Google’s Chrome-plated strategy

i keep learning about more and more little advantages and quirks with Chrome, such as with privacy, for example… now if only they would take care of it’s cookie management glitches

Is google bothering anyone else? I have been a user for roughly 10 years. I started back when it was little known. Now when I search, it is becoming difficult to get infomational pages. What comes up as the top 1000 links are stuff to buy. In addition, one company will buy dozens of domains, and so all the top hits for a particular product will lead you to the same company. You can choose “A”, or “A”, or for some real variety have a look at “A” – I am looking around for something better.

Privacy, shmivacy. I honestly wonder if all these privacy posts aren’t by Microsoft Strategic Marketing employees doing their job to curb the buzz about Chrome.

People: WHAT do you think Google is going to DO with your site viewing history that will IMPINGE upon YOUR privacy? Hell, sell mine! I couldn’t care less!

Google doesn’t collect or use anything that would affect my personal or public life. Period. Why are you people so concerned? Unbelievable.

It amazes me that so many people are willing to give up their privacy without a second thought. I’m just saying….times have changed.

It’s the fastest browser out but this beta version has still not worked out the bugs for popup Java Applets, JavaScript, and some issues with Flash and Shockwave websites. And only Vista or XP compatible now.

From a tech support view this is one of the best browsers i have ever seen.
From a user perspective they probably wouldn’t notice much difference from any other browser. What is really hurting is the support for business users behind a proxy. That does not work well at all. Then again this is only a BETA version so lets give Google a little room here for improvement.

Wow, a lot of people are all “Google is invading my privacy!!”

1) Don’t download it.
2) This website tracked who referred you to, how long your session is, what you clicked on, and whether or not you’ll be back.
3) Want to talk about Privacy? Why not ask the NSA about the big locked up servers at AT&T.
4) If you think that google is the only one tracking your habits online, you fail, and fail long and hard.

If you’re such a space cadet that the mere notion of anyone spying on you has you spooked, there’s plenty of programs out there to help with that. Firefox addons to control cookies and javascript, peerguardian, firewalls, TOR Onion Routing, various anonymizers, etc. The point is, if you’re going to wear a tinfoil hat, you should have a tinfoil suit too, instead of walking around in your underwear thinking you’re not exposed to the world.

Give it up, if you want something sent privately you have to do it in writing with a private courier called yourself, then burn the letter after.

This browser smacks of Google big brother-ism.
Google is notorious for not only collecting a VAST amount of user information, but also for SHARING it.

Searching for something like “how to build a bomb” on Google will show up in your trial…

Searching for something like Walmart will show up in Wally World memos of which products are searched on Google.

Even if it is Open Sourced, still expect some proprietary code in there to collect data. I give it about 2 weeks before people discover this. Or it’s not implemented in Beta, and waiting for Release 1 or somesuch.

Why get all upset about this? You can use different browsers. No need to get your shorts in a wad over Chrome.
Several browsers are common, and many users switch back and forth all the time.

I installed the browser yesterday and I admit it is much faster than Firefox. I also like the fact that the tabs are independent of one another. There have been plenty of times when I had to totally close Firefox because of a crashed tab. I will have to see what type of third party apps will be available for it in the future.

I’m confused about some of these comments – if a producer wants to track information about its customers, it can and should be able to. people who complain about using these services are more than welcome to use sub-standard products that don’t track.

there’s a reason google has a huge share of the search market – it produces good results. don’t want google to track your queries? use yahoo (if you really are naive enough to think yahoo doesn’t track user searches). better yet, go back to dogpile (if it’s even still around). sure, you won’t find what you’re looking for, but at least you’ll be safe.

yup, just as i suspected – google is taking your information
fine print people!

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10030522-56.html?tag=mncol

By submitting, posting or displaying the content you give Google a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, and non-exclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute any content which you submit, post or display on or through, the services. This license is for the sole purpose of enabling Google to display, distribute and promote the services and may be revoked for certain services as defined in the additional terms of those services.”

I gotta be honest…
chrome still does need a lot of adjustments, I am not talking about the interface itself, but about the app core.
It does nothing but take a lot of brilliant ideas from Mozilla Firefox and a few others from market competitors Safari (Apple) and Opera and put them all together into one big happy family
Let’s talk about ‘incognito’, nothing new there, it’s been in Safari for over two years (it was first introduced in Safari 2.0, april 2005), it’s just that people didn’t notice it, maybe cause it was known by a different name (private browsing), I dunno.
my point is the web does not need an umpteenth browser, cause users already have some pretty good browsers out there, may they be open source or not they are still, pretty good. this is gonna do nothing but confuse the average user even more.
people need solid applications not toys, an app should be tested for quite some time before being released even as a beta

Easily one of the most asinine titles I’ve ever read. A “free” browser? Really?? When is the last time anyone has paid money for a browser? We have a complete newbie writing tech articles for Fortune? This title lends such credibility to your publication….

What a tremendous pile of garbage.

It amazed me they even released something this poor as a beta.

Google is supposed to “do no harm”, yet every thing they do seems to integrate themselves further into our personal lives.

