Microsoft's Internet Explorer losing browser share

Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE) web browser, now accounts for less than 60% of the market, down from 95% at its peak in 2003, according to new figures.

Latest statistics, from measurement firm NetApplications, show that IE has 59.9% of the market, with Firefox gaining on it, with 24.5%.

While third-place Google Chrome's 6.7% share of the market looks tiny by comparison it is rising sharply, up from just 1.7% this time last year.

A new version of IE is imminent.

Microsoft has gradually been losing market share, largely due to concerns over security, experts said.

Viable alternatives

Measurement firms tend to agree that IE is losing market share although the percentage share of rival browsers is more hotly contested.

In the UK, research firm Nielsen suggests that IE still commands 70% of the market, with Mozilla's Firefox on 18%. It does not include figures for Apple's Safari.

It still shows a downwards trend for IE, losing 6% of market share since last year.

This could be due to more awareness of rivals, thinks Gartner analyst Jeffrey Mann.

"There are more viable alternatives now. Google has been advertising and there are more people using Macs and Apple's Safari. There is just a great awareness that there are alternatives," he said.

Recently people using version 6 of the browser were advised to find an alternative due to large security holes.

It may shift loyalty away from Microsoft, thinks Gartner analyst Jeffrey Mann.

"There were a lot of people using IE6 and some will have said that if they are going to change, they may as well look at some alternatives," he said.

Microsoft introduced browser choice to European Windows users in March.

This was the result of a ten-year dispute with the European Union over the fairness of IE being installed as the default browser on billions of computers using the Microsoft Windows operating system.

Now customer get the choice of 12 browsers.

But this is unlikely to have affected current market-share figures thinks Mr Mann.

"That is only just beginning to kick in and is likely to have a minor affect overall. It will see some really small browsers getting a lot of prominence," he said.

For rivals to IE it is going to be a "long, slow rise", thinks Mr Mann, as Microsoft remains dominant.

And with the release of version 9 of Internet Explorer, the battle could really hot up.

IE9 promises to support HTML5, the next-generation standard for coding web pages, which aims to reduce the need for software plug-ins, such as Flash.

Apple remains a key rival for Microsoft in the browser market and it has seen its Safari browser gain market share but the two rivals are united when it comes to supporting the HTML5 web standards.

Apple sees HTML5 - along with other technologies such as the h.264 standard for video - as a replacement for Flash and has been involved in a high-profile spat with Flash owners Adobe.

Apple has banned the video standard Flash on many of its products.

BROWSER MARKET SHARE

Continue reading the main story

• Internet Explorer - 59.9%
• Firefox - 24.5%
• Chrome - 6.7%
• Safari - 4.7%
• Opera - 2.3%
• Opera Mini - 0.7%
• Netscape - 0.46%
• Mozilla - 0.16%
• Flock - 0.06%
• Lunascape - 0.04%
• Source: Net Applications

BBC News

Ferrari dismiss tobacco claims as 'ridiculous'

(CNN) -- Ferrari President Luca di Montezemolo has dismissed claims that his team's cars carry subliminal tobacco advertising as "ridiculous".

Reports last week quoted several health professionals as suggesting the red, white and black barcode on Ferrari's Formula One cars and Felipe Massa and Fernando Alonso's overalls were a link to Marlboro cigarettes.

Tobacco advertising in F1 was outlawed in 2005, yet reports claimed a spokesman for the European Public Health Commissioner said the barcode constituted potential subliminal marketing.

The Times newspaper quoted John Britton, a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians, as saying the barcode resembled the lower half of a packet of Marlboro cigarettes, and that it was "creeping branding".

Under a law passed in both Britain and Brussels in 2002, it is an offence for a tobacco company to sponsor a sporting event.

Phillip Morris, the owner of Marlboro cigarettes, is a long-standing sponsor of Ferrari, but Montezemolo has described the stories as "pointless".

He told Ferrari's official Web site: "Frankly, I find this argument completely pointless and it is verging on the ridiculous to claim that the color red or a graphic design which shows a bar code could induce people to smoke.

"At a time when, on the other side of the Atlantic they are fighting to provide a more equal health service, in the old continent of Europe, so called experts are racking their brains to come up with theories that have no scientific basis: I think there are more important matters to think about than a bar code.

"Therefore, it's best not to waste any more time replying to this sort of nonsense or to those who are instrumental in wanting to stoke up the story".

CNN

Mum spits in the face of the man who raped her daughter (12)

A desperate mother lost control in court yesterday as she spat in the face of the man who raped her 12-year-old daughter.

Butcher Stephan F. (28) was sentenced to three years and six months for rape and serious sexual abuse, in a court in Gera, Germany.

