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Sep30
Why Is Google Chrome Losing Its Shine
Filed under: chrome, google; Tagged as: google chrome, losing shine, no takers, users back to firfox and explorer
Eric Schmidt the chief executive of Google said the new Web browser “represents some of the best Google can do,” and encouraged everyone to try it. But now not many people are. Shortly after Google, unveiled Chrome, it was a big hit initially. Chrome shot up to 1 percent of the market but then dipped to 0.8 percent.Chrome gained a percentage of the market share within the first 24 hours of its release Sept. 2, but since then, it has given back much of those small gains to the leaders, Microsoft Corp.’s Internet Explorer and Mozilla’s Firefox.
Apple Inc.’s Safari was not affected, because Google has yet to release a version to run on the Mac operating system. Chrome is currently ducking it out with Opera for fourth place. Net Applications tracks the browsers of unique visitors to 2 million Web sites.
Chrome started off pretty fast and furious, within 24 hours, they surpassed 1 percent of usage market share, which was shocking and impressive. Since then, they have been slowly fading.”
Microsoft declined to comment, other than to pump up its latest version of Internet Explorer as “faster, easier, more safe and reliable than ever before.”
John Lilly from Mozilla said it was premature to draw any conclusions. “It’s only been three weeks,” he said. “We don’t know anything about anything yet.” But he added that Firefox was “seeing lots and lots of users come back.”
So the big question is why are users returning to Explorer and Firefox. Why are they? Are they not convinced that Chrome offers the speed or features that would get them to ditch their current browsers? Are they concerned about privacy?
Google said: “We’re pleased with the response we’ve gotten from users thus far.” To reverse the slide, Google will have to market Chrome. It’s hard to tell, although Chrome gets more usage at night than during the day when people are at work.
Thus far, Google has settled for promoting it on its home page and sponsoring links on the Google and Yahoo search engines.
There have been no announcements to get Chrome pre loaded about deals with vendors. (That’s how Microsoft trounced Netscape during the first browser wars back in the 1990s, although Firefox has captured market share without crafting such deals.)
9 Responses to “Why Is Google Chrome Losing Its Shine”
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Scott Suppa September 30th, 2008 at 11:20 am
I think what endears people to there preferred browser after judging function,is good extensions. An ability to personalize there browser is vital.I am sure down the road Google has extensions planned for Chrome.
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dale carstensen September 30th, 2008 at 2:26 pm
Chrome has some nice features, but in this day and age having a browser that doesn’t show pdf files is dumb. There might be a plugin for it somewhere on the net, but why wouldn’t google just add it on to begin with? It is frustrating to want an alternative to IE only to have to go back to it every time I want to view a pdf file.
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Tie Chrome into my G-phone damit. And where is my flying car?
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I do love google, i really do, (i would totally work there in the future, there place is so cool! =D) but chrome just… isnt that good. I love the extensions Google worked out for Firefox, I think those are great, and Firefox is just so slick and easy to use and personalize. I’m sticking with Firefox for now.
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Kayren October 1st, 2008 at 6:46 am
Chrome has nothing to make it special like Firefox does. I want my Roboform & add ons & plug ins & stumble upon, etc. etc. etc.. When Chrome adds all those, I will definitely be its first customer, but until then, I am sticking with Firefox.
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google chrome can’t become famous till there is firefox.
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Plain Jim October 3rd, 2008 at 5:29 pm
Why not use Chrome? How ’bout because I have Firefox extensions that block ads, block Flash, manage .pdf downloads, manage other downloads, tweak my bookmarks, manage my cookies, check my webmail, synchronize my bookmarks across the five computers I use at home and at work, and do three or four other things I can’t even remember?
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i havnt switched, just because of stumbleupon toolbar not working with chrome. thats really the only thing.
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Chuck88 November 8th, 2008 at 8:10 pm
I installed Chrome. I used it for a very short period of time. It ain’t no Firefox. I uninstalled it. Speed isn’t everything unless you are capable of perceiving the difference between 50 ms and 100 ms. Firefox rocks!!!