::sigh:: I wonder what Google is doing collecting all that information from us….sorry. While I like google as a search engine…I’m not about to “Google-out” and get everything Google. They are infamous for collecting absurb amounts of data on individuals. While MS already does…I don’t really need another doing the same thing.

I just downloaded both of them.

On the google browser, it is super fast. But I would like to see the toolbar on it. Tested several websites without problem.

IE 8, I still have the toolbar, but some of the websites I visit they can not be displayed.

Also, I noticed on IE 8, that on other websites with tables, images from the center will run over the left side table if image is too big. This does not happens on IE 7, Firefox or netscape. So IE 8 still have some fixing to do.

do you think that Microsoft is not collecting personal info? The end result is that the experience is better and quicker and Google Chrome is just that… I have been using it for 24 hours and I am very impressed…

I hope they make an OS, Exchange and Office competitor as well and take some $$$ away from Microsoft… I know that it will be a better product than anything Microsoft puts out…

Just spent 20 minutes on a 1/4 T1 backbone trying out IE8 by hitting sits I don’t visit (to give it a chance to deal with stuff that’s not in the cache), and then did the same with Chrome. Chrome was faster, though IE8 is pretty quick. If you’re getting a javascript/Flashplayer error when you try and view embedded video, go to the Chrome page and then the “Learn About Chrome” link, and you should be presented an opportunity to install the plug-in. Works fine after that.

Another interesting difference. I went to CBS.com and tried to navigate to some of the “Show” menu links. Spent several minutes trying to get the pop-up menu to stay in place while I navigated down to the show I wanted to look up, but the menu kept dissappearing. Shut down IE8, went to Chrome, and it worked as it was supposed to, w/o flaw.

If you have the time, take 10-15 minutes and read through the “comic book” about Chrome. Despite all the name-calling, fear-mongering, and other snarky comments, Chrome is a serious competitor. It hasn’t got the “little person working from their garage takes on the corporate giants” appeal (needed a soccer mom from Alaska to develop it, I guess). So it’s not going to be a complete media darling.

As a beta it does the job well, it does several things better, and it’s free open source. Watch out! Chrome is moving in to stay, folks.

While I’m all for competition in the marketplace, I would have preferred Google invest in Mozilla Firefox. As someone who cannot bear using IE and much prefers the innovation and flexibility found in Firefox, it’d be nice to have the chrome features Google is touing in Chrome available as an extension, or core component, of Firefox. In the end, such splintering of the open source browser market will only benefit MSFT, at least in the short-to-mid term, assuming Chrome garners a sort of critical mass along the lines of Firefox. And that’s the point: Firefox took years to mature into the viable (and arguably) superior competitor it is today…given Google’s intentions to preserve its search dominance, is their approach supportive of their objectives? Time will tell.

It is high time that Microsoft is dislodged from its unmerited dominance. This is a good first step – offering an alternate browser that is bound to evolve faster than IE.
At first glance, Chrome looks simplistic, and I for one like a more cluttered, techy dashboard. However, I am willing to give Google the benefit of the doubt, and I will see how Chrome performs under “stress”.

I downloaded Chrome last night. Within 15 minutes I got rid of Internet Explorer and made Chrome my default. It’s fast and robust. Great human factors. Google wins again!

I love what all the features of Chrome thus far. I love open source programs and appreciate all the work that is being done to bring open source programs to us for our benefit and to improve the internet.

Why shouldn’t Google or Firefox get something back for their investment? They have provided a useful service at cost to themselves and if its useful they should be able to benefit. Microsoft is not giving anything away. And if left to MS alone we would not have all the improvements that we have seen.

As to privacy, in this day and age you have to assume someone is watching even if it only be the govt. Why would you even trust an option to alledgedly stop any kind of tracking? If someone wants info bad enough they are going to get it. Its as simple as that. Whether on the internet or phone or via snail mail I always assume someone is going to see it and if we’re that concerned about it then we need to stop giving out info that we think will compromise ourselves. Otherwise be safe, be smart and enjoy the technological advances and I’ll see you on the web!

Yes, IE comes preinstalled on PCs and has over 70% of the market.

I think people fail to understand that about 70% of computer users don’t know how to do much more than email and browse, and have no idea what the difference between any browser is.

Irritating when it’s pointed out that IE dominates the market as if people are consciously choosing it because they care.

As a computer novice (I can hold my own, but am no programmer or whiz kid on new apps, etc.), I’m curious about all of the comments regarding the collection of our private data, whether it’s through Chrome or IE, etc. Can someone fill me in here? Are we talking demographics, identity theft, stealing billing info when purchasing an item, or what?

If someone would take the time to answer this “internet-dummy’s” questions about privacy, that would be SOO COOL!!!!!!!!

TIA,
Bren

Considering the only thing that crashes on my PC anymore at all is the stupid browser, go Chrome! Just last night firefox crashed like 10 times, given it restores the pages but you can’t restore them independently so until I figured out which one was crashing it just crashed again. I’m not even going there with IE because the day IE works properly the world as we know it will no longer exist. I tried Chrome out last night. It was smooth and worked well alongside my games so I could tab out without a long load. If google wants to know where I surf, so be it. They can have it, as long as I get a browser that works.
Oh and why is it so bad that for once someone created a simpler program that works? Too used to Microsoft telling you bells and whistles are better? Guess what… bells and whistles CRASH and TAKE FOREVER TO LOAD.

