According to a post on ArsTechnica.com, it seems Google is ready to release its new browser to the world, by setting it as a default browser on new computers.
Google, meanwhile, is exploring its distribution options and examining the various ways it might improve its market share. “We will probably do distribution deals,” Pinchai told The Times. “We could work with an OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) and have them ship computers with Chrome preinstalled.”
By preinstalling the browser on new computers, you’ll reach a relativily small percentage of internet users out there. It might replace IE for some users, but those who are scared of changes (and that’s just about every PC user with little or no knowledge of IT) will return to Internet Explorer – their safehaven, the software they know and have used for several years. It’s proven to work – why would they switch to something else?
Those people that use FireFox (a 20% marketshare at the moment), have made the step from Internet Explorer to try the new browser. They are the ones that _do_ like change, so they switched. That 20% marketshare is probably the only share that’ll considder using Google’s Chrome.
By further promoting it, the Chrome browser will only steal marketshare of the “alternative” browsers – FireFox, Safari, Opera, … – not the mainstream Internet Explorer users causing more diversity.
Since the launch of IE3 in 1996 to today, Microsoft has never had to compete for browser share against a company as large and powerful as itself. Once Chrome launches, that’s going to change; Google has the money and the expertise to match Microsoft dollar-for-dollar and feature-for-feature. If both companies stay on track, 2009 may be the year we finally test John Curran’s hypothesis, both in the UK and around the world.
I’m curious to see how that will go. If spending money only means getting the browser preinstalled, then the war will still be won by IE. If it means tearing down IE’s reputation through public ads, commercials and likes – to get to the “common” man, who’s afraid of change – it might tilt the other way around.
If I look at my immediate surroundings, those users that still used Internet Explorer a few months ago, are using it now. Those that had FireFox/Safari/Opera, made the switch to Chrome.
I was ones a FireFox user. I switched to Chrome.