The problem with calling technologies dead too soon. | Hacker News Reader

The problem with calling technologies dead too soon.

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27 pointsMacha25 comments

I know people that still use really old computers. If you're trying to sell something to them, they aren't your market. If you think they care that your website looks like absolute crap on their computer, they don't really care. These aren't people that generally look at computing as anything more than something they grudgingly were forced to do. They know their computer is old and expect things not to work on them. It fits into their perception of computers being useless anyway.

Yeah my parents were like that. The only things they did on the internet were pay bills and check their email (using Outlook web access, which not only works in IE6, it works a lot better than in Firefox).

I think that says more about OWA than it does about Firefox.

What proportion of computers sold in the last year ran Windows 98?

Ok, the market for selling Win98 computers is dead, then, we agree?

So what remains is the leftovers of the people who already bought those computers. But no one will buy a new one.

So, going back to the iPad... people who are saying something like the iPad will kill, say, the personal computer industry (like Charles Stross) aren't arguing that everyone's PCs will suddenly vanish in a puff of smoke. No one would be stupid enough to argue that.

What they're arguing is that the iPad and devices like it will transform the landscape of devices sold. Right now, probably 0.01% of computer-like devices are "tablet computers" and 99.99% are "PCs" (i.e. netbooks, desktops, macbooks, etc). What people who predict the "death" of those computers are predicting is a reversal of that sales situation - i.e. a not-so-distant future where 99+% of "computers" sold are tablets, and only a negligible percentage are traditional computers.

Sure, there'll still be people using Win98 even then, but who cares? Anyone who spends any money on computer-like equipment will have moved on to spending their money on something else (both hardware and software).

I'd like to use my current computer for 20 years: http://mark.pilgrim.usesthis.com/ Only 17.5 years to go!

It depends on what you mean by "dead". [1]

[1] http://www.paulgraham.com/cliffsnotes.html

I like to urge on the death of IE6. For my paid work I often don't have the luxury of ignoring IE6. But for my side projects, I often specifically check for IE6 users and offer them some kind of "go away" page. My thinking is that I want to make the IE6 Internet the "boring" Internet. If everyone's interesting side projects didn't support IE6, then after a while the general public will catch on that their IE6 browser is crippling them. Meanwhile, the enterprise IE6 users aren't affected because they are at work and wouldn't (shouldn't?) be visiting silly side project websites anyway. ;)

Here's what alphabetclock.com looks like when you view it in IE6:

http://imgur.com/J7809.png

I helped my wife launch a dessert baking blog at chocochichi.com. Here's what that looks like in IE6:

http://imgur.com/py8rn.png

If you are going to do this please add a link to something to educate a user on how to upgrade and why as just pictures like yours come off confrontational and would probably leave casual computer users (who are the ones that can actually upgrade their browser) confused and probably irritated.

Good point. Can you suggest a web site that properly explains the issues with IE6 and how to upgrade in language that's appropriate for users who may not even know what a browser is? I bet there are some pages out there already like that.

This one is quite helpful: http://browsehappy.com/

Thanks. I'm using that at the moment, but I'm going to keep looking. The site doesn't get to the point fast enough and it doesn't suggest Google Chrome.

I agree, those pictures come across as unnecesarily flippant and rude. I don't need to be insulted by someone just because my web browser is out of date.

That just strikes me as being a bit of a dick. Of course it's up to you what you do on your own sites but still. What about the people (like the one mentioned in this article) who would need to pay for a new computer to be able to upgrade? Why should someone who doesn't really care about computers pay out large sums of money every few years just to get a new plastic box much like the old one?

By all means ignore IE6 compatibility and even display messages informing your users that things probably won't work quite right. But intentionally shutting them out is just silly.

Pretty much any computer that can run IE6 should be able to run Firefox, no? I think the number of users who would have to upgrade their hardware to use something newer than IE6 is very low.

I agree about not shutting IE6 users out though. If broken rendering and warning messages aren't enough to get them to upgrade, blocking them from the site isn't going to accomplish anything except reducing the number of visitors to your site.

No, it cannot. Windows 98/ME are unable to run new versions of Firefox, but can run IE6.

People who run IE6 aren't going to know what a browser is, or what IE6 is. Your examples aren't cutesy and progressive, they're smug and unhelpful.

And one day, I'll be visiting someone's house and remember a great chocolate recipe from your wife's blog, will sit down at a computer running IE6 and try to visit your site, and your messages will have me shouting "It's none of your business what browser this is, I didn't choose it; just show me the site so I can copy some text out. I don't care how badly rendered and mangled it is, that's my problem not yours. If you want to serve it up picture perfect then make it a freaking PDF, that's what PDF is there for, it's not what HTML is there for".

That's a very good point.

Here's what chocochichi looks like in two other web browsers:

http://i.imgur.com/MvmB9.png

http://i.imgur.com/pdyqV.png

I think it's tasteful on your alphabet clock. But it bothers me on the cooking blog. For instance, I'm at work. I'm excited, because I'm going to get a recipe from chocochichi.com and pick up ingredients on the way home. But because work has very old computers, the site is blocked! I become sad and stop by McDonalds on the way home.

A much less, well, rude way to do it would be to throw Dean Edward's IE8.js or IE9.js scripts on it: http://dean.edwards.name/weblog/2010/03/ie7js-update/

and don't do anything else for compatibility, then put a little notice. They probably won't pay attention either way, but you won't be needlessly cutting people off either.

I was convinced by the comments that my approach to IE6 was not the kindest or most enlightened, and since my mama taught me to be polite, I changed the sites:

AlphabetClock: http://imgur.com/92qW4.png

Chocochichi: http://imgur.com/O5rNv.png

Personally, I like this better. I tells the user what they should do, without judging them. You'll probably get better turnover rates with this, I believe.

A little side note. The author says:

The best online image editor I could find, still doesn’t achieve feature parity with Paint.NET, which it is obviously inspired by.

I think that the aviary.com suite is well past that point.

I'll have to look into that one. I never heard of it before.

If your job is to build new technology products, is there a difference between a technology being dead and the users of those technologies not adopting any new technology? I don't think so. Saying Windows 98 is dead is just short hand for saying users of Windows 98 are never going to be my customers so I don't need to build a Win98 compliant desktop version of my product.

Its not just about IE6. I've users who would have used DOS 6.22 and an old POS software happily. However they were forced to upgrade since they needed to use Thumb drives, DVD Writers (for Backup) and USB printers. If it were not for these hardware requirements, they would have happily used DOS. [updating the app through net? A lot of users have very simple requirements that once done are done for a long time.]

The average Joe upgrades their software only when they miss out very essential things. If they are still able to Facebook, check mails and watch movies, they're probably okay with whatever old OS they've. They really don't care about 64 bit computing or the latest Service Packs unless it has something very directly related with daily use.

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