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Campaigns to kill the web browser that just won’t die: Internet Explorer 6

Graphics from the anti Internet Explorer campaigns

Today, August 27th, marks the day Internet Explorer 6 (IE6) first came out. It’s a seven year-old browser. This little factoid is part of a battle cry by M. David Auayan to stop developing websites for IE6 by March 2009. Enter the IE Death March.

Internet Explorer 6 will be SEVEN years old on August 27th. It came out a few weeks before the Twin Towers fell. It came out before the Nintendo GameCube. It came out before the first iPod.

It’s time to put a deadline on dropping IE6, and I say that time is now, and the deadline should be soon… say like, March 2009. That’s roughly a little more than 6 months. Feel free to join me. If your company is dropping support for IE6, let me know and I’ll gladly post it up.

There have been tons of initiatives to finally ditch one of the most loathed software on the planet. You may have noticed some of these around the Internet:

So many parties are restless about the state of web browsing, and rather than wait for Microsoft to get its act together, they take it upon themselves to do something about it. It doesn’t really stop with the viral websites. Every few months or so you’ll find a blog post that details how the author has had it with IE (IE6 usually) and that he has resolved to drop support for the browser completely.

One must ask: are any of them making a significant difference in the market share of IE? Or IE6, specifically?

According to statistics from several prominent web counters, Internet Explorer is still the dominant browser at around 76%. Although it’s slowly going down by a few percent every few months, that’s still a high number. Even on sites that advocate web standards like W3Schools show that around half of the site visitors are on IE, a quarter on IE6.

The biggest agent of change was probably Google, since it actually paid people to download Firefox. But now that’s gone, will the ball keep rolling? Is it time to look at other, more drastic strategies the way Mozilla did recently?

It seems we’re all feeling a little desperate these days. After all, it’s been seven years.

Related reading:

Published by Sophia Lucero on August 27, 2008 in Web Programming and tagged , , , , , , , , , , , • Did you like it? Subscribe! Or Submit it to Blogosphere News!

52 people says things!

  1. I unite to your movement, I hate IE6, it should be stopped, tell me when and I’ll drop support to my clients.

    By Jaime Creixems on August 27, 2008 6:18 am

  2. Try hitting the site http://joblogs.cc with IE6 and you’ll be greeted with a message along these lines “The web browser you choose to use says a lot about your character. Please upgrade to a new version of FireFox or Safari before people start talking. Besides, you’ll have more fun here too.”

    By Steve Ireland on August 27, 2008 6:48 am

  3. Campaigning to kill IE6 is definitely a good idea but don’t do it by annoying your users!

    I add a small unobtrusive piece of html (don’t use javascript!) in conditional tags so that it only appears in IE6. This .warner div displays on the front page of any site I write in red and warns the user that they will experience errors and poor security until they update their browser to the latest version. I also tell them if any section of the site will be inaccessible (for example a gallery page I wrote recently would not display properly so I noted this). This makes the message useful and informative for the user and makes them more likely to listen.

    If you want to include a .warner div then get the user on your side. Explain to them the benefits of upgrading and make it as easy as possible. Don’t annoy them with popups. That is a guaranteed way to get them to ignore your message and your site. People don’t want to listen to a crusade they probably don’t care about unless there is something in it for them.

    By Fluffy on August 27, 2008 7:09 am

  4. [...] IE6 is 7 years old!, and Wisdump has a campaign to kill the web browser that just won’t die. [...]

    By IdleTogether - Technology, design and impressive web applications » Blog Archive » Happy Birthday IE6!! And DIIIIIE. on August 27, 2008 2:45 pm

  5. [...] van Microsoft. Gisteren, op de verjaardag van IE6, kwam er nog een leuke post online over de verschillende campagnes die er gaande zijn om het gebruik van IE6 terug te dringen. Het is uiteindelijk wel fijn natuurlijk [...]

    By Weblog Edwin Duinkerken » Blog Archive » De laatste webontwikkelingen on August 27, 2008 2:57 pm

  6. Meh. Annoy the hell out of IE6 users, whatever it takes.

    By Ashley on August 27, 2008 3:36 pm

  7. Well this is the badest (worst) thing ever can happen on earth in the field of website development. New developers may not know how IE-6 behaves & might not be that much expert in their coding style because of other browsers simply understanding or overcoming those mistakes & still showing the expected results.

    IE6 requires a greater amount of clean markup which other browsers may not require. I have never came across the browser issue in IE6 except PNG support which is not its property itslef, in entire my 4 years of life in Web Design. Bring to me any issue in IE6 & i can resolve it out. You may bring the complexest (the most complex) application. I think sometimes IE6 behaves more matured than any other browser & i challenge it behave better than FF3 (FF3 is a joke).