Yes. It fasted browser, but his face is very bad. Google in FireBox… Yahoo forewer….

I am sold on chrome. It is stable, ultra fast, and will help break Redmond’s monopoly, which put so many smaller innovative companies out of business.

Chrome is a tremendous first attempt, and will mature quickly. If Google wants to track my browsing habits, well what’s new about that?

Google should come up with an OS as well, and let the fun and games truly begin.

Google should “buy” Firefox and rename it Chrome? Man, some people have no grasp of the concept of open source software whatsoever.

Installed and uninstalled Chrome yesterday. Now IE7 does not work !
Have Google left something behind to sabotage IE ?

I have tried the new google browser and its very fast.Google collects data but are they really better protects
as Microsoft.

sorry for the bad english,but i am from germany =)

I am a little dismayed at the ignorance displayed in regards to Google Chrome. First off, in regards to data collection, Google has been doing that for years now; heck I remember when the whole thing came down when Gmail was first released. Off course Google collects statistics – what do you think Firefox, Opera, Safari, and Internet Explorer do under the hood? You think you can turn it off – guess what, they still collect!

Secondly, yes, this is a beta, but for a beta, it’s darn good. Simple to use, minimalistic like Google’s other products, fast to start, fast to load pages, and some neat features you have in other browsers unless you download and install plugins.

Thirdly, Adobe Flash – just download the Adobe Shockwave Flash player for Firefox, etc., and install it – YouTube and any other site using Flash works just fine.

Bottom line is, every browser when it first came out; Internet Explorer, Opera, Safari, and yes even the toted ‘holy grail’ FireFox had issues. They grew, and now they are pretty much a personal choice now. It’s all how you want to experience the web. Google Chrome is a BETA – and it will grow as well and has the potential to be a really slick browser raising the bar.

So before you make comments on the browser, understand these facts mentioned, evaluate what you WERE going to say, then give Google Chrome a FAIR overview – good bad or indifferent.

Good Job Google – Keep Up the Great Work!

The technology behind Chrome is long overdue. That they are delivering it speaks volumes of their ability to innovate and take advantage of their resources. Microsoft should take a clue from the example. But they are entrenched, instead. In what, I’ll leave to your imagination.

Google is following a natural evolution of applied technology and intelligent business operations. For that, they have my respect.

Wow I have just started using Google Chrome and I must say I am impressed. It’s super fast. Loads everything quicker than I have seen. Looks cool as well as very easy to use. Love the recently viewed page as soon as you open the new tab. Address bar I think somewhat took Firefox 3’s approach of showing quick history as you type the web address in.

Ask yourself…why is Google spending all this money and effort? To make the world a better place? This browser exists solely to allow Google to collect even more of your personal data.

Would you hand over all your personal records to any other private corporation? If not, then why are you giving your information to Google for free?

If you think Google isn’t interested in your data, then it’s a fair bet that you don’t have a basic understanding of things like the Internet and capitalism.

There are some serious google-ass kissing fanboys in here.
This browser is not even beta quality, if any other company released this they would have been laughed out.

youtube videos dont work – this was funny as hell to me

Chrome is aimed at the Zombie cool think-they-be that gag on Google.

Befor Internet Explorer 8 is released and users realize the value and convenience of swatting away Google’s privacy bugs; Google wants to permanently implant the bug on the naive’s machine.

Go for it suckers.

So, now you Can’t disable the web trace feature in the new Google browser like you can in Safari, IE and with FF plugins….

If Google rules the browser space, they can direct you to sites they want….

mmmmm…. shades of big brother.

Why would I leave IE?

I like my spyware being compatible with my browser.

“I wonder if Google is capturing messages, queries, etc. regarding competitors products to use in designing their own?”

If they were doing anything underhanded we’d find out very quickly, since you can’t hide anything in open source code. Worry more about a proprietary program like IE.

Why is it all right for Google to couch its vertical integration of the web experience under their sole platform by stating that it will ‘make it simpler’ for users to navigate the Internet? I do realize that privacy has long been compromised whenever someone accesses the Net but, do we always have to compromise more of it for purported ease of use? Google is turning out more like a “Big Brother”.

“As a web designer, it’s bad enough we have to design for IE and Firefox and a few others, and now there’s to be another? I know this designer won’t be designing for Google browser. Lets see if Google is really doing this to collect your surfing data because in the end, its really about the marketing bucks — hence doubleclick. I urge all to not support Google’s project.
Posted By Joey Ry, Vancouver, BC : September 2, 2008 6:41 pm”

Joey, as long as developers bow to kiss M$’s ring, you will have the present problem. Solution: CODE YOUR PAGES TO THE STANDARD. If your IE users cannot make full use of your pages, kindly direct them to a standards-compliant browser and they will be happier in the long run anyhow. Put the blame where it belongs; if someone complains about your standards-compliant page, TELL them that IE is incorrectly interpreting a standard command and that the only solution is to change browsers. Even dim-witted twits can install Firefox or Safari (even me!). After a while, M$ might get the idea … or maybe not. One caveat: M$ has re-coded their server products. If one’s company has bought into certain configurations of M$ servers and WAN domain structures, their users will only be able to log on to their corporate system with IE since M$ has embedded some hidden code into their server/browser programs to ensure that IE is required to log in. Anyone teaming up with this kind of monopoly better expect to be on the slipper slope.

