Final goodbye for early web icon (BBC) {Netscape support ends tomorrow}

[eppur_se_muova]

By Jonathan Fildes
Science and technology reporter, BBC News

A web browser that gave many people their first experience of the web is set to disappear.

Netscape Navigator, now owned by AOL, will no longer be supported after 1 March 2008, the company has said.

In the mid-1990s, as the commercial web began to take off, the browser was used by more than 90% of people online.

Its market share has since slipped to just 0.6% as other browsers such as Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE) and Firefox have eroded its user base.

The company recommends that users upgrade their browser to either Firefox or Flock, which are both built on the same underlying technologies as Navigator.
***
more: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7270583.stm

Netscape was my *second* browser -- it was Mosaic that introduced me to the Web. A friend had introduced me to Mosaic only a short time before Comet Shoemaker-Levy collided with Jupiter (not suggesting a causal connection) in July '94. I was amazed to be viewing images from observatories around the world within hours of the impacts (there were several visible impacts, as the comet had fragmented earlier), and realized that this was going to shrink the world in a way that TV never had, despite the expectations of 'futurists' and 50's SF authors.

For more on the legal battle surrounding NCSA Mosaic and Netscape, see the Wiki articles:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netscape_%28web_browser%29

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NCSA_Mosaic

Background

Marc Andreessen and Eric Bina originally designed and programmed NCSA Mosaic for Unix's X Window System at NCSA. Funding for the development of Mosaic came from the High-Performance Computing and Communications Initiative, a program created by the High Performance Computing and Communication Act of 1991 (or The Gore Bill after its author, then-Senator Al Gore).<3><4>

[DemoTex]

1. Mosaic first .. then Netscape, too.

Gosh, that was back in antiquity!

[eppur_se_muova]

3. Hey, not THAT far back! I was running Mosaic on a Macintosh IIci ...

and a PowerBook 170 (groovy monochrome screen!):)

Try running any of the current browsers on a machine with 8 MB of RAM ...

[originalpckelly]

4. MAN THAT ROCKS!

I had a Mac SE as a kid, then I went over to the dark side and got a band spankin' new HP with Windoze 95!

Aw, I remember the good ole days! That's so fucking long ago, it's just not right! :P

[Chovexani]

8. Hee! My first Mac was an SE.

1 MB of RAM, 8 MD HD. I remember the ones that didn't come with HDs at all.

Then I got a Classic II, then a Power Mac 6100/66av (the updated version of the first entry level Power Mac), then a Rev C iMac (Strawberry!) and my current baby, a 20" iMac Core Duo.

Never had a PC, never will.

[originalpckelly]

10. Yeah, this was second hand, I was just a kid!

But we had a special HD, I think it was after-market. Like 40 mbs or more!

I gave it to my aunt Barbara, and I have no idea what happened to it.

Those were the days!

[Chovexani]

11. My SE was a hand me down too, hehe

My sister got it for me used when her job got rid of a bunch of equipment.

[Buns_of_Fire]

2. I had Netscape back when you actually had to BUY browsers!

I think I still have a distribution package (with 5 1/4" floppies and a (gasp!) MANUAL) buried in the basement someplace.

Farewell, old friend.

[asdjrocky]

5. One of my email addresses is still a Netscape address.

You should see peoples face when I give them my Netscape email.

[originalpckelly]

6. ROFL!

I had one of those too! :P

Wow! That just seems so long ago now, doesn't it?

My my, how the times have changed. The e-mail capacity I have on G-MAIL is the size of the harddrive in my first brand spankin new 'puter!

[eppur_se_muova]

9. What, giving up on BITNET already? It's coming back, I tell ya! :P nt

[Chovexani]

7. I remember fighting with the other nerds in the lab at school

Over the one Mac LCIII that had Mosaic on it.

Ah, the good old days.