    Its fine that we are dropping IE6 support, as newer technologies evolved & a simple user has nothing to do with IE6,7 or FF or any other browser that he uses. Its the developers who will be suffering because of this. I think at least developer should accept this challenge & still check their websites in IE6 as to generate the cleanest markup style.

    So sad that being a developer you are promoting this…! at least promote it for user & not for developers

    By suraj on August 27, 2008 4:10 pm

  8. [...] lezen: IE Deatch March Campaigns to kill the web browser that just won’t die: Internet Explorer 6 W3Schools statistieken Geen gerelateerde [...]

    By Frank-ly » Blog Archive » IE6 is jarig. Alweer. on August 27, 2008 4:11 pm

  9. Ditching a seven year-old browser is the worst thing that can happen in web development? Are you sure? Do you feel the same way about IE5? Netscape Navigator 4?

    IE6 may have given us a better understanding of the box model and other concepts, but it renders things incorrectly. Why are you defending a browser that does not follow proper specifications? Are you implying that people who have documented all of IE’s bugs are wrong?

    It is not IE that forces cleaner markup. It is the newer, standards-compliant browsers that do. Please read up on the ACID2 and ACID3 tests.

    And do you believe that by not evolving, by not supporting “new” features like PNG-24 transparency or CSS3, that you are not being an awful member of the web industry?

    How and when is web design going to move forward, then? What do you suggest? We’ve been dragging IE’s wretched ways for seven years. That’s a long time in the history of the web.

    By Sophia Lucero on August 27, 2008 4:25 pm

  10. Well thanks for updating my knowledge. I am always excited for newer technologies that come. I even don’t support IE 6, but this browser came in when there was nothing in Web Dev & latest technologies are still supported by IE6 to a certain extent & so I ask programmers to check there pages on IE6. forget about users…

    By suraj on August 27, 2008 4:35 pm

  11. @ Jamie joblogs.cc says a lot about him - does he kick over someone in a wheelchair because it says a lot about their ability to walk?! come on, this is a crazy thought process. Whether developers like it or not people are allowed to choose what they want to use.

    IE6 is heavily used in business for the reason that it is expensive to upgrade thousands of systems when IT departments have enough to do, IE7 is too different and workers don’t adapt well to change (most people downgrade from office 2007 because it has a different look and feel from previous editions).

    What it comes down to is how good are developers? If you can’t cater for everyone then you’re not very good at your job. Plus, if supporting major browsers is too hard then make the thing in flash - that works the same on every platform. With mobile internet on the rise badly built sites are looking even more stupid. You can’t force people to like what you like..

    By graham on August 27, 2008 4:57 pm

  12. The only time I ever use IE is when I install a fresh copy of Windows XP and have to redownload Firefox :)

    By Eli on August 27, 2008 5:29 pm

  13. IE 6

    By Ignacio Ricci on August 27, 2008 9:33 pm

  14. IE 6 is total crap. IE in general is crap, and will always BE crap.
    However it isn’t THAT problematic to make a site with a few hacks for IE.
    I know that as developers it sometimes pisses us off, but at this point I am already used to dealing with IE 6.

    It would be lovely to deprecate the browser anyway!

    By Ignacio Ricci on August 27, 2008 9:36 pm

  15. [...] more information, there’s an article on Wisdump, which offers some [...]

    By Elliot Jay Stocks » Death to IE6 on August 27, 2008 9:39 pm

  16. While I find IE6 to be an abomination and the bane of my existence, punishing the average Internet user who could care less that we have to jump through so many hoops to accommodate their browser is not the answer. Doing that is no better than the many sites that only work properly in IE and fail miserably in FF et al. I think Steve Ireland’s (above) approach is more considerate and yet making an effort towards educating the world at large.

    I know all too many computer illiterate people who approach the web with great fear and have no clue that their browser is called IE or Internet Explorer. It’s their website program and they don’t know a thing about how it works. Blocking them from sites because they aren’t computer professionals seems awfully elitist / snobbish. We should be all about educating our visitors, not using bouncers to keep out the riff-raff.

    That’s my 2 cents :^{>

    By ’Mas on August 27, 2008 10:41 pm

  17. [...] for a second that this is the only “Give IE the axe” campaign … Oh no! There are quite a few out there already.  Elliot Jay Stocks says Death to IE as well. As of now, I’m no longer including it in [...]

