Firefox is No Longer Foxy

Poor Microsoft, they never could get their web browser Internet Explorer just right. Years ago, at the dawn of the Internet, there were those using MS Internet Explorer, and those who knew better were using Netscape.

Earlier in the 2000’s, Firefox became the web browser for power users. Internet Explorer, while it could always do the job, just wasn’t a very sexy web browser. And we all know the power of sex in advertising.

I was using Firefox as my primary default web browser until a few days ago. Once I loved the browser – if you can in fact “love” a web browser. I enjoyed the numerous themes available to customize it, the plug-ins which made it faster, safer and more secure, and the way showed every web page I visited cleanly and quickly.

Then, over the past month or so, Firefox just wasn’t all that foxy a lady anymore.

First there was that horrible update a few weeks back, where Adobe’s Flash update prevented Firefox users from seeing videos.

Then I began to notice a lot of my plug-ins had stopped working. I was on the BETA channel, but not by choice – another beef I had with Firefox. Having an iPhone, I wanted to sync my web browsing bookmarks and history with my iPhone so I could easily visit the pages I frequent on my mobile device. Firefox can sync with the Firefox iPhone app – but only if the desktop version of Firefox is the BETA version.

Grrrrrrr!

I don’t like being on the BETA version of anything – why should I be a crash test dummy for someone else’s product or service? Besides, who wants to be a crash test dummy?

Being on the BETA test version of Firefox, I noticed there was a new update every week. We all like our apps and applications to be updated regularly. However weekly is a bit much!

As these weekly updates took place, every so often one or more of my plug-ins would stop working. It’s understandable that a plug-in may stop working when a new version of an app is released. However, its also normal for that plug-in to be updated, or the app to be revised to allow the plug-in to function again.

Not with Firefox on the BETA test channel – once an app stopped working, it was pretty much dead.

I also noticed themes which I downloaded directly from Firefox’s website eventually stopped working too, forcing me to always download new themes, or just revert back to the default look of the web browser.

Enough was enough – no longer was Firefox being a good little web browser. It had become the rotten spoiled teenager, and I wasn’t going to let it control my web viewing any longer.

So, I checked out Opera, Safari, even the most current version of MS Internet Explorer.

Sorry Microsoft, but Google’s Chrome won out this time.

I haven’t been using Chrome for long, but so far I am mightily impressed. The browser is far faster than Firefox, has many of the same plug-ins I was using in Firefox (only these ones actually work!) and it works seamlessly with my Google+ account.

I’m saddened by having to drop Firefox as my primary web browser. But the team at Firefox lost me with their constant updates, lack of continuity for plug-ins, and their seemingly lack of integrity in quality control.

I have a feeling the reason they update Firefox so often, is because they are fixing the bugs they should have caught BEFORE releasing the previous version to the public. Not all bugs will be caught, hence the use of BETA test groups. But when your software becomes more of a pain in the rump, than a joy to use it is time to move on.