New MSN Toolbar Beta Tells Users to Use IE

Ugh, Microsoft. Why can’t you just admit that Firefox has you beat at the moment, and leave people alone about their personal browser choice?

From beta.msn.toolbar.com when viewed with Firefox:

Warning! Your browser does not meet the minimum system requirements. You are recommended to use the MSN Toolbar Suite with Internet Explorer 5.01 or later.

I’m not saying that you should give up the fight – I’d love to see a good browser come out of Redmond – but right now you are asking your users to use an inferior, less secure browser. I can’t trust you when you do that. Integrating desktop search into my browser is not a big deal to me, when I can put a search box on my taskbar with any of the major desktop search vendors.

Just lay off the IE pressure. Internet Explorer sucks right now, plain and simple. Yes, even the SP2 version. Here are the three strikes against IE:

  • It’s slower than Firefox
  • It’s more vulnerable than Firefox
  • It’s less usable than Firefox – no tabbed browsing!

    • I’m sure you’re working on it, and eventually it will be better, but right now it just sucks. And I don’t recommend that anyone use it.

    This entry was posted on Monday, December 13th, 2004 at . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

    6 Responses to “New MSN Toolbar Beta Tells Users to Use IE”

    • Devin C Reams Says:
      December 14th, 2004 at

      I admit I switched back to IE as my primary browser becuase of it…

    • Tom Laird-McConnell Says:
      December 14th, 2004 at

      The requirement for IE is just for the IE toolbar. You do NOT need IE to use desktop search. (You can still search via the Outlook Bar, the DeskBar and the Windows Explorer Bar) and firefox works fine.

      You can have your cake and eat it too.

      -Tom

    • Jason Says:
      December 14th, 2004 at

      Yah, I realize that. But the warning is disingenuous. Most users would not realize that they can use the toolbar while still using Firefox as their default brower. See the first comment here.

      Of course, that’s the least of the MSN Toolbar’s problems at this point. It’s a passable beta, but not worthy of keeping on a machine in the face of stronger competition from Copernic and even Google (not to mention X1, although that’s not free).

    • sdfkjdsf Says:
      December 15th, 2004 at

      IE is not slower

    • Jason Says:
      December 15th, 2004 at

      Haha! What is that claim that “IE is not slower” based on? Wanting it to be so doesn’t make it so. Here’s just one example from a reputable source:
      http://www.anandtech.com/news/shownews.aspx?i=23397

    • mike 'frost' Says:
      December 22nd, 2004 at

      i love firefox, i never get pop ups, its faster,or to me it seems faster,i like having the tabs at the top of the page to g ack and fourth instead of taking up space at bottom lile ie. i think firefox is way better. im just trying to go through and pick up my msn toolbar, an aim toolbar and yahoo toolbar(which i have but isnt the same as my ie yahoo toolbar…)
      anyways firefox slaps internet explorer across the face with a clean well pressed glove