    By Is it finally time to ditch IE6? | web non-sense : blog on web design, photography, music and jeeps on August 27, 2008 10:44 pm

  18. As a front end developer I have suffered psychological damage, stress and recurring suicidal thoughts, all because IE6 does not follow W3C standards…

    Please, please, kill it!

    By Lola on August 27, 2008 10:55 pm

  19. Careful.

    Here’s why… http://elliotjaystocks.com/blog/archive/2008/death-to-ie6#comment-2533

    By Dan on August 27, 2008 11:00 pm

  20. Unfortunately, orking for an ecommerce company, we don’t have the option of doing away with IE6. A decent chunk of our customers are still using IE6. Although the trend is starting to shift. Great article.

    By Justin on August 27, 2008 11:00 pm

  21. It is the browser that won’t die, and it is a thorn in the side of compliance nuts like myself; but I give it due credit – when it came out it offered a lot more features than anything else available, not to mention that when it came out a lot of the standards it doesn’t implement weren’t all that established or reliable. The problem is that for the majority of internet users they use the computer as they receive it and aren’t especially diligent about keeping up with changes in browser technology, so anyone who’s still running Windows Xp / 2000 is most likely using the browser that shipped with their OS which is IE6. Not to mention organizations with an IT infrastructure that doesn’t allow arbitrary software to be installed that are perfectly happy with IE6 since it works fine for their intranet, or whatever. I’m in favor of advocating that people upgrade to IE7, or start using FF over IE all together, but there will always be compatibility issues. Even now there are subtle differences in the implementations of Safari, Opera, Konqueror, and a host of other minor browsers that for the most part we don’t care about because IE6, being the most used browser on the internet, takes center stage. When IE6 eventually fades into the background, what will become the new object of the 2 minutes hate? Will it be FF2? Some old version of Safari? One thing for sure is that it will always be something that we’re complaining about.

    I somewhat get a kick out of the complainers & newbie web developers that never experienced the joy of doing battle with the Netscape 4 / IE5 dichotomy; or Gob forbid NS3, IE3 & 4, those were the good ole days, working around IE6 issues is a breeze by comparison. The issues are relatively minor and well documented. These days all the major browsers are much more secure, which means that trust in JavaScript and cookies has returned to a point where you can more or less expect them to be available, back in the NS4/IE5 epoch there had been some serious security issues so a lot of people surfed with JavaScript disabled, taking away a primary mechanism for making browser based layout adjustments, leaving server side script (ASP, PHP, JAVA, ColdFusion) as the most reliable tool for layout adjustment, in turn leading to some fairly ridiculous server side code – especially if you’re implementing a ‘pixel perfect’ design.

    It’s a fair argument that the developer is responsible for acquiring the knowledge necessary to execute their tasks and it’s a fact that we as developers respond to the market not the other way around. If tomorrow 50% of internet users decided to start using NS4 again the next day every web developer out there would be expected to become a NS4 Guru’s by the day after, it’s a fact of life, get used to it, Man Up, RTFM. IE6 will expire, in time, but only time will make that happen, Microsoft has no control over it, and it’s not a developer’s place to tell users what client they should be using. As a vendor or web site owner / operator you should just be glad to have the traffic at all.

    By all means if you feel strongly about it, do put in a blurb on your site somewhere commenting on the topic, if visitors care they’ll read it – in which case they’ve most likely already upgraded. But please, come down off the cross, use the wood to build a bridge, and get over it, we seriously have bigger fish to fry.

    By Steve L. on August 28, 2008 12:21 am

  22. Meh, Have you guys ever tried developing for NS4? IE 5 for Mac? Ugh.

    IE 6 is nothing.

    We coded uphill in the snow both ways when I was a young developer.

    The real culprit here is that nobody liked Vista and XP shipped with IE 6 till the end. MS just discontinued XP, so I think we will start to see a more steady decline.

    This boycott stuff is just developer fantasy. The people who pay my bills don’t care how much of a pain IE 6 is.

    By craig on August 28, 2008 1:11 am

  23. [...] Finally, I think we’d struggle to find a web designer who likes IE 6, however today bought us to the question, why are we still having to design for it as it reaches its 7th birthday. [...]

    By Help Developer - Graphic and Web Design Blog with Collections, Freebies, Tutorials and Forums » Blog Archive » HD Todaily - 27/08/08 on August 28, 2008 4:02 am

  24. Until Linux becomes more popular with common users (which will probably be in the next 20 years or so), it will always be necessary to support IE, whichever version Microsoft is packaging with Windows. Since Firefox does not come with Windows or Mac, users are going to more than likely use the tools that were given to them. I know this sounds horrible, but having FF just makes it a bit harder on developers because now they have to make sure sites work in FF, IE, Safari, Opera, Flock, Camino, mobile browsers… the list goes on… It may not be as popular, but Safari has just about as many issues as IE does. I say if you want visitors to come to your site, which if you develop sites for a living, you usually do, then you’re going to need to develop with these browsers in mind.

