Firefox crosses 500 million download mark

Sometime last night, Firefox downloads crossed the 500 million threshold.

Mozilla congratulated itself on attaining 500 million downloads of the Firefox Web browser.

(Credit: Mozilla)

It's an arbitrary but interesting milestone for the open-source Web browser, whose development is overseen by Mozilla but that's also developed and extended by a large number of outside programmers. In September 2007, Firefox crossed the 400 million download mark, indicating an average rate a bit shy of 20 million per month at present.

According to the Spread Firefox site, there had been 500,168,448 downloads as of 6:15 a.m. PST. About 12 hours earlier, there had been more than 499,900,000.

Firefox has spread widely in the years since its release. The project originally was named Phoenix to symbolize a rising from the ashes of the Netscape open-source browser project that began in 1998 but languished for many years as Microsoft's Internet Explorer solidified its lead.

Now Firefox programmers are working on version 3, which brings performance improvements and interface changes, and Mozilla also is working on a mobile version of the browser for handheld devices.

A sister subsidiary of Mozilla, Mozilla Messaging, is working to reproduce the successes of Firefox with the open-source Thunderbird e-mail software.

[Commander_Spock]

Wow!

"According to the Spread Firefox site, there had been 500,168,448 downloads as of 6:15 a.m. PST. About 12 hours earlier, there had been more than 499,900,000..." How we wish this was happening with OS/2. Perhaps, following "Microsoft's API and Protocol announcement Thursday"

http://www.networkworld.com/news/2008/022108-microsoft-open-api.html?netht=rn_022208&nladname=022208dailynewsamal

IBM may see some value in offering OS/2 "for free" like it is doing with Lotus Symphony and this might just rock the Microsoft Empire like an earthquake. !

[ittesi259]

I love it

Its solid, runs well and I think performs better, thats why it is my primary browser on both my Windows XP notebook and my iMac.

[john55440]

Downloaded doesn't mean used...

Just because someone downloads Firefox doesn't mean that they actually use it.

I downloaded/tried FF2, but prefer/use IE7.

That said, I will try FF3 when it is released. If nothing else, FF2 is useful as an "emergency backup browser".

[pj_mouse]

Agreed

I've always found it to work better. I also installed it on my sister's computer where IE7 does nothing but crash all the time. I do hope the world is coming to realize the superior product open source provides.

[Dalkorian]

FF is the only browser for me!

Whenever I'm dealing with a PC, if FireFox isn't already installed
it's one of the first things I do. I won't even use IE, I consider it
trashware for retards. The second thing I do after getting FF
installed on a PC is to hide IE so it's difficult to use.

I rarely run into one of those nasty "IE only" websites, but when I
do I just move along. I don't need anything out there that forces
me into servitude and slavery.

The only exception to this is when I'm on a Mac, I actually like
the Safari browser (although I do tend to keep a copy of FireFox
for the rare occasion when a site doesn't render properly in
Safari). But for winblows and Linux, it's FireFox or no internet at
all.

[Penguinisto]

FF outstripping IE?

...FF has 20 million downloads per month.

What was Vista's sales rate again? I'm thinking that (very probably) Firefox is perhaps outstripping IE in install rates...

/P

[chash360]

How many bugs?

I am curious, has anyone tallied the amount of FF vunerabilities and security holes against IE's (version 6 or 7)?

[chash360]

Hard to count users...

I would suspect that even those who intend to use FF exclusively, still end up touching and using IE in the background in some cases, thanks to M$ making such tight integrations with the OS.

I also suspect that these may be some of the remaining appearent sources of error in FF, because the OS want FF to do something that only IE will do, (that you probably don't want it doing anyway), that gives rise to some of the errors.

[robinaire]

Firefox

I have Firefox on my system,and everybody seems to rave about it, but it is TERRIBLE to use!! Is there a site that explains how to use it?? When I call it up, I get a start page with 3 items on it, one of which is email, and the others don't seem to do anything! HELP!!

[captphill]

FF

When I bought my first PC many years ago. My DL was Firefox.

[wkia]

Two worlds, in one, Is that possible?

Personally, I switch between IE7 and Firefox.
They are 2 extreamly good browsers. (IE is even better when used with security)
I use IE7 more than FF because personally I like IE7, but I must say I am impressed with firefox. FF is technically not an internet browser, but instead a multi-function application. With the correct extensions FF can do virtually anything.

Now just imigine if IE and FF were combined into one product. (That probably won't happen) People would stop fighting over which one is better and actually use for program for it's original intent, browsing the internet.

Then again, that's like combining the 3 OS'es.
Merging Windows, Mac, and Linux would make a great product, again, that will never happen. That's only wishful thinking.

[capitanqueso]

Firefox

Opera is better! to me, it has paste and go, duplicate the page, show the images as they are wysiwyg, it has a practic zoom, has an interesting "insert personal data" & "insert notes", everithing that has explorer 7 & firefox was first in opera the only fault is how it show some javascript or i dont know some link images in some ordinaries pages.
Opera Browser es mejor!, para mi, tiene pegar e ir, duplicar la pagina, muestra las imágenes como son, un práctico zoom, tiene un "insertar personal" e "insertar notas", todo lo que tiene firefox y explorer7 opera lo tenia desde antes del 2000solo falla en una cosa no coinciden algunos links con las imagenes pequeñas en las paginas mas berretas