2.56% to 2.78%? Splitting a few hairs, are we?

I'm a (mostly) satisfied Safari-user, but this is statistically meaningless.

it's not splitting hairs. It's a monthly stat, and .25% in a one month period is a substantial increase. Over the course of a year, that's several percentage points. Remember in Superman III when they siphoned off fractions of pennies? Over time, they add up! As Mac marketshare increases, so will this statistic. This is great news.

Guest, according to http://www.internetworldstats.com/ , there are 972,828,001 internet users worldwide. Safari's market share jumped from 2.56% to 2.78%, an increase of 0.22%. 972,828,001 x 0.0022 = 2,140,221

You think that the addition of over 2 million Safari users in one month is splitting hairs? I respectfully disagree. If they could gain that every month, that would be over 2 percent in a year, or a near doubling of the market share in 12 months.

Normally I'm solid behind Apple in most things, but I still prefer Firefox. The new 1.5 version is very good; great piece of software.

Look, it's good news, no doubt. It's certainly not bad news. And I know that there are hundreds of millions of internet users, so that a fraction of a percentage point can mean millions of people. Believe it or not, I thought about all that before I posted. What I said was, it is STATISTICALLY meaningless.

Two percentage points in a year may mean something, but come on - we're still talking less than 5%. I just can't get excited by these figures. And the fact that Firefox seems to be stuck just under 10% is also disheartening. Call me stupid (OK, kidding - don't), but I really hoped by the end of this year we'd see IE under 70%, Firefox and Safari around 15% each.

THAT would mean something. Here's hoping for 2006.

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Willmark wrote:
Normally I'm solid behind Apple in most things, but I still prefer Firefox. The new 1.5 version is very good; great piece of software.

You know, I like Firefox, but it just looks too..."Windows-y." Especially the dialog and input boxes. The rendering is just...."softer' and more pleasing in Safari. That, and the fact that plug-ins are a nightmare (to me) with Firefox, has kept me from switching full-time. I like that Safari "just works."

Quick story - one day I got fed up with some Safari quirks, and decided that I was a big boy, and it was time for me to switch to Firefox at home. I'd been using Camino at work for some time, and liked it just fine.

So I went home, downloaded the lastest stable build and started getting acquainted. I quickly decided I couldn't live with the standard Firefox skin, so I went and got me a brushed metal skin to match Panther. After figuring out the weird way one installs a skin, I was busy surfing, checking things out, transferring bookmarks, etc.

I came back later in the day, and the skin was gone. Hell if I could figure out why or where it went. I downlaoded it again and it wouldn't install. Then Firefox started crashing.

And that was it. I chucked the whole app. Some weeks later I reinstalled it and the skin, and it's still in my apps folder, but my point is, I don't care to screw around with crap like this. I am 100% positive I could master the art of installing plug-ins and skins on Firefox relatively quickly, but I don't want to. I'm no longer a tinkerer when it comes to my Mac. I just want it to work, and I want it to be trustworthy. Firefox failed me.

Firefox is a great browser and runs and looks great on Windows and Linux. But on the Mac it just looks out of place which is why Camino exists

Dude - if your main reason for using software is how it looks as opposed to how it works, one word: LLLLAAAAAMMMMEEEE.

Firefox has worked amazingly well on the Mac since it's first inception to the market. It has features that Safari doesn't come with, like more advanced controls over images blocked (ad banners anyone?), text controls, and how things load.

Not good on a Mac? Give a better reason than "looking out of place".

"Call me stupid (OK, kidding - don't), but I really hoped by the end of this year we'd see IE under 70%, Firefox and Safari around 15% each."