The Google Chrome browser is simply awesome. It stays out of my way and is blazingly fast.

My only complaint is the lack of a full complement of plug-ins for the browser. But hey, its only been out one day so far; expect this to be resolved soon . . ..

Using it now. I would say its almost flawless; fast, opens immediately, seamless, clutter free. The only thing that’s missing is an “Open Previously Closed Tabs” option. It might be there but I haven’t seen it yet.

The only problem I’ve run into so far is it doesn’t like Adobe Shock Wave. It seems to look like a cross between Safari and IE8. Not much for originality in style but the speed is much faster then all others.

From the Eula :
“By submitting, posting or displaying the content you give Google a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, and non-exclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute any content which you submit, post or display on or through, the services. This license is for the sole purpose of enabling Google to display, distribute and promote the services and may be revoked for certain services as defined in the additional terms of those services.”

Lets see. New IE8 with privacy mode or “you will be asimilated” Hmmmmm.

Of course, Google should be trusted with my bank account numbers, and well, really complete access to my computer, right?

Being all around google fans, we’re anxious for the Mac version to be developed. Soon they’ll pick up our new website at Caffection.

HO-ly SMOKES! It screams. I’ve been trying IE8 for a while, and it locked up and crashed about twice a day. Haven’t used this for long yet, but it is fast-Fast-FAST. I’ll keep IE8 installed for a while, but it already looks likely I might uninstall IE (as well as FF, Safari, and any other browser currently wasting space on my hard drive).

Now that I’ve got the flash player plugin fixed, it’s great…and it’s only the BETA. Sha-ZAM!

With the overall and detailed approach to Chrome, the Google war chest funding base, and the Google organization behind it, this beta bodes very ill for Google competitors.

Move over FF, Safari, and the rest. There’s a new soon-to-be-big-dog on the browser block.

I can’r help but feel it’s big brother creeping into my PC. Google is well know for tracking everything and everyone. Who know who there are sharing that info with. Maybe a browser, maybe a spy, maybe I’m nuts!

There is a reason why this browser is now labeled beta. I’m loving it already, the nerd stats and other renovated features.

Follow up re javascript/flash player error when trying to run YouTube videos. Go to the Google Chrome page, click on the link to “Learn About Google Chrome” and on the next page if you get an update prompt, install the plugin. Did that, now it works for YouTube. Don’t know why they didn’t make it easy to do from the Chrome interface, but I guess that’s betaware for you…

There are many things to like about this especially if you are a hacker. I think it is interesting, but I would stay away from this with anything important. It also looks like Google is looking for a way to get people to do the jobs of their current employees for free. Please don’t make addons and apps for them unless you work for them. Also it is about time someone says that the addons they have made for other browsers constantly crashed or stopped working. I hope they can pull off this browser better than addons they have made. Chrome is cool but needs some time to develop and makes it easy for you to get hacked if you don’t know what you are doing. It’s made to run fast on Java! that cool because most things on the web are Java but as for other things they may take longer than f-fox and nothings slower than IE. I think it’s cool for anyone trying to learn about how browsers work.

Further, it is based on webkit, so if you’re supporting Safari, you’re supporting GC

Facebook won’t even load in it.

Lameo…

I see little advantage to switching to it from Firefox. Unless they tightly integrate support for Google Apps, shared bookmarks, etc., I don’t see another reason to have another browser that essentially does the same thing. And the dilemma for them is if they do in fact integrate their own google products, then of course people wille accuse them of being too powerful (which they are!)

Interestingly, when you try to visit YouTube and run a video there (Google’s subsidiary), you get a flash player error and a dead link to fix it. Sort of a major oops on Google’s part, don’tcha thnk?

What isn’t mentioned here, and one of the more exciting aspects of the Chrome (at least, by my understanding), is the way that online apps are handled. Whereas other browsers simply interpret javascript as an integrated aspect of the web page, Chrome has a seperate module that compiles the script as machine code that it then runs as a seperate process. What this means is that the traditional barriers between web apps and native apps can be broken down. This is the first step towards doing away with the conventional OS as we know it.

Chrome even has a built-in Task Manager… It might look simple on the outside, but under the hood there is some serious stuff brewing.

love it!!!!

It’s a total killer. Forget everybody who says FF/IE.

Google funds FF. It can and will muster the plugin developers. All a regular user cares about is speed and stability. GC delivers on both.

Omnibox? The company that set the standard for creativity and innovation can’t come up with any better name? Exactly why do we need this Omnibox anyway? The search box and URL box are side by side in Firefox and frankly it is not that mentally or physically challenging to click in one as opposed to the other depending on the results one desires. The toilet and sink in my bathroom are side by side and you certainly won’t see my trying to merge the two into an Omniplumb.

Well, that was disappointing. Maybe if you were John McCain and had never experienced the internet before, an overly simplified browser like Chrome might be good. But for anyone that’s been online for more than a few days… Chrome looks cheap (like a plain-wrap store brand) and offers nothing.