    By brian on August 28, 2008 6:25 am

  25. Another, more neutral campaign is PushUpTheWeb:
    http://www.pushuptheweb.com/
    “Pushup is an effort to push the web forward by helping users upgrade their outdated browsers”

    Imagine if cars wouldn’t rust or break down, would we still be driving 1970’s gas guzzlers, because, well they do their job? Cars still drive you from a to b. But they’ve gotten safer, cleaner, quiter, … because of progress. We have to nudge users into newer technologies, else, what was wrong with Lynx? Well, we can do a lot more with new browsers, compared to what a 7 year old one can handle. It’s not just about JavaScript and CSS version support, there is a whole lot more going on.

    my 2c

    By Halans on August 28, 2008 11:10 am

  26. I’m agree, stop the IE6 compliance developments !

    By Sorin Badea on August 28, 2008 8:58 pm

  27. @anybody who thinks anything can be easily fixed on IE6 without hacks, try this:

    z-index a div directly above a element.

    There is a way around it (with hacks), but for those who wish to try their luck, go for it.

    (Tip: There is NO way around it without hacks - it is a critical bug).

    By Andrei Gonzales on August 28, 2008 9:29 pm

  28. @craig
    “IE 6 is nothing.”

    word! Just thinking about NS4.7 can make me shudder with angst.

    Apart from that I totally agree that IE6 ought to die. And it will. But don’t hold your breath.

    By henrik on August 28, 2008 10:14 pm

  29. [...] ulteriori informazioni ho trovato questo articolo su Wisdump. Inoltre alcuni siti di fama mondiale, tra cui lo stesso Facebook, hanno [...]

    By The Daily Fuffa » Blog Archive » Morte a IE6… on August 29, 2008 4:34 am

  30. you have to read this
    internet explorer 8 is just way too revolutionary, try to digg into every new feature, you will understand:)
    http://www.microsoft.com/windows/internet-explorer/beta/default.aspx

    By oxygen on August 29, 2008 12:28 pm

  31. [...] هفتمین سالگرد نسخه ۶ اینترنت اکسپلورر که در زمان خودش به نظر من [...]

    By مایکروسافت و تحولی دوباره در وب | عصرونه - Asroone on August 29, 2008 4:37 pm

  32. I, like so many of you, have been surmounting the shortcomings of IE6 for years now in my daily web design and development work. The good news is that IE6’s shortcomings are well understood and relatively simple to work around. The bad news is that perpetually implementing patches to circumvent these shortcomings needlessly eats away at time and resources which, in my opinion, could and should be directed toward solutions to more meaningful challenges and opportunities. Finally, the SAD news is that Microsoft, arguably the most resource rich software development outfit in the known universe, opted to publish a sub standards compliant Web browser during an important time in the development of the Web. They should have been leading the way to standards and accessibility as opposed to hampering the progress it. Shame on Microsoft for IE6 and for their lack of vision and for the colossal number of man-hours (and woman-hours) that have been squandered on IE6’s behalf . IE7 is significantly better, albeit late to the party. I sincerely hope IE8 is really something to write home about. As much as I’d like to, I’m not holding my breath…

    By Brent on August 29, 2008 5:13 pm

  33. IE 7 is just as bad as 6. Anyone who says otherwise doesnt know what they’re taking about.
    Regex doesnt work, its PNG support is 99% as crap as 6, all theyve done is automate the dxfilter hack. Whats with this illegible, cleartype fad they’ve tried to start? It doesnt even work properly, try adjusting some css properties and watch the filter disappear then reappear, same with PNGs. SHIT! Why move half the browser buttons to a completely non standard position? i hate IE.

    By Trullock on August 30, 2008 1:17 am

  34. I’ve already taken the first step. Ditch IE6 support on all my websites and added KApp in: http://www.otherroaddesign.com/pages/kapp.html

    By The Ron on August 30, 2008 12:11 pm

  35. Thanks for mentioning http://www.end6.org. I’m working on a redesign at the moment and a v2.0 of the script that’s more gentle, yet more forceful if that makes sense. I’m also taking another step that I recommend for others in that I’m redesigning my own site http://www.hudin.com and am not only going to not build it for IE6, but am also going to create style elements that we know don’t work well in IE6 (like the entire box model) so that it really, really shows IE6 to be the piece of junk that it is.