Ok, don't you think that's just a little unrealistic? I mean the Mac installed base is AT MOST 16%, if everything you read on the web is to be believed, and Firefox is available on both Mac and Windows, so Safari has to compete with IE, Firefox, Camino, Opera and OmniWeb. Also, Safari only runs in Mac OS X, so Mac OS 9 and below users (which still make up a sizeable chunk of the installed base) can't run it. Now subtract the number of Macs that are not used for web browsing and you should have clearer picture of why it's unrealistic for Safari to have 15% of the web browser market. C'mon, give credit where credit is due. Apple Safari is the #3 browser worldwide, and it is only even available to less than 10% of the users out there!

So far this year, Safari has increased it's market share by 67%. If we assume that the rate of market share increase is constant (very conservative), then by this time next year, we can expect their market share to be somewhere around 4.66%. The year after, 7.78%, and Christmas 2007 at 13%. At some point it might hit a ceiling, that being the Mac installed user base, but if Mac sales continue to grow, and Apple continues to steal PC market share from the rest of the industry at an increasing rate, you could very well get your wish of a 15% Safari market share one day in the not too distant future.

Don't fret Guest, these numbers are good and have nowhere else to go but up!

Complaining about a 0.25 increase being statistically insignificant is a meaningless statement. Do you know how the statistics were gathered? What is the error? If they are quoting to two decimal places, then odds are that they gathered enough numbers to have that kind of accuracy.

Wow. It sure is easy to get you guys riled up. i wasn't even trolling.

Speaking of - whatever happened to our pal, RC?

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Guest wrote:
Wow. It sure is easy to get you guys riled up. i wasn't even trolling.

Speaking of - whatever happened to our pal, RC?

It was a rather abrupt disappearance, I wonder if he is military and is deployed. Not all troops have the time to surf the web

Apple's P/SaMaSh (Price to Safari Market Share, pronounced "Peanut Butter Sandwich" on CNBC Squakbox) ratio is 313.6 at the close of the market today. Analysts are forecasting this number to go to about 450 over the next year, as Safari market share nearly doubles to about 5%. This means the stock price should be about 1.2 gazillion dollars in December, 2006. And that means only one thing. Apple will be buying Google and putting it in Steve Jobs' airplane for safe keeping.

Speaking of - whatever happened to our pal, RC?
(comment by guest)

It was a rather abrupt disappearance, I wonder if he is military and is deployed. Not all troops have the time to surf the web
(reply by Al Swearengen)

Have been also wondering about RC.
His outrageous statements originated learned and interesting clarifications by people like Small White Car, Kenaustus, Biff, Al Swearengen, et al. I learned a lot with it.
Are you listening RC? Don't give up, ok?

Have a nice weekend you all.

Rod
(faithful reader from Santiago, Chile)

-Tabbed browsing is better in safari. Always works as it should.
-Text encoding is larger.
-PDF's are natively supported and displayed IN BROWSER.
-Ad banner blocking can be edited to suit your needs.
-Built in pop up blocker works better than any other pop up blocker and allows locally generated web pages to pop up, but not ads from another server.
-Native Spellchecking built in.
-Ad SAFT plugin for for much more customization, including the sidebar functionality, customized search field (to search the search engines of your choice, not just google) and sort yoru bookmarks how you choose.

Safari rocks Firefox.

There is just one page I have to use Firefox for these days. It is with my Portuguese banks and there are some buttons which in Safari and all the other browsers I have tried (not IE for Mac, though) appears shine and 3D-like but without showing the digits, which is important since they change places all the time for a more secure log in - on Windows:)
In Firefox they appear flat and Windowsy and you can read the digits.
Aside from that, everything seems to work in Safari these days. It used to be lots of pages which didn't back in the early Panther-days when I moved over from 9.2.
As for gaining market share, I see it as building up pressure against the levee and when the pressure is strong enough, it will break and the flood will wash away the monopoly. Hopefully, there won't rise any new such monstrosity. I hope to see a multitude of OSes, inspiring each other to improvements and innovation through sound competition. If Mac OS would end around 15-20% and Windows with 10-15 and lots of Linux-distros (maybe even some user-friendly ones:), we'd be living in a more perfect world.

