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HTMLHelp Forums _ Off Topic _ MS Edge browser to begin using the Chromium rendering engine
Posted by: Christian J Dec 8 2018, 11:43 AM
Official confirmation: https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2018/12/06/microsoft-edge-making-the-web-better-through-more-open-source-collaboration/
Comment from Mozilla: https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2018/12/06/goodbye-edge/
Posted by: pandy Dec 8 2018, 06:22 PM
I can't but agree.
What a bore the web is becoming. I almost miss Netscape 4 and the holy wars. What now? Google tells the W3C what to include and not in the spec? Oh, I forgot. Browser makers already do that.
But we could have some fun and take bets! Which will be the most dumbed down incarnations of Blink? Chrome or Edge?
Posted by: Christian J Dec 9 2018, 05:09 AM
What a bore the web is becoming. I almost miss Netscape 4 and the holy wars.
At least the engines were labelled as different products back then. I suppose the new browser war is going to be about who each separate Blink/Chromium incarnation will spy for:
Chrome - Google/Alphabet
Edge - Microsoft
Opera - China(?)
My bets are on Edge, but I also suspect nobody will care about it anyway. On the other hand Google has felt a lot of pressure lately from governments, maybe Chrome's market dominance will be regarded as a monopoly (similar to how Windows had to offer more browsers than just MSIE a few years ago)?
Posted by: pandy Dec 9 2018, 06:35 AM
(similar to how Windows had to offer more browsers than just MSIE a few years ago)?
I must have missed that. What do you refer to? Surely not Edge?
Posted by: Christian J Dec 9 2018, 11:06 AM
This one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BrowserChoice.eu
Posted by: pandy Dec 10 2018, 05:20 AM
Totally missed that. A little exaggerated, wasn't it? I've always thought the integration with the OS was the problem with IE. Not that they provide a browser bundled with the OS. What OS does not come with a browser installed? Things would be complicated if you didn't have a browser handy right away after installation.
Posted by: Christian J Dec 10 2018, 06:29 AM
A little exaggerated, wasn't it?
Quite a bit.
Didn't MS use that as a legal excuse somehow? Then people found out that you could run multiple IE versions on the same Windows installation, and that MS was lying, IIRC.
Compare this with Chromebook, where I believe almost everything is done in Google's cloud through the Chrome browser. Google should be forced to offer multiple vendors' cloud solutions, browsers and search engines on a new Chromebook, including Apple's and Microsoft's, and with Google's own not being the default.
Posted by: pandy Dec 10 2018, 07:29 PM
I don't want to think about Google. It's scary.
Isn't, or at least wasn't, Safari an integrated part of a Mac? It is (or was) also used as file manager, I think.
Posted by: Christian J Dec 11 2018, 04:18 AM
Didn't MS use that as a legal excuse somehow? Then people found out that you could run multiple IE versions on the same Windows installation, and that MS was lying, IIRC.
Here it is (not really worth reading):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Microsoft_Corp.
The Browser Choice feature seems related to this case (which was primarily about Windows Media Player):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union_Microsoft_competition_case#Related_investigations
Isn't, or at least wasn't, Safari an integrated part of a Mac? It is (or was) also used as file manager, I think.
No idea. All those judgements seem very arbitrary. There is a Windows version of Safari, but there was also a Mac version of IE, but that was held against MS.
Posted by: pandy Dec 11 2018, 06:20 AM
At the same time I've never heard any criticism about MS offering a Mac version of Office. Yeah, judgements seem passed at random.
And when it comes to evilness, what Google is doing in now is far more evil than anything MS ever did. Google soon owns every aspect of people's lives. The day they purchase Facebook we're done. MS just wanted our desktops.
Facebook is in trouble, I hear. I've read Americans are leaving FB in large numbers. Swedes probably still don't get it, but Swedes don't matter anyway. If this continues it could mean Zuckerberg et al will be inclined to sell and guess who will be ready to buy.
Posted by: Christian J Dec 11 2018, 07:16 AM
And when it comes to evilness, what Google is doing in now is far more evil than anything MS ever did. Google soon owns every aspect of people's lives.
It has also made itself indispensable with all its free services, making it harder for governments to regulate them (unlike FB which is not much more than a vanity blog and a contact book). Now it seems Chromium is becoming an indispensable item too. Wonder what it means for the spying on user in practice, though? MS may not want to share Edge/Chromium's user data with Google.
Wonder if they would be allowed to do it openly like that? But I guess Google could always discreetly buy data from FB (and vice versa).
Posted by: pandy Dec 11 2018, 12:11 PM
Why wouldn't they be allowed? Because of monopoly rules? But FB is an unique concept, different from what Google owns already. It's not as if they were on a shopping spree buying every search engine out there.
Yeah, FB is a big address book. And a diary. And almost everyone is there. That's just it. Personal information is food for today's monsters.
Posted by: Christian J Dec 11 2018, 04:15 PM
Why wouldn't they be allowed? Because of monopoly rules?
Wasn't some planned big acquisition cancelled lately because of that?
Now I also remembered this: https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/19/17586258/google-eu-antitrust-explainer-play-store-android-search-fine-apple --seems MS is not the only one under fire after all.
Perhaps GDPR or similar forbids it?
I suppose Google could use at least FB's adress book feature, OTOH I'm sure Google keeps track of who's mailing who on GMail in a similar way (MS in turn bought LinkedIn).
Posted by: Christian J Dec 19 2018, 04:19 PM
Yeah, FB is a big address book. And a diary. And almost everyone is there. That's just it. Personal information is food for today's monsters.
I was just waiting for something like this to show up:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/18/technology/facebook-privacy.html?module=inline
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/18/us/politics/facebook-data-sharing-deals.html
"Facebook allowed Microsoft’s Bing search engine to see the names of virtually all Facebook users’ friends without consent, the records show, and gave Netflix and Spotify the ability to read Facebook users’ private messages."
Posted by: Christian J Dec 19 2018, 04:43 PM
This thread and article claims Google is sabotaging Youtube pages for non-Chrome browsers:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18697824
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/12/18/google_monopoly_abuse_claims/
Posted by: pandy Dec 19 2018, 05:21 PM
Google Play has less functionality in FF than in Chrome.
"[...] gave Netflix and Spotify the ability to read Facebook users’ private messages"
Jesus Christ...
Posted by: Christian J Dec 6 2021, 11:43 AM
Microsoft Edge Wants to Give You a Loan
https://www.howtogeek.com/769427/microsoft-edge-wants-to-give-you-a-loan/
Posted by: pandy Dec 6 2021, 12:15 PM
Holy cow.
Soon we'll have payday loan (SMS loan) offers splat up on our desktops, either we use Edge or not.
Is MS doing bad financially? I don't follow things like that if it isn't in the headlines.
Posted by: Christian J Dec 6 2021, 03:08 PM
Holy cow.
My thoughts exactly.
At least the MSFT stock price has increased steadily over the years, but the expectation is always that profit must continue to grow by any means. I suppose the loan shark business is as good as any. Perhaps you will need to connect a credit card in order to activate future Windows versions?
Posted by: pandy Dec 6 2021, 04:15 PM
the expectation is always that profit must continue to grow by any means
And that is the problem with the world.
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