Reading the Windows Internet Explorer 8: Get the Facts marketing campaign instantly made me wonder, "When did Microsoft hire Oracle's marketing team?" While Oracle is getting much better, it was legendary for making bold claims by cherry-picking "data." It used to drive me nuts when I was in the IBM market intelligence group and was asked to pull background data to refute these claims -- not because the work was hard, but because I felt that the work was unnecessary. After a while, readers and customers learned to discount the bold claims.
In any case, back to the current story at hand: I'm probably more pro-Microsoft than most open source folks, which is why the IE8 marketing stings more than it should. I have nothing against IE8, and it may very well be an excellent browser. For what it's worth, I use both Firefox, the "View in IE" Firefox extension, and IE7 daily.
[ InfoWorld's Robert X. Cringely has some choice words for Microsoft regarding its latest browser too: Thinking about upgrading to IE8? Think twice | Keep up with the latest open source news with InfoWorld's open source newsletter and topic center. ]
When I read a comparison table and one product has a check on every item and the other two competitors have, at most, four checks, I am instantly wary of the comparison. Markets are way more competitive than the story Microsoft is painting with this comparison table.
I really wonder who Microsoft is targeting with this campaign. For most Windows corporate and consumer users, IE is on their desktop and they'll continue to use it. This campaign doesn't mean much to them, and can't really be targeted at them. If these users are using Firefox, it's because someone they know or someone in the IT department has convinced them to use Firefox. To get my little cousin to stop using Firefox, Microsoft has to get me to stop using Firefox and wait for me to tell her that IE8 is much better than Firefox.
But this comparison table treats me like a moron, especially when you consider that I'm using Firefox and have pre-existing views on many items on the comparison table. Only IE8 gets a check for security, privacy, and ease of use? Really? At a minimum, Microsoft should have used Harvey Balls to show that the competitors have capabilities, which may not be as strong as IE8. Microsoft could have posted videos that show how easy it is to carry out a common task in IE8 and compare it to Firefox with the relevant add-on installed. Show us what happens when a session crashes and how much better the combination of "tab isolation and crash recovery" is in day-to-day use versus Firefox. In this case, simply having two features versus one or the other doesn't tell me anything about my day-to-day experience.
If Microsoft wants me and others like me to take IE8 seriously, I expect the company to treat our intelligence with some respect. Anything less, and after a while, we'll have been taught to discount their bold claims.
Follow me on Twitter at: SavioRodrigues.
p.s.: I should state: "The postings on this site are my own and don't necessarily represent IBM's positions, strategies, or opinions."
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