Regarding Firefox: more features doesn't equal better. I remember all the talk about iPod competitors having more features. If all your concerned about is features I have to say "LLLLAAAAAMMMMEEEE," to quote a previous post. Safari is quicker and easier in accessing those features which makes for a faster, more efficient, and more enjoyable experience.

I hope this increase in market share is a reflection of people discovering just how truly great Safari is. I wouldn't have any browser take its place.

While there is certainly a lot one can say in favor of Firefox, especially v.1.5 compiled for the G5, there is a feature I find I cannot do without any longer in Safari. If I am forced to use webmail, or am posting to a board, the spell-checker inherited by Cocoa apps is fantastic, and provides the same, effective, and consistent spell-checking (and dictionary look-up) I get in all my Cocoa apps. Firefox, lacking this, is going to get second billing from me.

I still use it sometimes to check things out in other browsers (e.g., is this supposed to look like that?), but Safari has me for the time being.

Last time I checked, the current version of Internet Explorer runs ONLY on Microsoft Windows XP, making Internet Explorer most certainly a single-platform browser!

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Guest wrote:
2.56% to 2.78%? Splitting a few hairs, are we?

I'm a (mostly) satisfied Safari-user, but this is statistically meaningless.

Well, it's an 8.5% increase in one month. Most people would be very happy if their installed user base increased by just under 10% over the space of 1 month.

Whether it's "statistically meaningful" depends a lot on the method used to measure the data and what sort of month-to-month variation is experienced.

The % numbers also don't tell us what the total installed user base is. Did the total number of users grow, remain steady or fall? If steady, then people are switching from using IE to Safari, a rather notable event. If falling, then people are stopping using IE and Firefox. If growing, then the number of Safari users is increasing faster than the number of internet users. The 1st and 3rd scenarios are good news for Apple. Coupled with the fact that Safari usage has grown since year start, it's unlikely that this result is merely noise.

Nokia's new mobile browser will be based on Safari, if you remember. I quess this wil help too.

Safari's good (and I would never use IE just on pure principle), but it always seemed to be a bit sluggish compared to Firefox 1.07. I just recently upgraded to Firefox 1.5, and this thing SCREAMS!

Very very happy. Keep up the good work Firefox team!

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Guest wrote:
Speaking of - whatever happened to our pal, RC?

Perhaps he died in a car fire?

I know that after his many retarded and/or untrue statements, a lotta people wished that on him. And that much karmic energy has a way of building to critical mass and coming true, lol.

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Anonymous wrote:

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Guest wrote:
Speaking of - whatever happened to our pal, RC?

Perhaps he moved on to better things?

I know that after many retarded Apple financial statements, a lotta people wished that karmic energy would strike the Cupertino HQ building to critical mass and wishes do come true.

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Anonymous wrote:

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Guest wrote:
Speaking of - whatever happened to our pal, RC?

Perhaps he moved on to better things?

Considering that its RC we're talking about here, what would that be? Hand-grenade volleyball, or blowin' Bill Gates 'microsoft' for a nickel?

Interesting. An Anime forum I frequent reports the following:
Firefox=60.30%
IE=29.16%
Opera=5.92%
Safari=3.00 (est)
Everything else=remainder.

Interesting.

Mac users deserve what they get.

Safari is an amateur attempt at a product. It is a minor nuisance to webmasters seeking compatibility in a sea of other nuisances. Unfortunately the whole software industry is in the hands of the incompetent, so there is no hope that the crummy designers who throw screws into the works for the rest of us will ever go away and quit causing problems. Safari deserves zero market share, not two percent and not zero point two percent. But it's them or the next amateur in line or the one after that. So, people, don't waste your time trying to work with or to fix garbage. Just put a clothespin on your nose and use what works.

So what is it you don't like? What is it about Safari that causes you problems? What is it that's getting your knickers in a twist?

Safari is the best fastest browser on the market today. And it looks snazzy. What more do you want?