The vile incident happened in December 2009 as Stephan F. visited his friend Jana H. (29). Later that night after having been drinking he sneaked into the room where the 12-year-old Melissa was sleeping and abused her, holding her down as she tried to resist.

The butcher claimed that he had merely fallen asleep in the child’s bed, wrapped in the pink bed linen.

As the sentence was read out in court, mother Jana H. stood up silently, went across to her child’s tormentor and spat him hatefully in the face.

Court officials promptly jumped in and escorted the mother out of the room.

Hurt mum Jana H. said: “My daughter feels like shit. She can’t sleep in her room anymore.” The child is now having psychotherapy.

Luckily the mother will not face trouble over the incident, after the rapist’s lawyer said that his client would not be pressing charges.

Bild.com

Dog that killed baby will not be put down

A dog that killed a Cottbus family’s eight-week-old baby will not be put down, a city spokesman said on Tuesday

The Husky-Alsatian mixed breed has behaved completely normally since it killed the baby last month with several bites to the head, he said. Animal experts have reported no heightened aggressiveness towards people or other dogs.

The parents of the baby said via their lawyer that they agreed to put the dog in “responsible hands” after it was determined it did not need to be euthanised.

The attack happened during a garden party after the baby girl had been left in her pram outside while the parent went inside briefly. The dog jumped up and pushed over the pram and bit the baby in the head. She was taken to hospital but died shortly afterwards from head injuries. 

Her parents, aged 37 and 38, could now face charges of negligent manslaughter.

DDP

The Local DEU

Abbas: Mosque fire endangers renewed peace efforts

By NASSER ISHTAYEH (AP)

NABLUS, West Bank — The Palestinian president warned Tuesday that a fire in a West Bank mosque he blamed on extremist Jewish settlers could endanger Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, just before they are set to resume.

A statement from his office said Mahmoud Abbas called the fire a "criminal" act that "represented a threat to the efforts to revive the peace process" because the Israeli army protects the settlers.

The fire ripped through the mosque in the village of Luban a-Sharkiyeh early Tuesday, but by nightfall it was not clear whether it was arson, as Palestinians charged, or accidental, as Israeli media reported.

The incident came as U.S. mediator George Mitchell was working to restart Israeli-Palestinian peace contacts after a halt of more than a year. Mitchell is set to mediate indirect talks toward a peace accord. He plans to start his mission Wednesday by meeting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The mosque fire destroyed holy books and prayer carpets. Although there were no witnesses, Jibril al-Bakri, the Palestinian governor of Nablus, said it was an act of arson.

The mosque has been undergoing renovations, but village mayor Jamal Daraghmeh said there was no fire in the area where the work was taking place. He added that settlers attacked village property in the past.

The Israeli military said it was working with Israeli police and Palestinian authorities to determine the cause of the blaze.

Israeli media reported evidence of an electrical short circuit in the mosque that might have started the fire. Israeli police said evidence was transferred to its forensics unit.

Also Tuesday, residents of the nearby village of Hawara said they saw settlers set fire to an olive grove close to the Jewish settlement of Bracha. The fire there destroyed about 50 trees before Israeli soldiers extinguished the flames.

"About 20 settlers came from the settlement and they set a fire here and then they left," Rida Mustafa, a village resident who said he witnessed the attack, told The Associated Press.

"Every couple of days, they come and cause trouble," Mustafa added.

The military said it did not know how the fire broke out.

Both Hawara and Luban a-Sharkiyeh — located near the town of Nablus — are ringed by settlements.

In another development, the Palestinian government said Tuesday it is determined to stop thousands of Palestinians from working in Israeli settlements, but it won't enforce the ban until the end of the year because of economic hardships.

Setting the date, Economics Minister Hassan Abu Libdeh pledged harsh punishments for working in settlements after the ban takes effect.

"I may not be able to place Palestinian police or a judge at the gates of the settlements, but I think that every single Palestinian working in a settlement is well known to us," he said.

Another part of the law, forbidding sales of products made in settlements, is already in force. However, the ban on Palestinians working in settlements is harder to enforce because of high unemployment.

Palestinians see the more than 120 Israeli settlements dotting the West Bank as an obstacle to their goal of a state and insist that construction there must stop.

However, about 23,000 Palestinians work in the settlements, an important source of income when nearly a quarter of the Palestinian labor force is out of work.

The anti-settlement law, signed last week by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, imposes fines of up to $14,000 and jail time of up to five years on violators.