SCT wrote: “would NOT even give ME the option of importing my bookmarks from Firefox, which has been my default browser for several years ”

Huh?

Maybe you should try “Import Bookmarks and Settings” under tools (the wrench)..

Chrome is much faster than Mozilla (forget about IE). I love the clean interface. It runs smoother. If a tab crashes, then the whole browser doesn’t crash.

Adios Firefox, just as I said adios to Netscape prior. Google has taken over the browser market.

YIKES!
It’s only a beta. Give the open source community a month and please ditch the tin foil hats!!

I wonder if Google is capturing messages, queries, etc. regarding competitors products to use in designing their own?
Since they allowed their search engine to carry a virus last year I don’t trust them.

I love it so far, just dl’d it about 20 minutes ago and its already becoming my browser of choice. Firefox will always have a home on my PC though as well.

I’ve been developing for the internet since it became public in 1992 and one important fact seems to escape everyone… standards… in particular, Microsoft’s inability or unwillingness to adhere to them.

The weakest browser in the world is Internet Explorer. It is the bane, horror, and worst nightmare of every developer out there… unfortunately, it is the most common browser out there. So, if you have to develop cross platform web technology then you have to accommodate the worst browser on the shelf and that promises to remain, for a long time… Explorer.

That, my friends, is the very sad reason no new browser technology is going to matter.

The ignorant masses keep IE dominant. It’s the same crowd that still gets excited over screensavers and animated GIFs, aka, my in-laws. Google Chrome seems extremely streamlined and incredibly fast. For those of you worried about “your data,” I’m afraid online privacy has been compromised for quite some time. If you’re concerned about Google, I’d suggest you revert to something more trustworthy, like newspapers. The web just isn’t for you.

Its pretty good so far. All it really needs in my opinion is an app to block ads and it will be more useful to me than Firefox.

I’m very excited for this because I am not 100% satistied with Safari, Firefox, or IE. They all crash and have issues. I’ll have to wait for the Mac version though.

As a web designer, it’s bad enough we have to design for IE and Firefox and a few others, and now there’s to be another? I know this designer won’t be designing for Google browser. Lets see if Google is really doing this to collect your surfing data because in the end, its really about the marketing bucks — hence doubleclick. I urge all to not support Google’s project.

Has anyone actually here used the browser before they have bashed it? First of all, the browser is amazing, it has all the simple features you might need, and the complexity should you want it. I’ve been having problems with my school email not allowing me to view emails, it kept asking me to login again to access, and I had the same problem with Firefox, but now that I’m using Chrome, the email worked fine.

I love Control+B, simply amazing. I think Chrome has the ability to surpass Internet Explorer, and I think it’ll do so rapidly. Some of the negative things might be true, I’m sure easily of it, but as far as I’m concerned, even in Beta testing, Google Chrome outshines Microsoft Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox.

“Show saved passwords – SHOWS ACTUAL PASSWORDS”
You can do the same thing in Firefox. You have to find it, but think about it. If you had your passwords saved, they can login on your computer anyway.

“Just what we need – another browser to support – and not even a good one”
Guess you didn’t see the small ‘beta’ under the logo. It’s far from being a complete browser experience. No themes, no non-Google apps (yet). And I have been testing it and there have been no Google ads in odd places at all. A lot things Google does isn’t directly business-driven.

It’s a good base, as they have said on their sites. Now it is up to both Google and the community to build upon it. And I tell you, things are FAST. But definitely not enough in Chrome to replace Firefox yet.

Google world. Get the browser and Google will take care of everything you need on the world wide web. Trust them to protect. Never mind their desire to control every aspect of the online experience. Watch out WalMart, Google bought DoubleClick and will be coming to a Chinesee manufacturer soon….

It sure is fast! EnterpriseWizard CRM runs about 20% faster under Chrome than it does under Safari, Mozilla or IE.

Seems to be the fastest Javascript implementation out there.

BAD. Underdeveloped even for a BETA – they should have waited to release this.

Ugly, also – really ugly.

If you want simply a “bookmark” button on the toolbar you can’t do it (you must use their “Bookmark Bar”) – would NOT even give ME the option of importing my bookmarks from Firefox, which has been my default browser for several years –

Give me Firefox any day…I really do believe this is SOME kind of joke Google is trying to pull – I just don’t get the punch-line.

Actually, the “omni box” feature doesn’t work quite that way in Firefox 3. What it does is do a search (presumably via Google) for whatever you type in the address bar and present the web page that was first returned in the search.

For example: “saber-toothed tiger” typed in the URL box returned the Wikipedia entry. “Crossfade cold lyrics” produced the appropriate page at lyrics007.com. A Google search for these two terms confirmed that Wikipedia and lyrics007.com were the first search entries displayed.

I point out that this feature doesn’t work too well if you’re behind a web proxy that blocks pages by their content tags. Some song lyrics pages can be accessed from behind my proxy, others cannot. This possibility lessens or even negates the usefulness of Firefox’s “omni-box” like feature.

Under Options, Minor Tweaks tab, Show saved passwords – SHOWS ACTUAL PASSWORDS – INCLUDING YOUR WINDOWS NETWORK PASSWORD – YIKES … A support technician can steal boss’ password – just like that.

