3 ms·

When Chrome appeared HN was full of comments like "I switched all my family to Chrome, I recommend you do too".

n144q 2y ago
Dude, that's completely irrelevant. Most people switched from Internet Explorer. Firefox was never the "mainstream" choice.
- black3r 2y ago
  > Firefox was never the "mainstream" choice. This may be more regional-based and profession-based though. Around 2010 when Chrome was entering the market Firefox had around 30% global market share. In Slovakia where I'm from Firefox was "mainstream enough" that we had it pre-installed on high school and library computers and were taught to use it instead of IE as early as 2005..., But also in lots of enterprise-style managed companies (including basically all government offices, banks, ...) you couldn't use anything other than IE as late as 2016 cause there was no way they were gonna allow you to change your homepage from the company intranet home, so there were also lots of people who were using Firefox at home but also using IE at work because they had no other choice...
  - rplnt 2y ago
    I think Opera had even bigger share in Eastern European countries at the time. But it was actively killed by Google. From homepage ads on google/youtube to blocking features or whole applications based on user agent.
latexr 2y ago
When Chrome appeared, Google still had “don’t be evil” as a motto and was generally considered a champion of users. It’s been a decade and a half since then, the tech landscape shifted tremendously. Think we’re Apple was back then, the iPhone barely existed.
lern_too_spel 2y ago
At the time, Chrome was far and away the most secure browser available. It still is the most secure browser in many respects but not by enough of a margin to outweigh its disadvantages in some cases, like mobile, where its lack of extension support hurts security for those who know what they're doing as well as usability.

Dude, that's completely irrelevant. Most people switched from Internet Explorer. Firefox was never the "mainstream" choice.

black3r 2y ago
> Firefox was never the "mainstream" choice. This may be more regional-based and profession-based though. Around 2010 when Chrome was entering the market Firefox had around 30% global market share. In Slovakia where I'm from Firefox was "mainstream enough" that we had it pre-installed on high school and library computers and were taught to use it instead of IE as early as 2005..., But also in lots of enterprise-style managed companies (including basically all government offices, banks, ...) you couldn't use anything other than IE as late as 2016 cause there was no way they were gonna allow you to change your homepage from the company intranet home, so there were also lots of people who were using Firefox at home but also using IE at work because they had no other choice...
- rplnt 2y ago
  I think Opera had even bigger share in Eastern European countries at the time. But it was actively killed by Google. From homepage ads on google/youtube to blocking features or whole applications based on user agent.

latexr 2y ago

When Chrome appeared, Google still had “don’t be evil” as a motto and was generally considered a champion of users. It’s been a decade and a half since then, the tech landscape shifted tremendously. Think we’re Apple was back then, the iPhone barely existed.

lern_too_spel 2y ago

At the time, Chrome was far and away the most secure browser available. It still is the most secure browser in many respects but not by enough of a margin to outweigh its disadvantages in some cases, like mobile, where its lack of extension support hurts security for those who know what they're doing as well as usability.