Associated Press writer Mohammed Daraghmeh contributed to this report from Ramallah, West Bank

Associated Press

Euro market meltdown resumes despite Greek deal

(Reuters) - A renewed selling frenzy gripped euro zone financial markets on Tuesday as concern mounted that a record EU/IMF bailout for Greece would not stop a debt crisis spreading in the single currency area.

Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero dismissed as "complete madness" a market rumour that his country would soon ask for 280 billion euros in aid from the euro area.

The euro sank to a one-year low of beneath $1.31 and the risk premium on Greek, Portuguese and Spanish bonds soared amid jitters about a possible Greek debt restructuring and worries over the fiscal health of other southern European countries.

In Athens, striking public workers challenged Greece's 110 billion euro (97 billion pounds) bailout-for-austerity deal, starting a 48-hour national strike that shut down ministries, tax offices, schools, hospitals and public services.

"There is no faith in what the EU and the IMF have proposed for Greece," said Dean Popplewell, chief currency strategist at OANDA, a foreign exchange brokerage in Toronto.

"Capital markets are betting on a Greek default, as Greece's own populace is not going to accept the terms of this rescue, and contagion is a real concern hurting the euro," he said.

News that Greece has appointed debt restructuring specialists Lazard to provide "general financial advice" fuelled speculation that some form of orderly rescheduling or payment moratorium may be likely, despite vehement official denials.

Finance Minister George Papaconstantinou told Reuters after news of the Lazard hire: "Any form of debt restructuring is out of the question."

Lazard recently advised countries like Argentina, Ecuador and Ivory Coast on sovereign debt restructurings.

"NOT FULLY DOUSED"

The main Greek public sector union, ADEDY, rallied thousands of protesters outside parliament to reject planned wage and pension cuts and demand that the rich foot the bill. Police fired teargas at a small group of protesters who threw rocks and bottles.

"We want an end to the freefall of our living standards," said Spyros Papaspyros, the head of ADEDY, which represents about half a million workers in the Aegean nation of 11 million.

The cost of insuring Portuguese, Spanish and Irish debt against default jumped as contagion worries spread, Markit data showed. Investors sought a safe haven in U.S. Treasury bonds.

Greek bond yield spreads over benchmark German Bunds spiked above 600 basis points for the first time since Sunday's euro zone rescue deal, and Greek bank shares plunged by 10 percent on the worsening economic outlook.

Jitters about whether the emergency loan package would be enough to stem the euro zone's sovereign debt crisis also hammered Spanish stocks.

"This would suggest that contagion fears have not been fully doused, with the Greece rescue terms not allaying fears of states facing similar challenges," Nomura rate strategist Sean Maloney said.

Worries that the aid package may be insufficient to meet Greece's borrowing needs contributed to market concerns.

Economists at several European financial firms calculated those needs to the end of 2012 at 120 billion euros, based on latest IMF and Greek government figures. Germany's Bild daily cited a government estimate of 150 billion euros given to the parliamentary finance committee.

European Commission officials said they expected Athens to be able to return to markets for funding in the second half of 2011 once it had won back credibility by implementing tough reforms.

But that remains a big "if," given the grim economic outlook and the scale of public opposition.

SOCIAL COHESION

Participation in anti-austerity demonstrations has so far been limited to a few tens of thousands, smaller than riots that paralysed Athens in December 2008 following the police killing of a teenager.

But anger is growing, raising questions about whether Prime Minister George Papandreou's socialist government can successfully implement what it has promised.

"These government measures are destroying my life," said Panagiota Katsagani, a 25-year-old part-time school teacher who was marching in Athens on Tuesday. "I was planning my future, now I have to go back and live with my parents".

"Whether Greece can actually adjust, whether their social cohesion will remain -- that's the key thing to watch," said sovereign ratings analyst Tom Byrne of Moody's.

European policymakers kept up a barrage of soothing comment designed to calm markets and reassure voters that the bailout will work.

"The tough decisions made over the past weekend have eased (the problems). We are going in a better direction," European Central Bank Governing Council member Erkki Liikanen told Finnish public broadcaster YLE.

Deutsche Bank CEO Josef Ackermann, who has been spearheading a drive in Germany to get the private sector to participate in the bailout, said fellow German firms Allianz and Munich Re had responded positively.

German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said that Greece may not have to tap the full amount of aid pledged to it because of contributions from the financial sector.

Some newspaper editorials said the bailout was more a rescue for European banks holding Greek debt than one of ordinary Greeks.

Additional reporting by Yoo Choonsik in Tashkent, Gernot Heller and Madeline Chambers in Berlin, Jan Strupczewski in Brussels and Tim Hepher in Paris; writing by Paul Taylor and Noah Barkin; Editing by Charles Dick

Reuters UK