I wouldn’t trust anything Google puts out anymore. All their free products are used to gather information on you and your web surfing habits.

Easy to import settings from Firefox. It seems faster to me, although another friend mentioned only the pictures load quicker. It might explain why it seems much faster on an older computer. I am running Vista and have had no problems at all. The interface though will take a bit to get use to. So far I like it but time will tell.

Indeed, Firefox did not combine the address and search windows, however, typing the same words in the address bar will render identical results to those generated by its search window. Their address window is a search window, too. Nothing new from Google’s browser really, other than its Java shortcomings and reliance on IE’s settings.

Google really is a big sinner nowadays

Just what we need – another browser to support – and not even a good one – rather a shaky patchy effort

Given that a business model has nothing to gain from a free browser you have to wonder when the google adverts will start appearing all over it

Alternatively will the other google viruses (they call them toolbars and applications) get forced into our machines too now?

crazy idea – ill defined purpose – ego trip for google

Functionally, I have reported two problems already (within an hour). Speed is good. However, esthetically, ACK, The blue shades in the tool bar are mundane, the icon should have a chrome finish of some sorts, presently, it resembles a swirled Windows logo. With the anticipation of this product, the interface should be Electric, a statement, something appealing, this product is blah. It looks amatuerish at best.

Actually the first to do this wasn’t Google, or Firefox. Maxthon did the combined search bar a very long time ago.

it is just another way they can monitor what to sell you …

To those who said it wasn’t faster, I’ve had a very different experience. Here’s my unscientific experiment:

I compared Chrome to both IE7 and Firefox…both of which can take upwards of 10 seconds to load from the Start menu. In comparison, Chrome opened to my home page in roughly one second.

Then I tried cnn.com
IE took roughly ten seconds
Firefox took roughly six seconds
Chrome took one second.

I am using my company supplied XP laptop, which is nearing five years old. Perhaps the difference is less noticeable on newer hardware?

I’ve been using Firefox for years and I like Chrome’s memory model a LOT more. It appears to be much, much faster than Firefox 3.

I’m not into customizing my browser much, so I can’t address those concerns. I think I’ll be using Chrome as my default browser for a few weeks to give it a shot.

Tried out the chrome.

Visually it’s not too impressive but that’s good. Simplicity first.

The javascript engine is pretty impressive. I have an ajax app I created that runs at least 5 times faster on chrome.

Unfortunately, chrome’s pointer system needs some work. My application is very javascript intensive. On chrome I noticed an instance where the variables are pointing to the wrong object. Tish tish!

The product is promissing. Get it working and I’ll give it a little more respect.

Dale – It does not remove the shortcuts from the start menu, it removes access to the component. IE6 is an imbedded part of XP, which is why it is not removed in the traditional way. However, when you remove “the shortcuts from the start menu”, you will find that you (nor the OS) have no more access to the browser. Furthermore, when you attempt to reinstall IE6, unless your i386 folder is on your C:, its going to ask you for the disk.

Lastly, none of this matters. This all began as a comment way down at the bottom of this thread meant to show that Microsoft is forcing users to choose IE6 by not allowing us to uninstall it. Not only can it be uninstalled, it also does not in any way force us to use it.

Google’s new browser ROCKS! I just downloaded it and it is one of the fastest browsers I ever used. I also love the streamlined features, such as the omni bar and the bookmarks. I think google is headed in the right direction and I can not wait for the real version to be realsed. Until then, I plan to keep the beta and keep using it as it gets better and better. Thanks google!!

http://www.opera.com/products/desktop/

All this new-Google-browser-Chrome sounds like one more cross-browsing compatibility issue to me with the added benefit of tainted search results based on anything you ever searched for in the past – browsed the Google way !!!

Using Chrome at the moment. It’s pitifully slow to render pages and what’s worse, it lets ads show.

shockwave is not supported.

I’m really curious how companies are making any money from browsers. There are no ads built in and we don’t have to pay for them. Is it the ability to track websites or money from develpers.

Since we can get all of them for free, I don’t understand why Google or Microsoft would care about which browser we use.

I wondered this back when Netscape and Microsoft were going at it back in the day. I must be missing something.

The article is incorrect – a “combined” search and address bar was first available in Firefox 3.

Firefox’s address bar is just as smart as Chrome’s. Try it. You can search Google, bookmarks and history by typing keywords into the Firefox address bar.

Firefox ALSO has a search box, which is redundant and easily hidden. It was left there because people were used to its presence in older versions of the browser.

i better stick to the most famous, multi-platform, proven and fastest WebKit based Browser in the world…. Apple Safari…

Andy, all the add/remove applet does, and I’m quoting here, “Adds or Removes access to Internet Explorer from the Start menu and Desktop”. In other words, it deletes the shortcuts. It does NOT uninstall IE.

Installed it, tried it, uninstalled it. Yes, it was faster than IE, but it was far less customizable. Also, several links I use routinely for work were clickable, but went nowhere. When it’s a bit more mature, I’ll give it another shot.

