And it came to pass that Jonas Jørgensen wrote:
> Christopher Jahn wrote:
>
>> Then Netscape announced Navigator, the first commercial
>> web browser.
>>
>> So MS bought up a browser called Interet Explorer, but
>> sales were bad because Navigator was better.
>>
>> Then MS offered IE free with Windows 95
>
> Actually, Microsoft didn't buy IE -- they stole it. It was
> originally developed by a company called Spyglass (look in
> your IE about box - it says "Distributed under a licensing
> agreement with Spyglass, Inc." somewhere).
>
> Their sales weren't going well, but then Microsoft came and
> said to them: "Hey, if you work on this browser and make it
> absolutely perfect, we'll distribute it for you and give
> you royalties for every copy we sell".
>
> And Spyglass worked very hard to make IE good enough for
> MS, and then MS took it and gave it away for free. By
> making it free (as in beer!), they never "sold" any copy of
> IE, so Spyglass never got any reward for their long, hard
> work. I think they went titsup long time ago.
They were finally bought out - by MS. But I accept calling this
"theft" under the circumstances.
--
}:-) Christopher Jahn
{:-( Dionysian Reveler
Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines.
To reply: xjahnATyahooDOTcom
