magitam: Google’s Non-launch of Chrome – do you think we should hold Google accountable for their broken promise? http://life.magitam.org.uk/2008/09/02/google-too-big-to-keep-its-promise/
Google has decided to create their own browser, dubbed Chrome. It is open source based on WebKit and powered by Google Gears. Another browser amongst many others. I don’t particularly care for most of Google’s products, thus I most likely won’t even test drive this product. I think, though, that Chrome will gain popularity, and it will be fast, very fast for couple of reasons.
First reason being – people, for some reason, are just crazy about Google and what it has to offer. They love to use their search engine, GMail and their various other apps. They look forward, with great anticipation, to anything new that the company hints or talks about.
The second reason why Google’s Chrome will gain great popularity is the same reason why Mozilla’s Firefox grew so fast in its user share – opposition to the standard, to the established – Microsoft’s Internet Explorer.
I believe that these two reasons will be the cause for Google’s Chrome to explode in its user share. Talk is all over the web about this. A quick search for Google’s Chrome on Twitter demonstrates this. All though, I do think it will be most popular amongst the tech crowd.
Chrome will see some competition from Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 8, so would Firefox. I installed IE 8 over the weekend and I can say that IE7 intrigued me, but IE8 enticed me and I might go back to using Internet Explorer. The new interface, functionality, privacy and build in tools are great. Microsoft is definitely moving in the right way with their work on Internet Explorer.
Google’s choice of introducing its Chrome browser in the form of a 38 or so paged comic is a wonderful approach of the proverbial RTFM. Personally I greatly enjoyed it, and I much rather read and look through illustrations than read pages of text explaining some technology, how it works, and what it is “supposed” to do.
I have been an avid follower of Google in the past, and I have looked for any products from them and I have attempted to use every one of their apps – as a Google fan, but I’m no longer. I did also switch to Firefox, at a time when I looked at Microsoft with an unkind eye. Plus, at the time Internet Explorer was rigid, unfriendly, and not all pages functioned well with it. So I did partake in both of the above reasons, even though they no longer apply to me.
I would like to hear what your thoughts on this are. Do you agree with the above reasons, or do you have reasons of your own? What are your thoughts about the comic? Should other companies apply the same methods when designing manuals for their products?
2 responses to “Google’s Chrome browser”
I read the comic – which I think was a good idea – and I am looking forward to test driving this new browser. If it can do everything as well as it claims then I think we have a real competitor.
But one significant aspect of this new unveiling that should be mentioned is that the Chrome browser may change the SEO game. Especially in terms of it’s “auto-fill” feature. People will only begin to type keywords or URLs and the browser will start making suggestions just like they do with Google Suggest (http://tinyurl.com/3uzbg). This is important because it may stop people from entering the variety of searches they had done previously thus making the “suggested” keyword phrases more competitive and harder to rank for in the SERPs.
In response to the Google fanboys adopting this browser… I don’t think it will happen unless it truly is the best product! And only time will tell if that is true.
I agree with your SEO concerns. It will definitely change how surfers arrive at sites.
1. No more mistyped domains. So, domainers who own misspelled domains will get hit.
2. Sites that otherwise might not get any Google traffic will start receiving “some”.
3. Surfers will not really have to use a search engine, if the browser just starts suggesting sites – so too bad for SERP.