Some people will point to the fact that this is a “Beta” release and therefore isn’t indicative of Google’s true programming prowress. However, the rest of us should remind such people that ALL of Google’s services tend to be in “Beta” for absormally long periods of time. — We don’t fall for that anymore.

Be very afraid of this “free” Google browser! Google distributed another free product to enhance your surfing experience called Google Web Accelerator. It was supposed to accelerate your web surfing, but what it actually did was redirect your browser to their proxy servers so they could capture every web page you browsed and sell that information. It did this by changing your browser settings without your permission to point to their proxy server’s IP address, and it is virtually impossible to undo (and they offer no uninstall routine for their software). This was a serious security vulnerability because Google cached all your web traffic including passwords, credit card numbers, everything. And the accelerator function ceased to work when their proxy servers became overloaded, and eventually crashed your browser. They withdrew the product after it was revealed it had security flaws (http://news.cnet.com/2100-1032_3-5700776.html), but I would be surprised if this new Chrome browser doesn’t do something similar under the covers. If you value your privacy, wait until the security community weighs in on this before downloading it. Anybody who believes “buyer beware” doesn’t apply to free products better think again!

“Omni box”? Netscape and IE have for years allowed you to type a query into the address bar and have search results returned. Nothing new there except that it wasn’t immediately apparent unless you mistakenly typed in the wrong spot. Since IE4 you could type “find [bla]” in the address bar.

I didn’t expect these responses. Chrome is way faster than IE7 and Firefox for me. I mean *way* faster. I think Google could take some serious market share with this browser.

Lots of software runs a script during uninstallation that pops up a browser window asking why you are uninstalling their software. They just want to know what you thought of it. And report you to the Department of Homeland Security for your obvious communist tendencies. No need for alarm.

“At first glance, Chrome doesn’t look all that different from Mozilla’s Firefox, a competing web browser. But unlike Firefox, Chrome combined the address and search boxes to let people search for information and websites by entering keywords into the same bar.”

The first version of Firefox had this capability, it was removed in the 2nd version and brought back in the most recently released version 3. I used this feature daily.

I am now using beta Chrome in Vista and must say that it’s better than Firefox (in Vista (faster)) and better than IE.

Yah I’m sticking with Firefox too. I upgraded to IE7 for S&G for those rare occassions I need to use it; it is horribly slower than Fox. It can’t seem to get out of its own way. I even have my TCP/IP settings tweaked/optimized (a nice add-on for Firefox btw). I am forced to use IE6 at work. Ugh no tabs how do I survive. I’m glad Google did this. It just means Mozilla will answer with an even better product. I do like the idea of them offering an OS to bad NOTHING out there would support it.

For those of you seaking to remove IE from windows are sadly on a failing mission. The courts tried to and even they failed. Why? Because IE is embedded into the OS. Everything MS does gets embedded so that there is not a way to remove it.

MS takes what they want and the new OS swallows it whole. Just like with MS’s “new” search features in Vista.

Like to see you try to remove the search function from your OS. You can’t; just as you can not remove the browser.

Window’s explorer is powered by the IE engine.

And let me guess, the only search engine you can get to from the address bar is Google? This sounds like a totally Microsoft move… Wasn’t one of the anticompetitive things microsoft did trying to force ie user to search with msn? What privacy features does Chrome have?

From reading some of the comments the readers are saying it is slower. That definately is not what I am seeing.

From what I have seen with the hour or so that I have used the browser is that it is much, much faster than IE. I use all the browsers and this one just seems much faster in rendering pages.

-Al

I just uninstalled Chrome from my computer. Google already knows that I uninstalled it. It asks me why I am uninstalling Chrome. That’s scary. Expect NO privacy when using Chrome.

Great. What other company can you think of that is always trying to dominate the market share and in it’s greed creates an inferior product?

Is Google the new Microsoft?

I mean, it is unparalleled search engine. Google stood for web progress, what are they doing?

And seriously, all of those described features just sound like stuff that Firefox can do in its sleep – stand alone and via add-ons.

I’m sticking with Firefox, which I really like. The last thing in the world I want is another software monopoly.

I have never found Firefox to be very stable; many people seem to claim its the bee’s knees, but i’ve had IE handle heavy multitasking (opening, downloading, clicking, and spawning new windows and tabs) such as what I have to do when searching scientific journals, than firefox has ever been; under these conditions, firefox has crashed nearly every time while IE allows me to do what i want.

I’d love a browser that is more stable, streamlined, and lighter on system resources.

Yes firefox definitely lets you search from the address bar and has so for a while. No need for an OMNIBOX.

I downloaded Chrome and used it.

I am really disappointed with this new browser.

Microsoft IE 7 or 8 Beta and Mozilla Firefox v3 are far superior than this unappealing browser. In their conference, Google touted their browser to be faster, but Apple Safari and Firefox is actually faster in loading both static and dynamic contents.

What a bust for such a big hype of a press conference! Google should stick to enhancing Web Search and Web Ads. Do more videos instead of creating a brownser in-house. Better yet, just buy Firefox and re-label it as Chrome.

This is the most useless and insignificant investment Google made. It would have been cheaper and more innovative to use Firefox as their platform.

You can uninstall IE6 from the Add/Remove Windows Componants section of the Add/Remove Software part of the Control Panel. Simply open add/remove components, take the checkmark out of Internet Explorer, and press next.

