

YouTube to kill IE6 support on March 13 - there
http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2010/02/youtube-to-kill-ie6-support-on-march-13.ars

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briansmith
This is pretty much a non-event:

"[IE6 users] will still be able to watch videos after that date, but new
features may not work properly."

What percentage of people use any YouTube features outside of the (Flash)
video player UI? It's got to be very low. I bet it is _extremely_ low for IE6
users, as IE6 users are typically people that don't keep up with new things
and/or office workers at work.

YouTube could add new features all day, every day, but for the vast majority
of users, video playback is all they care about anyway.

~~~
InclinedPlane
In the short-term IE6 users won't see much difference, IE6 won't be blocked,
it's just that the youtube devs won't test against IE6 compatibility in the
future.

But there's a very real potential not just for "new features" to be unusable
for IE6 youtube users but for the entire layout of the page to be broken for
IE6 users, rendering the site unusable. Who knows if that will happen but
youtube (aka google) is saying now that they don't care whether or not that
happens in the future, it's the users' responsibility to upgrade to a more
modern browser if they have that problem.

That is indeed very significant.

~~~
briansmith
Where did Google say they wouldn't test it in IE6?

AFAICT, they're not going to let it become unusable for IE6 users. That would
be silly, because they could just create a IE6-only stylesheet with "display:
none" for everything on the page except the Flash video player. A lot of users
would actually consider that a significant improvement.

~~~
gscott
They have made Adwords pretty much unusable in IE6 but they are unlikely to
make a user-centric site like Youtube unusable.

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jdietrich
I think a lot of us are expecting something to finally kill off IE6 and I
don't think that's really going to happen. I think the watershed will be when
most developers just stop caring. I think that this move is an indication that
more of us should consider that option. Google is an incredibly smart company
with a truly vast user base and this announcement shows that they just don't
care about alienating IE6 users. Given their obsessive attitude to testing, I
can only assume that they've worked out that pissing off the few remaining IE6
users with nag screens and bugs is cheaper than continuing to support them.

Of course Google have other interests in pushing modern browsers, but I would
be flabbergasted if they haven't done a rigourous cost/benefit analysis on the
decision. Given their economies of scale, I think this is an indication to
those of us with more limited resources that we should just ignore IE6 users
unless we have strong evidence that they matter. In the Pareto sense, it's
just not a good use of developer time.

I have no evidence for it, but I have an intuitive expectation that IE6 users
are generally bad customers - I would expect that they demand more customer
support, are less likely to pay for online services, are more likely to
contribute negatively to communities etc. Of course there are plenty of users
who are stuck on IE6 because of bad corporate IT policy, but there are plenty
who are too lazy or uninformed to upgrade their browser and frankly I don't
want that kind of person as a customer.

~~~
TheTarquin
To be honest, I don't think that the day when "most developers just stop
caring" will actually kill IE6. I work making custom web-based help systems
and most of our clients (who aren't software firms) base their browser support
requirements on market share. We base our browser support requirements on
their requirements. So until fewer people use IE6. As of last month, IE6 still
has 10% of the market share (source:
<http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.asp>).

So many companies won't ditch IE6 until fewer people use it. Of course, the
surest way to get IE6 users to upgrade is for support to die. Thus the IE6
snake of suckitude begins to eat its own tail.

It could well be that it won't be until their hardware dies and they're forced
to get a new computer that a lot of people will upgrade their browser.

~~~
benologist
Getting browser marketshare stats from W3Schools is like getting os
marketshare stats from Ubuntu.com. It's a very specific site with a very
specific audience that is far from representative.

~~~
TheTarquin
Out of curiosity, what's a more reliable or representative source for browser
share information?

Here's a TechCrunch article that actually quotes IE6's browser share at 20% -
[http://techcrunch.com/2010/02/02/internet-explorer-
browser-s...](http://techcrunch.com/2010/02/02/internet-explorer-browser-
share/)

~~~
benologist
Any of the big guys tracking across a huge range of sites is generally
alright, although your own personal stats are what ultimately matters -
depending on who your audience is you might have 99% of your users using a
browser traditionally regarded to have single digit market share.

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modeless
The kind of companies that force their employees to use IE6 will probably
welcome the help in preventing their users from watching YouTube videos.

~~~
grinich
What companies require the use of IE6

~~~
DeusExMachina
Some big companies simply do not want to take the "pain" of upgrades. I'm
working as a consultant now, we are developing a project for a big
international company on Microsoft CRM, that specifically works only with IE.

IE6 causes a lot of problems even with Microsoft technology. Nonetheless this
client do not want to upgrade their browsers. This is not the first time this
happens.

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jackowayed
The placement seems interesting. Chrome in top left, obviously. But Firefox in
the bottom right? Opera in what seems like it should be the 2nd-best position?

My guess is the idea is "surround Chrome with browsers that people like less
and are less familiar with so that they might click through to chrome before
even considering firefox (or IE8)"

~~~
djcapelis
Does anyone know if the placement is actually static? Given that it's Google I
assumed it was randomized placement with statistics tracking so they can A/B
test the various placements just for the fun of it...

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tomlin
On my birthday. How fitting.

~~~
jayair
and a day before mine!

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mynameishere
Didn't look at that post, but youtube is also threatening me because I have FF
2.0. Makes me sad, because it's the best version despite the horrible memory
leaks. Not sure what the problem is. As far as youtube is concerned, the
browser is basically just a flash wrapper.

~~~
briansmith
Isn't this reason enough to stop using it?:

"Firefox 2.0 is no longer supported and the last update, Firefox 2.0.0.20, is
affected by several vulnerabilities fixed in newer versions of the program.
All users are urged to upgrade to the newest version of Firefox."

[http://www.mozilla.org/security/known-
vulnerabilities/firefo...](http://www.mozilla.org/security/known-
vulnerabilities/firefox20.html)

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InclinedPlane
Well, youtube will drop testing their site in IE6, it may still work just fine
(unlikely though).

~~~
there
i have a feeling that they'll be implementing a new feature on march 13th that
is known not to work in ie6.

~~~
InclinedPlane
We can only hope.

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yosho
about time, this should have happened about 3 years ago