    By the way, I’m at about 14% IE6 on my site. I’ve had large drops of about 40% on other sites where the End6 script is running as well. I’m not saying it’s a cure all, but it it’s more of a push all.

    -miquel

    By Hudin on September 1, 2008 5:45 am

  36. There needs to be a campaign to have the IT departments in Federal and State Government switch to firefox or another modern browser. It’ll be all downhill from there.

    By Natalie on September 4, 2008 10:05 pm

  37. Very true Natalie. Also toss the UN in to that. I’ve seen some of their machines out in the field still running Windows 2000 and Explorer 5.5 Ergh…

    By Hudin on September 5, 2008 11:30 am

  38. [...] reading: Wisdump, Elliot Jay Stocks, [...]

    By The Death of Internet Explorer 6: Still Prematurely Called | Devlounge on September 8, 2008 8:01 pm

  39. [...] http://wisdump.com/web-programming/campaigns-to-kill-the-web-browser-that-just-wont-die-internet-exp... [...]

    By Fatih Hayrioğlu'nun not defteri » Internet Explorer 6 Olmasa Hayat daha kolay ve zevkli olurdu » yazarlarını, çok, farklı, tarayıcılara, yazmaktır, Birinin, düzgün, yorumladığını, diğer, için on September 10, 2008 4:25 pm

  40. This is self serving, instead of client serving.
    Please check: http://www.w3counter.com/globalstats.php

    By Thijs Visser on September 13, 2008 11:29 pm

  41. No, not true. It is a client serving initiative as IE6 is extremely insecure. I’ve had two family members lose systems due to security issues with the browser. After rebuilding their machines, they were put on a strict Firefox diet.

    Anyways, even based the link you provided, it is reasonably safe to estimate that IE6 use will be below 20% by the end of the year and maybe even less. It’s really time we stopped developing for it and start thinking about making sure our sites are compatible with browsers such a Safari and Chrome, the first of which is starting to show up more and more.

    By Hudin on September 15, 2008 6:18 am

  42. [...] todo la versión 6 que para nuestra desdicha, todavía mucha gente usa. En Wisdump.com recopilan varias campañas para matar al infame navegador de [...]

    By Muerte a internet Explorer 6-ACIDminds | Ideas corrosivas on October 2, 2008 12:03 am

  43. [...] or developing in rich platforms like Flash and AJAX. And we’re not even talking about browser preferences here; we’re referring to technologies that are almost indispensable in the age of Web 2.0 and [...]

    By Opera’s MAMA discovers what’s under the hood of the collective Web | Wisdump on October 16, 2008 2:48 am

  44. [...] 18. Campaigns to kill the web browser that just won’t die: Internet Explorer 6 [...]

    By Amazing web design articles of Summer 2008 - Morning Break on October 21, 2008 2:37 am

  45. savethedevelopers’ web site is now directly pointing to Internet Explorer’s official web page. What a lame shot from Microsoft. Microsoft did it again!

    By GeemeeTheway on October 23, 2008 3:21 am

  46. Even more depressing than how slowly the IE6 market share is decreasing is the fact some “developers” can’t understand why IE6 is bad for the web.

    By Stifu on October 29, 2008 1:38 am

  47. [...] IE6 and IE7 incompatibility (no surprise there!) [...]

    By Really? Everything I Know About CSS Is Wrong? | Wisdump on October 29, 2008 10:06 pm

  48. [...] Quelques campagnes qui tentent de tuer Internet Explorer 6 ! [...]

    By Le blog de Vincent Battaglia » En vrak - 83 on October 30, 2008 6:49 am

  49. if ie6 then:
    redirect to rss feed;
    else:
    show website
    ;

    as simple as that :-D

    And add a warn: “If u want more features than a RSS Feed please use a decent browser”

    By antouane on October 31, 2008 1:14 am

  50. [...] for building a browser. It would seem like good news for those who’ve spent sleepless nights keeping websites from breaking due to IE’s numerous bugs, although I’m not quite sure why have to have 3 different derivatives of WebKit in the first [...]

    By “Why is IE still relevant?” Good question. | Wisdump on November 8, 2008 3:50 am

  51. You can always make IE6 users’ life sad: http://browsesad.com ;-)

    By Michal on November 18, 2008 12:22 am

  52. [...] companies with overbearing and controlling IT departments who have yet to upgrade to IE7 from the dreadful IE6, I wonder how many will actually take the leap to browsers like Chrome of my favorite FireFox [...]

    By Browser Wars Continue on November 19, 2008 1:13 am

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