie6countdown.com/#chart http://www.ie6countdown.com/#chart Extrapolate the line on its current trend and IE6 will not be even 1% in 13 months time. Why invest a significant effort when the market share will evaporate within the year? Further, if your project is going to take time to get traction, it may be a reality that by the time you're done the world no longer cares.

by veyron 15y ago

melling 15y ago

Hmmm... Let us look a little closer at that map. 2% of the US uses IE6. The numbers in Europe are pretty low too. This doesn't make sense..oh wait... China and South Korea are skewing the numbers. They're not important for our site, it's ok to drop IE6 support.

Technicolour 15y ago

A good proportion of that 10% is in China however. So it's likely that you could easily cut that percentage in half, which is easier to digest.

marakas 15y ago

I would love to stop supporting ie6 but I develop for customers in China and on the last count from our logs over 60% accessed the service with ie6. ( which, surprisingly, is about double of what is shown on your link )

w1ntermute 15y ago

Well, 10% of the world also uses Macs, but people don't seem to support that as much. Why not? Because it depends on the target demographic. IE6 usage is probably a lot higher in the corporate environments and thus matters to websites targeted at the corporate world, just like how if you're not targeting hip 20somethings, Mac support is unnecessary.

jhamburger 15y ago
I do consulting and have been in many offices of large corporations in NYC, and I have not seen IE6 on a corporate PC in maybe 5 years. Macs on the other hand are practically neck-and-neck with PCs from what I have seen. My image of an IE6 user is a 50 year old housewife with a spyware-invested eMachines they bought in 2002. I'm sure in other countries this could be very different but that has been my experience in the US.
ricardobeat 15y ago
Since there isn't a crap browser like IE on a Mac, you don't need to "support it", things will work fine if you follow standards. If you're targeting developers or technology/art/design/movie professionals Mac usage is way above 10%.

bmunro 15y ago

10% of the population of the world use IE6, but that is heavily weighted by countries such as China (34%) and South Korea (22%) If your target audience is English-speaking or European countries, the relevant proportion is 2% to 3% or less. That's a pretty good level to start to consider whether supporting that small percentage is actually making you more money than you would if you didn't support their browser.

w1ntermute 15y ago
Does anyone know why Asia has such a high level of IE6 usage? I don't think it has to do with the computers being old, because IE6 usage is relatively high even in developed places like Japan, Hong Kong, and Singapore.
- kingkilr 15y ago
  My understanding is that it is very common in China because people mostly use a browser supplied by their ISP which is a rebranded IE6.
  - w1ntermute 15y ago
    Well, that makes sense for China, but not for Japan, Hong Kong, or Singapore.
- veyron 15y ago
  I imagine there are a large number of pirated windows xp copies in china
  - w1ntermute 15y ago
    See http://hackerne.ws/item?id=2830887 http://hackerne.ws/item?id=2830887
- bmunro 15y ago
  A major reason in South Korea is that in the late 90s, the government mandated the use of ActiveX for online banking. This was only recently repealed, and the Korean government is now encouraging people to move on. The government mandate encouraged many websites to also use ActiveX. South Korea is probably the only country where ActiveX is still in use. Internet Explorer has a browser share of 90-95% in Korea. IE6 is about 15-20% of this.

Morcane 15y ago

Heh yeah... We had a DOS client program for one of our services, written in abouts 1985, and we had to support that one until 2-3 years ago, when the single one user in our country (the single one user globally for that matter) retired. So remember when you put funny comments in your software: it lives longer than you expect.

buro9 15y ago

A better argument than the figure today, is where it will be in a year. From ie6countdown.com, click the line graph icon: http://www.ie6countdown.com/#chart http://www.ie6countdown.com/#chart Extrapolate the line on its current trend and IE6 will not be even 1% in 13 months time. Why invest a significant effort when the market share will evaporate within the year? Further, if your project is going to take time to get traction, it may be a reality that by the time you're done the world no longer cares.