[oc] Netscape to enter new territory with browser release

[jamilkhatib@netscape.net]

This NEWS.COM (http://www.news.com/) story has been sent to you from jamilkhatib@netscape.net

Netscape to enter new territory with browser release
By Reuters
April 4, 2000, 10:20 p.m. PT
http://home.cnet.com/category/0-1005-200-1630970.html

  NEW YORK--Netscape Communications, maker of the Web-browsing software at the heart of the U.S. government's antitrust case against Microsoft, is set to unveil tomorrow a much-delayed upgrade that marks the sharply curtailed ambitions of the once pioneering program.  

    Netscape 6.0, the latest version of the program millions rely on as their primary window to the Internet, will be introduced at a trade show in Los Angeles by executives of America Online, which acquired Netscape last year.  

  But the software that created the first Internet explosion and once held nearly a 90 percent market share faces an uphill battle against Microsoft's Internet Explorer, which ships in every Windows PC and holds nearly 70 percent of the market.  

  Much of the Microsoft antitrust  trial centered on Microsoft's tactics vs. Netscape. The U.S. judge in the case ruled yesterday that Microsoft's actions violated antitrust laws by attempting to monopolize the browser market.  

  "This used to be a debate between Coke and Pepsi. But the discussion is no longer whether a particular brand of flavored soda sells well," said Clayton Ryder, an industry analyst with Zona Research of Redwood City, Calif.  

  For while the Netscape Web software has been plagued by delays, Microsoft has pumped out new versions that allow faster access to data and printing, simplify use of audio and video, and feature other improvements.  

  "The discussion has become how does this fit in as part of a fuller meal?" Ryder said, referring to Microsoft's success in making Internet Explorer the standard to which many companies now develop new Internet programs.  

  Netscape's new software is the result of a drawn-out effort known as the Mozilla open-source project--a volunteer network of independent Internet programmers who banded together more than two years ago to keep Netscape browser development alive.  

    The company chose to forego the release of the fifth generation of Netscape last summer, offering users of Netscape incremental changes to its Netscape Navigator 4.7 program.  

  Under America Online, the Netscape browser has been transformed from a single, monolithic product into a set of component technologies that not only have been used in Netscape 6.0, but which have been licensed to a variety of other industry players.  

  Netscape developers have focused on making the new software more easily customizable and ready to run on software alternatives to the Microsoft Windows operating system that dominates on personal computers.  

  AOL also is using the technology behind Netscape 6.0 as the core of its "AOL Anywhere" strategy, a bid by the company to distribute Web services not only on PCs but via televisions, cell phones and handheld computers.  

  Ryder said the Netscape browser has become increasingly irrelevant among commercial Internet users. Instead, it has reverted to something akin to the original  Mosaic browser, which popularized Web use in 1993.  

  Story Copyright  2000  Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.

      

-------------------------------------------------------