Great yet another browser that website developers have to support. Frankly, Mozilla, IE, Opera, and Safari are enough we don’t need still more browsers – I would never use this tool. The added functionality is trivial and we already have well developed options.

How is that uninstalling IE. When at the end of the instructions it says clearly says “After you uninstall Internet Explorer 7, double-click the Internet Explorer icon to verify that Internet Explorer 6 is restored.”

“respects their personal choices about how they want to browse” – you cannot uninstall IE.
Posted By Henry, Corvallis, Oregon : September 2, 2008 2:58 pm

Yes you can.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/927177
Posted By Grady, Portland, OR : September 2, 2008 3:18 pm

For those already “testing” and complaining about this and that, please remember this is a BETA version and not the final product.

Hey brainiac, the Knoweledge Base you linked only restores IE 7 to version 6. It does not remove IE from your computer. There is no easy way to remove IE from Windows.

ah! just what the world needs.

web designers have enough work trying to get webpages to render correctly.

cant google just suggest the improvements to firefox?

Although I do use Google for my search engine, I would be extremely weary of using a full-on browser from Google as I am sure it’s loaded with spyware built into the software. Let’s not forget that Google has publically acknowledged that their “Google Toolbar” actively opens up your microphone on your computer and uses voice recognition software to listen to keywords so they can fine tune their advertising to you. Just imagine what using their webbrowser could do… Maybe look at your bank account whenever you have it open so they can see where you are shopping? Save all of your browing history so they can create a full profile on you so their paid advertisers can send things to your home?

doesnt the new firefox allow you to search from the address bar?

Yes you can uninstall IE7, just have have IE6 restored.

SUMMARY
This article describes how to uninstall Windows Internet Explorer 7 in Microsoft Windows XP and in Microsoft Windows Server 2003. It also describes that Microsoft Internet Explorer 6 is restored after Internet Explorer 7 is uninstalled.

I like this idea, fire fox is good but I still find ie more stable, and in ie you can also type in a randome search in the url bar and it will come up with search resaults, nothing new. I’m hopeing this turns out good.

Given the choice between the new privacy in IE 8 and a browser that specializes in targeted marketing, I’ll choose privacy. Personally I’m tired of things on the net trying to sell me stuff.

Google got it wrong this time.

No, you cannot. You can “remove” IE7 by following the instructions listed but then you are left with IE6.

From the article…Other Chrome features include movable “tabs” and an “incognito” window that lets users browse without saving their search history (which bloggers have already nicknamed the “porn mode”).

That is accept Google themselves, the EULA allows them to use any of your submissions to their own benefit, tracking, marketing, etc.

Way to go Google?

i’m testing it out now.

the scroll wheel only goes down, not up.

there is no option for “smooth scrolling”, it goes by steps which is highly irritating.

cnn.com does not display properly.

i guess even google can’t get things perfect the first time out.

No you can’t.

That Microsoft support stage just reverts IE7 to IE6 on pre-Vista machines. You can’t make IE go away entirely.

There is a download link now on Google’s homepage or maybe this direct url will work (http://www.google.com/chrome/index.html?hl=en&brand=CHMG&utm_source=en-hpp&utm_medium=hpp&utm_campaign=en )

Using it right now. It’s pretty cool, and super fast at rendering. To B Kimbell’s comment, it also has an “incognito mode”

I’m using it now and so far it seems to be very stable and user friendly, download it at http://www.google.com/chrome

“respects their personal choices about how they want to browse” – you cannot uninstall IE.
Posted By Henry, Corvallis, Oregon : September 2, 2008 2:58 pm

Yes you can.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/927177

You’re an idiot, Ray.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Google integrates it’s spreadsheet and document capabilities into Chrome, thus turning Chrome into the all-in-one office suite.

that quote from the microsoft spokesperson is so laughable. “people like IE because it does all these basic things web browsers are suppose to .. blah blah ignore that we’re losing market share to firefox and that we’re riding off the fact that computer illiterate people don’t realize they can switch to something other than IE…”

Hmmm… Microsoft touts Internet Explorer 8 will allow anonymous browsing so companies (like Google)cannot collect personal data from your searches and browsing of the internet, so Google releases their own browser. Suspicious behavior from Google here folks.

It’s available for download at http://www.google.com/chrome

Google revenue comes from advertising and tracking users behaviours to provide context and targetted advertising. Google makes the vast majority of their revenues this way.
The new browsers are about to offer highly secure browsing (IE 8’s privacy mode) which will seriously compromise Google’s value.

It would seem a smart move to protect your revenue stream (based on monitoring and deliverign advertising) to own the browser. Let’s see if they can make this their first truely successful client based product (search bar aside).

According to the article above, it became available today.

All this for software that is given away for free. I don’t get it.

“respects their personal choices about how they want to browse” – you cannot uninstall IE.

I find it funny that they claim IE is superior based on the statistics, showing IE the more popular browser. the truth of the matter is that it only has the majority because IE comes pre-installed and that the vast majority of average joes are unaware or too lazy to upgrade to the superior browser…firefox.

I must have been under a rock to not know Google was developing a browser. So is it available yet?!